linux on usb flash drive

[ScottieG]

i remember reading a review not to long ago of the distros and a how-to guide on linux distros that fit on a usb flash drive. I can't find that review anywhere and yes i've tried google, does anyone remember reading something like that and you can link me plz

[Si Veteran]

Don't know exactly what you read, but I have Feather Linux runnning a treat on my flash drive (Y)

Grab it here: http://featherlinux.berlios.de

Install guide is here: http://featherlinux.berlios.de/usb-instructions.htm

You may need this to make your flash drive bootable (it works with non-hp drives): http://h18007.www1.hp.com/support/files/hp...load/20306.html

[markwolfe Veteran]

And DamnSmallLinux offers their distro set up on USB drive.

http://www.damnsmalllinux.org/usb.html

There are HOWTOs available for doing this yourself, too, if you wanted to.

[ScottieG]

with all these distros can you have the standard window managers like gnome? and... how good is a usb drive i just bought one on black friday a 1 gig for 60 bucks. I'm going to use it for home and other computers, how do the drivers work for the systems, do you have to reconfig it to each computer you hook it up to?

[Si Veteran]

If you have a 1gb drive you could fit the entire knoppix distro on there (awesome! :woot:)

Here's a guide to making it usb friendly: http://rz-obrian.rz.uni-karlsruhe.de/knoppix-usb/

[markwolfe Veteran]

with all these distros can you have the standard window managers like gnome?  and... how good is a usb drive i just bought one on black friday a 1 gig for 60 bucks.  I'm going to use it for home and other computers, how do the drivers work for the systems, do you have to reconfig it to each computer you hook it up to?

585002779[/snapback]

The smaller-sized distros (DSL) come with lightweight Window Managers, like Fluxbox. I use Flux on my main PC, so that is actually a plus for me, as the space that KDE or Gnome would take I would find wasteful.

As far as USB on Linux, I have not known of any problems at all with incompatibility. All the 'drivers' that Linux needs are in the kernel, so it will 'just work'.

However, booting from USB may be an issue. That is set by BIOS, and your BIOS must support booting from USB. If not, then BIOS doesn't see USB, so you can't boot from what you don't see.

[Lokheed]

You could run Arch from disk and setup your pendrive as storage...though I believe Arch uses KDE as its default DE.

[ScottieG]

well the question i had on drivers is will i have to configure the drivers for my system devices such as sound and graphics every time i connect the device to a new computer?

[markwolfe Veteran]

well the question i had on drivers is will i have to configure the drivers for my system devices such as sound and graphics every time i connect the device to a new computer?

585004018[/snapback]

Typically, no. I don't think so.

Linux does 1000 times better at being able to boot and use a PC when you pull a hard drive from an old Intel Pentium PC and move the drive to an AMD Athlon with a completely different chipset. Windows won't boot. Linux will.

There are always exceptions, though.

[aem4162]

the computers i use now have asus a7n8x-x and -deluxe boards in them. the bios lists usb-fdd, usb-zip, usb-cdrom, and usb-hdd as possible boot thingies, but does not specifically say usb-flash. i'd love to be able to put knoppix on a flash drive, but should i even bother if the bios might not accept it? i guess i'm also nervous about boogering up my beasties by trying to use an unsupported flash drive.

[kyro]

lol.. and if u think u dont have enuf options ...

try slax... extremely easy to add and remove software, based on slackware, livecd but can install on hdd and usb-flash.... good support of forums there and also has xfce+fluxbox version if u want fast gui.

[MSN6]

Which distro has the best GUI for installing it on USB 256MB? :unsure:

[kyro]

hey msn6 :) how r u ?

and for 256 mb thing ... slax popcorn version looks nice... its latest, good , fast and easy. also DSL and feather linux are good but i like slax.

[ScottieG]

the computers i use now have asus a7n8x-x and -deluxe boards in them.  the bios lists usb-fdd, usb-zip, usb-cdrom, and usb-hdd as possible boot thingies, but does not specifically say usb-flash.  i'd love to be able to put knoppix on a flash drive, but should i even bother if the bios might not accept it?  i guess i'm also nervous about boogering up my beasties by trying to use an unsupported flash drive.

585007036[/snapback]

from reading alot of articles you can choose usb-flash or usb-zip, pretty much the same thing

[aem4162]

cool....thank you!!!! :)

[Mathiasdm]

Which distro has the best GUI for installing it on USB 256MB? :unsure:

585007280[/snapback]

I think VectorLinux would fit on that.

-Fluxbox

-IceWM

-XFCE4

You choose :-P

[ScottieG]

hey, i'm still trying to find a review on diffrent linuxes on usb pen drives i'm not able to find, i know it was on the web a couple of days ago but i'm having no luck :( anyone??? i remember reading about a version that has kernal support for ntfs partitioned drives in the kernel, anyone?

[markwolfe Veteran]

i remember reading about a version that has kernal support for ntfs partitioned drives in the kernel, anyone?

585031328[/snapback]

I know that DamnSmallLinux supports NTFS read. I am sure that most of the others do, too.

You weren't asking about NTFS write, were you? It can be slow and/or risky to do. Not recommended...

[ScottieG]

yea rite, i thought in the review i read like a couple of days ago i saw something about fully supporting ntfs w/r in the kernel

[markwolfe Veteran]

Well the first three hits that mention 2.6 in a quick Google search: http://www.google.com/linux?num=10&hl=en&q...+kernel+support

Show these items:

http://www.desktop-linux.net/ntfs.htm

http://www.computing.net/linux/wwwboard/forum/26676.html

http://linux-ntfs.sourceforge.net/status.html

Two of them say it is experimental and potentially dangerous, and the one that seems to say it works (and tells you where to submit bugs you find :huh: ) tells you of the following limitation:

Still read-only, but with safe file overwrite support on all Windows versions without changes to the file size (uncompressed, unencrypted, nonsparse files only).

So, your writes are limited to non-compressed NTFS drives, also non-encrypted files, and the files must be the SAME file size. No adding a line (or even a character!) to the end of a text file.

That last one is from the ones who write the NTFS support. I would call that feature not very practical at this time.

[ScottieG]

yea i guess your right, i don't see how you can write to ntfs, either way, the review i was reading was from tuxme.com i found it. There is this other distro i found that just came out called flash linux, its gentoo on a gnome desktop and takes less than 200 megs, i think its perfect for my 1 gig drive. only thing is i dono how to install it from windows, cause the intructions are suggesting that i already have linux and i want to install it froma linux app already.. hmm

[linuxbox superman]

Check out http://www.linuxonastik.com/

They have a version of Knoppix pre installed on USB Flash Drives as well as Damn Small Linux on CD.

Lot of other stuff too...

Hope that helps somebody :)

[betamaxman]

Typically, no. I don't think so.

Linux does 1000 times better at being able to boot and use a PC when you pull a hard drive from an old Intel Pentium PC and move the drive to an AMD Athlon with a completely different chipset. Windows won't boot. Linux will.

There are always exceptions, though.

Windows is made to be this way so that Bill can better control his copy protection. It is not an inherent inability and there is a way around it. :cool:

[Barney T. Administrators]

[Thread Moved Here]

Barney

[Soham]

www.puppylinux.org