Damn Small Linux - Not!

ggordon · Joined: 20 Apr 2006 Posts: 11

USB pendrive install seems to be hanging...once it get to the point of installing image....it just keeps going and going...never ends...plus it said something about it couldn't figure my disk geometry for a 256MB USB drive and would use defaults of 255&63 or something to that effect...never had any probs on USB install from regular DSL...use USB-Zip choice..work for my BIOS...anyway...like everything else....would like to see new themes and default Fluxbox styles included....made a couple of app suggestions in that part of DSL-Not forum...so far..looks like a great start...nice to see newer kernel...keep up the great job...DSL my fav 'small' distro and just about my fav in general..thanks for the new DSL-Not!

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ggordon

roberts · Joined: 17 Apr 2006 Posts: 320 Location: OC CA USA

USB-HDD works great and most modern machines support this.
Again its the more modern machines that this verison dsl-n is targeted at.
USB-ZIP has severe geometry issues because of the old ZIP DRIVE specifications.
For these reasons USB-ZIP will probably be dropped from the next cut.

ggordon · Joined: 20 Apr 2006 Posts: 11

I can do USB-HDD also, so gave that option a spin and same result..locks up at writing image to uba1 after a minute or so....only file that gets written to device is ldlinux.sys before it flakes out...and my computer is a late model 1.2 Ghz to tons of RAM and works pretty spiffy with all other Linux distros, so, don't think it's a prob on this end.....anyway...will wait for later releases and thanks again...really a Fluxbox fan and really like booting an OS from a thumbdrive...makes my windoze friends go...hmmmmm....cool Smile

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ggordon

doobit · Joined: 18 Apr 2006 Posts: 32

[quote="ggordon"]I can do USB-HDD also, so gave that option a spin and same result..locks up at writing image to uba1 after a minute or so....only file that gets written to device is ldlinux.sys before it flakes out...and my computer is a late model 1.2 Ghz to tons of RAM and works pretty spiffy with all other Linux distros, so, don't think it's a prob on this end.....anyway...will wait for later releases and thanks again...really a Fluxbox fan and really like booting an OS from a thumbdrive...makes my windoze friends go...hmmmmm....cool Smile

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ggordon[/quote]

Be aware that the usb installs take a looooong time to complete. You may be pulling the usb device before the install is actually finished.

wally · Joined: 18 May 2006 Posts: 3

Same problem here as ggordon.

The time problem on the usb zip install isn't the problem I think. I already have the usb zip install busy for half an hour.

Here is the output so far:
[code:1]Changing geometry for USB-ZIP compatibility on /dev/ubb
Partitioning /dev/ubb

/dev/ubb:
Formatting /dev/ubb2
Formatting /dev/ubb1
mkdosfs 2.11 (12 Mar 2005)
unable to get drive geometry, using default 255/63Setting up boot loader on /mnt/ubb1
Setting up boot image on /mnt/ubb1
mkdir: cannot create directory `/mnt/pendrive': File exists
Setting up system image on /mnt/ubb1...|[/code:1]

And now it halts for half an hour already...

wally · Joined: 18 May 2006 Posts: 3

Ok, after almost 45 minutes waiting the usb zip install is completed.

But now are there 2 little problems... When I boot the boot proces stops right after "INIT: Entering runlevel: 5" and then shows the following messages:
[quote]Invalid device ubb2
Press enter to continue:[/quote]
When I press [enter] x is being started. The problem is that there is now backing up of your /home /var and /opt directories.

Another thing that is really odd is that when you are going to reboot everything is killt and then the 'livecd' message appears:
[quote]Please remove CD, close cdrom drive and hit return.[/quote]
There is no cd in de cdrom drive and the cdrom drive is closed and stays closed...

roberts · Joined: 17 Apr 2006 Posts: 320 Location: OC CA USA

Of course, USB-ZIP type installs require a certain geometry. The larger pendrives are very difficult to setup this geometry. Then because of the size limits set by ZIP requires a second partition. This second partition is not seen by WinXP, all earlier versions of Windows can see it.
But either way ZIP is a PAIN.
Use USB-HDD.

I think I will drop ZIP as it causes more grief than it is worth.

ke4nt · Joined: 02 May 2006 Posts: 13

Just a note..

Out of 5 systems I test on regularly that offer USB booting,
only one has the USB-HDD option in bios.

The remainder only offer USB-ZIP, along with USB-FLOPPY.

73
ke4nt

roberts · Joined: 17 Apr 2006 Posts: 320 Location: OC CA USA

Maybe the real issue with USB-ZIP is the size of the target pendrive.
Smaller pendrives seem to work within the geometry requirements of USB-ZIP specs. Does anyone have a 256MB pendrive that works via USB-ZIP? a 512MB? a 1GB?? If I recall, the 256MB was the upper limit for this type of install. If you have other results please share.

PaulSchroeder90 · Joined: 20 May 2006 Posts: 7

The USB-HDD (and ZIP but i dont want it anyways) hangs when i use the install script

humpty · Joined: 22 Apr 2006 Posts: 5

This is a link that's not easy to find in the wiki;

wally · Joined: 18 May 2006 Posts: 3

[quote="roberts"]Of course, USB-ZIP type installs require a certain geometry. The larger pendrives are very difficult to setup this geometry. Then because of the size limits set by ZIP requires a second partition. This second partition is not seen by WinXP, all earlier versions of Windows can see it.
But either way ZIP is a PAIN.
Use USB-HDD.

I think I will drop ZIP as it causes more grief than it is worth.[/quote]
I chose USB-ZIP because the systems that need to run the USB stick do have the USB-HDD option in their bios, but when I put an USB-HDD stick in them they won't boot from it. I tried serveral things to get them to boot from USB-HDD, but they simply won't...

USB-ZIP works fine with them, even if I didn't specify in the bios that it had to boot form USB...