USB booting :: USB boot compatability list



The Compaq Presario S5000NX will boot from usb right out of the box ;)
I have the "triple boot" 0.9.1 DSL installed on my Sandisk Mini Cruzer 256Mb. (The "embedded" option works in Windows but not Linux, but that's another story.)

My desktop system (with an AMI BIOS) appears to have BIOS options for USB booting - from memory, they are HDD, FDD, ZIP, MO and removable disk. Unfortunately, none of them seem to work with the Cruzer, even if I move the USB boot option to the top of the list.

I'd guess that one of these options should work, so is it possible that the DSL installation on the Cruzer is not bootable as it stands? (I understand the Cruzer itself should be bootable.)

Thanks,
Tim
Has anyone had any luck booting from a Lexmark JumpDrive 512MB?? I have tried everything you can think of to make sure that DSL is loaded correctly, but everytime I try to boot, it gets to syslinux then says "Boot Failed" in the same line. Has anyone succesfully booted from a jumpdrive 512mb???
I am one seriously happy DSL user tonight :D :p :laugh:

Why? Because I finally managed to boot my main desktop PC into DSL from my pen drive (see my post above). In fact, I'm posting this from Firefox, in a DSL session, just to prove to myself that it's actually working...

In the end, the problem - and the solution - were quite simple, and I hope my experience will help anyone else with an AMI BIOS-based PC, trying to boot from a pen drive:

I have a USB hub attached to my desktop PC, as the USB ports are round the back and it's hard to reach them during normal use. The pen drive was plugged into the hub, and this evening when I tried booting from it again, I noticed that the activity light on the drive did not glow until most of the way through booting the system from the HD.

It then hit me what the problem was: the USB hub was not being accessed until well after the system looked for bootable devices. My pen drive, and the BIOS, were both probably bootable - it was just that the system never got the chance to find the drive until it was too late.

I fished out a USB extension lead, plugged it directly into the back of the PC, connected the pen drive, and rebooted. Ta-daaaaa - the BIOS' list of bootable drives now included "USB RMD-FDD". I chose this, and was whisked straight to the DSL desktop.

Now I've set "USB RMD-FDD" as the first boot option in the BIOS, any time I want some DSL action I can just connect up the Mini Cruzer, and there it is. (Strange how the option was not USB-ZIP, as I've read elsewhere, but if anyone else has the same BIOS and can't get USB-ZIP to work, try USB RMD-FDD.)

Hope the above is of use to someone else - as for me, I love this system!!! :D

Tim
I have a 256 PNY Attaché and it runs DSL perfectly on my computer w/ USB-ZIP booting enabled.  I also had a 128MB SanDisk Cruzer Mini which ran DSL until it died 3 months after I buyed it :-(

EDIT: And both of these where on a home-built computer with Pheonix AwardBIOS
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