Installation on USB Pen drive 4 GB - Problem
Forum: USB booting
Topic: Installation on USB Pen drive 4 GB - Problem
started by: TomKet
Posted by TomKet on May 03 2006,11:22
Hi,during installation i got a message in context of the cluster greatness? -> i thinking in the direction of Fat -> Fat32 because of the 4 GB PEN Drive.
How can i change the Script for installation on the App->Installation USB Pendrive that the Script format the Pendrive with FAT32 instead off FAT
Thanks for your issues
TOM
Posted by pr0f3550r on May 03 2006,17:26
'Cluster greatness' sounds too much like Scientology, and you are Tom... Katie... very scary!
Posted by TomKet on May 04 2006,06:15
Hi - very usefull issue - Thanks a lot 
Sorry for the bad english but is there a opp. to fix the problem.
I try to explain it in a other way...
by formating with FAT the USB-Pendrive could only 2 GB or something like that.
So my Pendrive is 4 GB and so the installation routine of DSL had to use FAT32 for formating the Pendrive.
any solution?
TomKet (not Tom Cruise LOL)
Posted by pr0f3550r on May 04 2006,16:50
Wierd!Fat16 should have a 4 GB filesize limit, not a 4GB partition limit.
Both ways you should be alright.
Try to reformat from another OS.
I'm curious, when you bought the stick, what fs what it formatted with?
I'm sure this is no mission impossible, Tom!
Posted by cbagger01 on May 08 2006,03:37
Actually, Tom is correct.FAT16 = 2.1GB size limit.
You cannot format your 4GB drive with FAT32 and use the default DSL USB bootloader called "syslinux", because syslinux only supports FAT16
HOWEVER, there are still ways to make it happen.
1) Manually format your drive FAT32 and then do a "poorman's" installation by copying the files and directories over from the CD drive to the USB drive. Then manually install an alternative bootloader that supports FAT32 like say GRUB for example.
2) Manually format the first 2GB of your drive with FAT16 and then manually install DSL and the SYSLINUX bootloader. The rest of your drive will be unusable for MSWindows but otherwise should be usable for Linux if formatted.
3) Try the old USBHDD script, hopefully kicking around on the download site somewhere. It formats your drive as an EXT2 partition and then installs EXTLINUX which works just fine. The only drawback is that your entire drive will be unreadable by MSWindows because Windows does not understand the Linux EXT2 file system.