liveUSB is superior to liveCD
 

Does anyone not agree that a liveUSB, if available, is superior to and more desirable than a liveCD? I had already noticed that you can't ruin a liveUSB by scratching it as with a liveCD; but isn't it also true that you can "burn" a much larger ISO to a USB stick than the 700 MB available on a CD? I hope the option to make a liveUSB becomes standard in every distro.

Hi there,

I don't, because a "LiveUSB" could also mean an external CD/DVD drive connected via USB.
That being said, I assume that you're comparing Live CDs or DVDs to the same ISO image being written on a USB flash memory. This is of course faster than a CD or DVD, because it provides seek times in the realm of microseconds, compared to some 100 milliseconds for real CDs/DVDs.

But you can easily ruin a bootable USB pen drive by accidentally writing to it.

Well, USB memory sticks below 4GB have become rare nowadays, so they're of course superior to CDs, and at capacities of 8 or even 32GB they even leave DVDs behind. Plus, they're a lot easier to handle, they fit into every pocket, they're not sensitive to sunlight, scratches, or heat.

But all that isn't anything new, is it? So what are you trying to tell us?

[X] Doc CPU

Are there any distros that offer a live CD that can't run off a USB stick instead?

There are disadvantages: USB sticks can be accidentally knocked out, and some computers (both of mine, for a start) won't boot off them.

Not all distro's can run off a live usb.

Not all usb flash drives are stable and fast.

ESD can damage flash drives.

Flash drives are known to stop working.

Some flash drives are hard to get to boot or be made bootable.

Not all computers boot to a usb.

It usually takes more time to make a live usb in my opinion. A DVD-ram or rewriteable disk is my choice usually but that can fail on burn or like you said scratches.

Many distro's can't boot off a usb 3.0 yet.

I tend to use real installs of a distro to a usb instead of a live cd/dvd to usb install.

not from a technicians/administrators PoV.

many places still lock down systems to not allow USB access and older hardware is not capable of booting from external devices like USB. for that single reason alone LiveCD/DVDs are of more use then LiveUSBs.

As for performance you will typically get better performance from a LiveUSB on systems that are capable of booting from them yes.

If you are an admin and allow your tools to be destroyed by something as silly as a scratch, you are a worthless admin.

Any distro that offers a LiveCD will typically offer a liveDVD iso as well. you can place either onto a USB. Size is not an issue as a result.

@jefro: If the distro offers a LiveXXX.iso, then it can be put onto a USB device.

the only flash/USB devices that are hard to get working are ones with the U3 tech, but that is not the device, but the 3rd party software that is placed on them. This software can be removed, and if you are going to use that device on any OS other then exclusive to MS Windows SHOULD be removed. its more of a PITA then its worth and does nothing for securing the data. you are better off with full disk encryption.

USB 3.0 is so experimental in ALL OSs it is wise not to use this tech for any kind of bootable device. Think of USB 3.0 the same way you would have thought of the original USB devices back with win95/98 and when win2k/XP first hit the market. In fact winXP/Vista are still prone to having multiple installs of the same device (printers anyone) that is USB connected. the MS world did not resolve this until win7 and even then USB can still be very hit or miss.

That is exactly how USB 3.0 is today. Very hit or miss. your OS matters not. There are not enough unified WORKING drivers out there to fully support USB 3.0 as easily as we now use USB 1.1/2.0 devices.

" If the distro offers a LiveXXX.iso, then it can be put onto a USB device."

No, what you mean to say is a hybrid iso had been made to be both used on a cd/dvd and use on a usb.

Not all iso's can be run from a usb even with tools like unetbootin.

I may need to re-read OpenSuse's support for usb 3.0. Seems to me it is not experimental at all anymore.

Unless a usb is sold as being "bootable" it can't be proven it will easily be bootable. One may have to still get tools like HP's usb tools to try to correct their usb. Things like flipbit may also help. Syslinux sometimes helps and using a generic MBR may also be needed. There is no standard on USB drives.

true, but that is why i dont use GUI tools for creating LiveUSB. I prefer the command line, but then again 99% of the time when im making a LiveUSB drive its for either a Fedora or Debian/Ubuntu flavor distro like Mint.

I've been using USB 3.0 flash drives and external hard drives on OpenSUSE 12.2 since it was first released without issue. If support is still experimental, then they're doing a good job...

I use both liveCD and LiveUSB where appropriate since my system can boot off both of them. Both have their pros and cons.

I use the liveUSB when I want to create a persistence USB to keep my settings and etc.

I was only pointing out pro's and con's.

As you say, it depends on the situation as to what is best so that would be the correct answer really.


"Does anyone not agree that a liveUSB,"

Not sure we can say one is better yet.