Hi,

Up to now if I want to try a new distro, I download it to my pc and then burn it to a dvd.
I have got the idea from somewhere that using a usb device would be better and easier. Okay, a few questions:

Is a usb flash drive the same thing as a usb data traveller, or thumbdrive?
Should I buy a device just big enough for an individual distro?
Is it possible to put more than one bootable distro on a usb drive?

Any other advice would be welcomed.

Putting the *.iso on a bootable USB stick would eliminate the need for burning the disk, and would be faster and easier once you get the hang of creating the bootable USb stick. I've used unetbootin for this purpose, but there are other tools that I haven't used.

Yes.

Any old USB stick that is large enough should work, and, though I haven't done it, I have read that you can make multi-boot USB sticks.

I use E2B (Easy 2 boot) for exactly this purpose. It can hold many iso files and you can boot to the one you want from a menu.

For almost all modern distros a usb drive of any sort will present as a hard drive.

Kind of a few things going on here. One is bios and uefi systems and supported distros.

Two may be the type of distro. Not all easily go to a usb in some of the various forms.

Those forms of install to a usb may be simply an installer (some sort of installer to a usb), some live to usb, some live to usb with persistence and finally a true install to the usb as if it were a hard drive.

Right, It's a bit more complicated than I thought. I've been thinking about it and I now think that I really would like a live bootable distro on a usb memory stick that contained the ability to print out to my printer. So, then I could carry it around with me, use it to boot up on a friends computer, and demo Linux's advantages over Windows.

I've been reading up about 'Persistence'. Would that fit the bill?

I'm pretty old and I don't know anybody who uses Linux. It would be nice to have someone to confab with.

Hope I'm making sense here....

You should be able to create a 'live' Linux systems with most major Linux distributions. How this is done varies with the distribution to some extent. The link below describes several methods of doing it from windows for Ubuntu and probably most derivatives. The second link is another method you can use from windows.

https://www.howtogeek.com/howto/1491...b-flash-drive/

https://unetbootin.github.io/

You can also do a full install to a usb drive. You need to familiarize yourself with Linux device naming conventions before trying this so you install to the correct device. If you did this on a larger usb, you could then copy an iso file of another Linux distribution to it and boot the iso file directly as a Live system. An explanation of this process at the links below.

https://www.howtogeek.com/196933/how...ur-hard-drive/

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Grub2/ISOBoot

The number of Linux live systems you can put on a usb is limited primarily by the size of the usb.

I have for the most part stopped using any "live to usb" sort of deal.

The question is more of how do you wish to use this usb exactly. Do you want to just put it in a computer and run linux or do you need it to be an installer like a dvd might do?

Hi again,

I found that Peppermintos linux, which is my main OS, has a built in USB Stick formatter and a built in USB Image Writer. So, this afternoon I popped out and bought a Kingston data traveller. I then downloaded the latest P'mint iteration, no 9, and saved that to my hard drive. I used the Formatter and then the Writer, and before I could blink had a live OS on my Traveller.

I works like a charm. I'm using it now, live, and I reckon it is an advance on whatever P'mint number I have currently in my PC. I'm going to upgrade to 9!

I realise now that I don't have to be concerned about 'persisting' the printer in the USB Stick. My few friends with computers don't have the same printer as me anyway.

I'm most grateful to those who posted. It always heartens me when people are happy to help. I do hope that you all have a Happy Christmas.

Clearfell

Merry Christmas, clearfell. And Happy Holidays to everyone else on the thread.

You can install a GNU/Linux to a USB alike to what you would to a disk. With any computer who can do it, you just select to boot from USB instead of HD, and then your GNU/Linux starts up instead of whatever is on that computer.

For this purpose a GNU/Linux distribution with a wide hardware support and good hardware detection is the best option, to work on as many hardware setups as possible.

My personal preference is Mageia.
www.mageia.org