How to boot into Linux from a usb hard drive (maxtor) on a laptop

w7fxh · 03-26-2009, 04:12 PM

I have Ubantu running on an old Pentium 3 machine, and would now like to run it on a Sony Vaio from a Maxtor one touch usb drive, by booting from that drive. I am not ready to install it on this machine as It doesn't have a very large hard drive and I am a little gun shy about making that kind of commitment on this somewhat new machine at this point. I am looking for direction as how to accomplish this.

frieza · 03-26-2009, 04:16 PM

that depends on the bios of your machine.. something that old might not support direct booting from a USB device
it might be easier to use something like gparted and resize your windows partition and then install linux in the free space created by resizing the windows partition, thus creating a dual boot environement...

manwithaplan · 03-26-2009, 04:55 PM

I've heard of configuring a small partition that loads the USB drivers through a initramfs... And some other tricks... Though guessing by the age of the P3 machine, you probably only have USB 1.1 ... and that's slow..!

I know because I was trying the same thing on an old P3 desktop and I had to jump through loops to get to work with loading from USB... Wasnt worth it.. And the USB performance was no good. USB 2.0 = 480 mbs / USB 1.1 = 11mbs.

Udi · 03-26-2009, 05:04 PM

The Sony Vaio replaces the old Pentium 3 so I assume that booting from a USB drive won't be a problem. You can go ahead and get the latest Ubuntu, plug in the external USB drive and start installation as usual. The important things you have to consider when going through the installation wizard are:

1) Don't wipe out the partitions on the internal HD by mistake. Make sure you are partitioning the external USB drive. I also don't recommend resizing partitions - I've seen it wreak havoc way too often.

2) When installing the boot loader (GRUB) make sure to put it on the MBR of the external USB drive. This way, when the computer boots without the external drive connected - it will boot normally like it did before it ran Linux, and when the USB drive is connected - it will display the boot menu and you can start Linux.

I hope you get the idea. I hope I answered what you wanted. Please ask if you need more help.

manwithaplan · 03-26-2009, 05:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Udi

The Sony Vaio replaces the old Pentium 3 so I assume that booting from a USB drive won't be a problem. You can go ahead and get the latest Ubuntu, plug in the external USB drive and start installation as usual. The important things you have to consider when going through the installation wizard are:

1) Don't wipe out the partitions on the internal HD by mistake. Make sure you are partitioning the external USB drive. I also don't recommend resizing partitions - I've seen it wreak havoc way too often.

2) When installing the boot loader (GRUB) make sure to put it on the MBR of the external USB drive. This way, when the computer boots without the external drive connected - it will boot normally like it did before it ran Linux, and when the USB drive is connected - it will display the boot menu and you can start Linux.

I hope you get the idea. I hope I answered what you wanted. Please ask if you need more help.

Missed that... He is completely right with this post

w7fxh · 03-27-2009, 05:33 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Udi

The Sony Vaio replaces the old Pentium 3 so I assume that booting from a USB drive won't be a problem. You can go ahead and get the latest Ubuntu, plug in the external USB drive and start installation as usual. The important things you have to consider when going through the installation wizard are:

1) Don't wipe out the partitions on the internal HD by mistake. Make sure you are partitioning the external USB drive. I also don't recommend resizing partitions - I've seen it wreak havoc way too often.

2) When installing the boot loader (GRUB) make sure to put it on the MBR of the external USB drive. This way, when the computer boots without the external drive connected - it will boot normally like it did before it ran Linux, and when the USB drive is connected - it will display the boot menu and you can start Linux.

I hope you get the idea. I hope I answered what you wanted. Please ask if you need more help.

Thanks, that sounds like what I needed.