LinuxQuestions.org - [SOLVED] Utility to Create Bootable Flash Drive

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Utility to Create Bootable Flash Drive

I've looked all over the place for the utility that will create a bootable flash drive. Can anybody tell me what the name of it is?

Unetbootin is the best known
http://unetbootin.sourceforge.net/

there are others specific to their distro
including

liveusb-creator which is Fedora
https://fedorahosted.org/liveusb-creator/

there's this new one
http://www.linuxliveusb.com/

and ubuntu's
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/LiveUsbPendrivePersistent

and this
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...ve_USB_systems

and Pendrivelinux has stuff
http://www.pendrivelinux.com/

what distro(s) were you gonna put on it?

Uh, Slackware 13.0 -- I'm looking for the utility that runs during setup that makes a bootable flash drive.

From the installation CD/DVD... slackware-13.0/usb-and-pxe-installers/README_USB.TXT

Quote:

Transfering the usbboot.img file to a USB device
------------------------------------------------

In order to create a bootable USB stick with the Slackware installer on it,
copy the 'usbboot.img' file to a USB stick as follows:

(1) In a Linux terminal if you're in X, or just from the console, change
directory to where the file 'usbboot.img' is located - you may have to
mount your Slackware CDROM or DVD first.
(2) Insert a USB stick that is going to become your Slackware installer.
Note that all data the stick contains will be erased in the next steps!
You need to find out the device name for this USB stick. Sometimes it
helps to run the command 'rescan-scsi-bus' if the USB stick is not
being detected right away.
On systems without SCSI or SATA disks, the USB stick will usually be
assigned '/dev/sda' as the device name. If '/dev/sda' already is your
SCSI or SATA hard drive, then '/dev/sdb' would become the device name
for the USB stick. Be very convinced that you know which device name
represents your stick before you advance to the next step!
(3) Transfer the image file to the USB stick using the 'dd' program. In the
example command line below, I am assuming that the USB stick is known as
'/dev/sdx'.

dd if=usbboot.img of=/dev/sdx bs=512

Be careful about the device name for your USB stick! The above 'dd'
command will wipe out any existing data on the device, so you had better
be sure that it is not the SATA hard disk you're targeting!

This blog post gives some additional explanation:
http://alien.slackbook.org/blog/inst...b-thumb-drive/

If you're trying to create a Slackware installer on the flash drive then you're taken care of. If you're trying to actually install Slackware to a flash drive then you just partition and specify that drive during the install process (wherever you run the installer from).

Nah, I'm trying to make a "bootstick" (not an installer). The Slackware installer asks if you want to make a USB bootstick (so you can boot the thing if the MBR gets screwed up somehow or other). I've installed Win7 64-bit then reinstalled Slackware 64-bit, ran Lilo and I can boot Slackware just fine but Win7 fails with a message about the BOOTMGR missing -- the fix for that seems to be to use the Win7 install disk to repair the MBR and I'm afraid that when I do that I won't be able to get Slackware booted again without a lot of grief. So, what I need, is a USB bootstick that will boot me into my existing Slackware partition if Win7 screws thing up during the "fix."

The script to create that is not available in the installed distro, IIRC. You have to extract it from the installer initrd.

/var/log/setup/setup.80.make-bootdisk

All of the setup scripts from the installer are stored here.

Ah so, you are correct.

Quote:

Originally Posted by disturbed1 (Post 3826591)

/var/log/setup/setup.80.make-bootdisk

All of the setup scripts from the installer are stored here.

Ah-ha! Couldn't remember where that stuff lives.

Thank you.

You can also re-run any of the setup scripts with pkgtool. Choose the Setup option, then it's for script in $ADM_DIR/setup/setup.* ; do :)

Quote:

Originally Posted by tronayne (Post 3826449)

I've installed Win7 64-bit then reinstalled Slackware 64-bit, ran Lilo and I can boot Slackware just fine but Win7 fails with a message about the BOOTMGR missing -- the fix for that seems to be to use the Win7 install disk to repair the MBR

As far as I understand, the missing BOOTMGR error message is reported after the boot record is done, so the problem must be different.

It is a bit strange that you do not emphasize the fact that BOOTMGR is in place. Do you see the hidden Boot folder in the Windows 7 boot partition?

Just in case there is no Boot, did you allow Windows 7 to use a whole disk on installation?