Is it possible to install an OS/boot from a USB drive?

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Rygo

Junior Member
Sep 28, 2004
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Fixing a laptop from work, dell inspiron 7500. I'm gonna guess it's a p2 with 128mb ram. Pretty much diagnosed the problem as the hard drive from a couple things:

problems creating partitions while trying to install windows 2k (often it said there was no hard disk)
win xp installer crashed during the windows setup procedure, the error was saying that the kernel wasn't available, basically that the files weren't there from what I gather (the files had "disappeared" heh)
qnx runs fine, so the ram and mobo are probably tip top.

Was curious to see if I could somehow set a usb drive up with linux and have the laptop boot to that. Not sure if I can use a usb drive without an OS already there though.

thanks.
 
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gaidin123

Senior member
May 5, 2000
962
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You could download and install Knoppix but that is a boot CD. However it is a full fledged OS and you could probably do some good troubleshooting with it and/or transfer whatever readable files there are off the damaged drive.

Modern Dells can definitely boot from a USB mass storage compatible device but typically one would do that in DOS or a limited linux for imaging purposes. I supposed you could do a Windows install of some sort onto a USB stick but that laptop sounds like it might be way too old to support booting that way.

Lastly you could look into PXE booting over the network but I think that would be too much work.

I've had windows installs crap out on me due to bad RAM in the past...Have you swapped that out? Also, have you run the hard drive manufacturer's or Dell's diagnostics on the hard drive? They could tell you pretty quick if the drive was bad (but not necessarily if the controller was dying).

Gaidin
 
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Rygo

Junior Member
Sep 28, 2004
8
0
0
thanks for the help

could you point me in the direction of a floppy-disk based diagnostic tool? I'm gonna scour dell's site right now
 
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ai42

Diamond Member
Jun 5, 2001
3,653
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FYI...

It it possible to load a windows install on a flash device. However, the constant write/rewrite processes of the swap file make it a huge strain on the flash drive. Basically flash memory isn't designed for heavy write/rewrite capability so I've seen a few dead or damaged CF cards doing something similar simply because some bits stop working and starts screwing everything up.
 
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tyim

Senior member
Jan 1, 2002
807
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Originally posted by: TheLonelyPhoenix
Originally posted by: kingsrook7
Feather Linux
I have used this, booting from usb jump drive, works well.
Click to expand...

Nice find. :thumbsup:

Yes. you can boot from USB key, but a Knoppix CD is usually more than ideal. And its free.
Click to expand...

I use Knoppix to backup in these cases. You can also use PEs like Barts.
 
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