Stuck on boot: Syslinux Problem

**Alecossy** · July 9th, 2012

First of all, sorry, my bad about the description but I've been preparing an exam till today (which I passed, btw).
All I'm trying to do is use the stick instead of a CD to "burn" in the iso (in order to boot the live DVD and try the distro and, eventually, install it on the laptop HDD).
I'm using both lili and unetbootin because it's the way I've always done that in order to get bootable live sticks (worked with chakra and with android x86, just to mention the latest two I tried).
I'm now feeling that it's not the right procedure to follow in order to obtain an ubuntu studio live stick, am I right?

Okay... this is somewhat strange...
On the PC it works extremely well, on the laptop it doesn't even goes on to loading the menus we're trying to edit...
May it be my laptop, then?
It's not the first time I use a live stick, though

**Cheesehead** · July 10th, 2012

Originally Posted by Alecossy

preparing an exam till today (which I passed, btw)

Congratulations! Always a good feeling.

If the USB-stick works properly in the PC but not in the Laptop, then there's nothing wrong with the way you made the USB-stick version. Your description (using unebootin) is the same way I make them.

This laptop has worked with USB-Stick boots in the past?

Laptop BIOS permits booting to USB? (Very old systems may support only USB-ZIP instead of USB-HDD, and we must use a workaround)

Problem with the laptop USB port?

**Alecossy** · July 11th, 2012

Laptop has worked with USB sticks before (I installed chakra via USB and, just 3 days ago, booted and then installed an android x86 distro)
I'm pretty sure there's nothing wrong with the bios either, since i've been able to do these steps before.
Port's okay, i've been trying on three different ones to be sure and i've been using the one i'm using now before...
any other idea?

**Cheesehead** · July 11th, 2012

Let's see. LiveUSB works on System A but not System B. Other LiveUSBs work on System B. Same method of creating all LiveUSBs.

Assuming all hardware is working properly, and I see you tested, then I'm out of ideas, sorry.

I was going to suggest trying a couple things, but upon reflection I won't - they're just grasping for more data.

**Alecossy** · July 11th, 2012

Which steps does loading syslinux take? We might try debugging if we follow it step by step...
Also, i'm thinking it might be a problem with the resources, cuz syslinux isn't even loading the cfg file (you know, you don't even get to pick one of the choices handled by that file...)
If anything else fails, i'm going to buy a dvd and try burning it on a phisical support

**Cheesehead** · July 12th, 2012

The MBR points to syslinux as the first program to execute.
Syslinux itself, once it starts, loads it's own .cfg files.

So this points to a corrupt syslinux file, or a bad install...but does not explain why the same install works fine on another system.

Debugging syslinux is described at http://www.syslinux.org/wiki/index.p...ment/Debugging , but effective debugging (if I recall correctly) requires recompiling it to add the debug hooks.

**Alecossy** · July 19th, 2012

seems like i can't get anything out of it... do you think it might work if I burned it on DVD?

**Alecossy** · July 22nd, 2012

Solved... thanks for the assistance, man!

**Cheesehead** · July 22nd, 2012

Don't keep us in suspense! Please tell us what the problem was, and how you solved it....

**Alecossy** · July 25th, 2012

that's quite a question... i simply went to the nearest store, bought a virgin dvd and burnt the iso over it and it worked.
I'm guessing my system had problems finding the files on the stick and simply kept hanging at the point I've shown you.
I'm now experiencing some minor problems but the overall stability and functionality of the system's good, even better than I could imagine.