Howto make USB boot drives

[guiverc]

Don't know what to make of this, but @sudodus

New RC has been spun for Lubuntu 20.04.2 now, so it was written to thumb-drives
`dus focal-deskt<tab>`

First was written with the standard LIVE mode only
Second was written with persistence as before.

So far I've only booted on
- sony vaio svp112a1cw (i5-9400u, 4gb, intel haswell-ULT)

which is where I had issues last time with persistence.. but both have booted on sony crapbook.

I then rebooted box; ejected & re-inserted media & it booted again...

Persistence is working, as it knew my wifi & could connect...
Sorry I'm not sure what to make of this, maybe as it contradicts (I think) my prior findings... but it's what I've got now.. I'll continue testing, but my current focus is on Lubuntu's latest RC.

I could later boot it on sony device, but when I attempted to boot it on
- hp dc7700 (c2d-e6320, 5gb, nvidia quadro nvs 290)
the box skipped it (like it does for non-bootable media)

[sudodus]

@guiverc,

Thanks for testing mkusb-dus version 12.6.9

I am looking forward to your final conclusions from testing how the released Lubuntu 20.04.2 LTS iso file can be used to create persistent live drives, and how they work in your Sony Vaio and the hp dc7700 (c2d-e6320, 5gb, nvidia quadro nvs 290).

If still some failures, it will also be interesting to compare the result with 20.04.1 LTS and hirsute hippo. (For example: maybe we should not force dus-persistent to use usb-pack_efi for 20.04.2.)

It is also possible that there is a race condition, that can explain unpredictable results when booting.

[guiverc]

Sorry, my primary focus was on the 20.04.2 release.. and mkusb testing only when time permitted.

My conclusions (as far as I recall) were it was bad luck (it failed, then it worked?? I'd need to do more testing, but on 50% I'd blame bad luck & not mkusb, as I seem to have occasional bad luck with thumb-drives, which get used, re-used so often....

The current daily ISO of hirsute written with persistence appears to have issues with hirsute

It's failed to boot on
- hp 8200 elite sff (i5-2400, 8gb, nvidia quadro 600) ; uEFI capable box
- sony vaio svp112a1cw (i5-9400u, 4gb, intel haswell-ULT)

It boots as expected
- hp dc7700 (c2d-e6320, 5gb, nvidia quadro nvs 290)
- dell [optiplex] 755 (c2d-e6850, 5gb, amd/ati radeon rv516/x1300/x1550)

(log of 'mkusb' write can be seen at https://paste.ubuntu.com/p/pyRTxK8gB2/)

First successful boot was done on hp dc7700, packages updated (3), `touch blah`, then reboot. On reboot (same box), all updates were applied, command history present & my touched file present.

attempts to reboot on hp.8200 & sony.vaiocrap were re-attempted but failed. dell.755 which was next tried with updated packages present, my 'blah' file present, command history etc & all as expected. dell.755-5 was reboot & all good again.

It looks to me like issues are with uEFI; at least from this very limited testing.

I've had issues today and on uEFI boxes including the sony.crap, which is a little consistent with the other day (but still inconsistent). I'm unlikely to do more today (mkusb wise), as I want to repeat some Lubuntu install testing (and it's getting too warm with multiple boxes on; something most people will likely be envious of!).

http://iso.qa.ubuntu.com/qatracker/m...s/1303/results

[sudodus]

@guiverc,

Thanks for continuing the tests with mkusb-dus.

My conclusions (as far as I recall) were it was bad luck (it failed, then it worked?? I'd need to do more testing, but on 50% I'd blame bad luck & not mkusb, as I seem to have occasional bad luck with thumb-drives, which get used, re-used so often....

I have failed to provoke the failures of mkusb similar to yours, but I have different hardware (computers and USB pendrives). I will keep testing mkusb-dus (making persistent live drives) ...

I notice in your log of the mkusb console that cloning the iso file into partition #4 is very slow (the long list of numbers from 11 to 100 and the total time 9 min 31 sec). It would be interesting to check if your luck will be better after wiping the whole devices (thumb-drives, which get used, re-used so often). The problem might not only be speed, but also choking of the buffer in the USB management system, and my experience is that wiping the whole device will remove some obstacles so that things will work smoother.

[C.S.Cameron]

Greeting:

I have been trialing mkusb 12.6.9 and mkusb-plug 2.8.4 with 20.04.2 for a while now.
It has been a totally boring experience, everything has worked as expected.

The highlight was finding the option in mkusb-plug to create a usbdata partition with a choice of filesystems.
Mkusb has gained a lot of features, I wonder if new manpage(s) are necessary.

My next exercise will be to test the latest version of mkusb with the latest version of Ubuntu to become designated as being supported, 14.04 LTS. For the story on this one see:

https://meta.askubuntu.com/questions...ent42249_19514

Regards

[C.S.Cameron]

I installed Ubuntu 14.04.3 to a USB using dus 12.6.9 installed on 20.04.
(Wow running 14.04 again was great).
I installed mkusb 12.6.9 onto the 14.04 USB.
mkusb-plug had unmet dependencies, (fdisk), and would not install.
I also had no luck installing fdisk.
Once mkusb 12.6.9 was installed I used it to install 14.04.3 to another USB.
I could not find the dus icon but dus boots okay from Terminal.
Ubuntu 14.04 installed on USB from 12.6.9 installed on 14.04 works as expected.
To bad about mkusb-plug.

[sudodus]

@C.S.Cameron,

Thanks for testing mkusb-dus and mkusb-plug.

1. I could not make mkusb-plug work with old versions of Ubuntu because of certain dependency problems, and you have discovered it. There is a detailed description here.

2. I must admit that I have sort of abandoned Ubuntu 14.04.x LTS because its normal support has ended. This version is at extended security maintenance now (paid-for-support for companies, probably mainly for Ubuntu Server installations). I have tested the current versions of mkusb-dus with Ubuntu 16.04.x LTS. So I am happy that it still can be used with 14.04.x LTS although with some quirks.

3. You are right, I had better spend some time on new manpage(s) and/or a manual in some other format.

[oygle]

I've used mkusb over several years and found it to be a very solid and easy to use product. It has always been for making bootable USB's from an ISO for Kubuntu/Ubuntu. Now I need to make a bootable USB for Windows 8.1, so obviously mkusb can do this also. Have downloaded the ISO from https://www.microsoft.com/en-au/soft...ad/windows8ISO , purchased a Win 8.1 pro key and now need to make the bootable USB.

Of course anything regards this from the Microsoft site is all EXE's and in fact the tool suggested by one company was rufus. However I see that is also an EXE. So, to use mkusb for this, are there any specific parameters or options to be aware of please ?

[sudodus]

@oygle,

- mkusb works in Ubuntu (and some other Linux distros).

- mkusb can create bootable USB drives with the Windows installer (for Windows 7 and newer versions). You can use mkusb-dus (mkusb version 12) or mkusb-plug for this purpose.

So you can boot into an Ubuntu or Ubuntu family flavour operating system and use mkusb to create a Windows installer in a USB drive. The size of the USB drive should be at least 8 GB. I think you will find the options for this purpose in the graphical user interfaces of mkusb-dus and mkusb-plug. Please ask again if you need more details.

---

As you write, Rufus is an exe file which is executable in Windows but not in Ubuntu. Rufus works well to create bootable USB drives with an installer for Ubuntu, another Linux distro or Windows.

[C.S.Cameron]

@oygle,

I have tried to make simple step by step instructions for installing Windows using mkusb-plug.

https://askubuntu.com/questions/1274...274975#1274975