Using HD install as USB boot possible?

Message

Lynux · #1 Post by **Lynux** » 2006-05-11 15:52

Basically this is the situation: I had installed Debian to my main HD with a normal HD install (HD is connected via IDE). But now I would like to use the same HD as an external USB HD and boot from it, but do not want to reinstall everything... is it possible?

ajdlinux · #2 Post by **ajdlinux** » 2006-05-11 21:01

Depends on if your BIOS can boot directly off USB and also depends on your kernel and if it is able to find your USB drive without loading extra modules.

lynux- · #3 Post by **lynux-** » 2006-05-13 02:26

There is an option in the BIOS to boot into "removable drive" (I'm using a Compaq 2108US laptop). But, nothing happens when I force the comp to boot into the HD (which is now an external USB one). I tried reinstalling grub, but that didn't help either. I'm going to check to see if I can boot off a USB keychain drive with puppy linux.

I do have another idea though. Is it possible to boot off a CD which then transfers the boot process to the external USB hard drive in the middle of booting? So that I can run everything like if I had booted off the USB hard drive.

Lynux · #4 Post by **Lynux** » 2006-05-13 21:39

After poking around a bit, I found out that this does indeed work. Even though I later realized that my laptop doesn't support booting off USB ("removable drives" refers to floppies I guess, though there are ironically no floppy drives installed). I even made a CD image that contains only Grub, which has the sole purpose of transfering the booting process onto the USB HD. I was able to half-boot Puppy linux this way (not completely because for some reason there were USB recognition problems *after* the initrd and kernel loaded from the USB drive for some reason). I'm going to try Debian very soon.