Puppy Linux Discussion Forum

[MrDyne]

Heyoo.
Is there a way to install Puppy to a hard drive using a IDE to USB adapter and another computer?

The computer I want to put Puppy on does not have a OS installed on it, and does not support USB booting, and I'm all out of blank disks. (Got plenty of blank DVDs.. ). Computer is a laptop so no floppy drive either..

~MrDyne

[starhawk]

If it doesn't support USB boot... you're going to need a CD no matter what.

Go here --> http://www.plop.at/en/bootmanager/download.html

You want the plpbt-createiso.zip file. Run the create-iso.sh file in a Linux box (or if you don't have one handy, create-iso.bat in anything older than Win7 should work fine. (I seem to recall that DOS files don't translate to Win7.)

Alternately, there is a Linux-only version of Plop BM called PlopKexec. This you just download and burn the ISO file. Get it here --> http://www.plop.at/en/plopkexec.html

I'll note that the one time I tried PlopKexec with Puppy it did not work... but you might have different luck.

What system is this, and what version of Puppy are you planning to use?

[bigpup]

I assume the USB to IDE adapter will be hooked up to the hard drive so files can be transferred to the problem computer.

Have a Puppy version ISO file on the good computer.
Put it someplace easy to find.

You can try this:
You can do a manual frugal install.
Have hard drive hooked to adapter.
Get Puppy running on the good computer.
Should see drive icons on desktop for all drives.
Click on drive where Puppy ISO file is.
Left click on ISO file to mount it.
Click on desktop drive icon for hard drive hooked to adapter.
Now you should have two Rox file manager windows open.
(one showing contents of Puppy ISO file and one showing destination drive hooked to adapter)
Now with two Rox file manager windows open:
Do a drag and copy to the hard drive connected to adapter window from the Puppy iso file window.
Need three files
initrd.gz
Puppy versionxxx.sfs (whatever version of Puppy it is)
vmlinuz

Close all the Rox windows.

Now you need to install a boot loader to the hard drive.
Run the bootloader config, for the bootloader you use.
I suggest Grub4dos Bootloader Config program
Choose options to install to the hard drive hooked to the adapter.

This will be the iffy part, because to boot you need a boot loader on the destination drive, to boot Puppy from it. You will probably get a bunch of boot entries on the boot menu, because it will see more than what is just on that hard drive. It will see any installed operating system, on all the drives, and make entries for all.
At the end of running Grub4dos Bootloader config, it will give you option to edit the boot menu. It is a text file called menu.lst

You may need to edit menu entry so it indicates stuff is on internal hard drive.
Example:
The entry kernel line needs to look like this for the pmedia part:
pmedia=atahd

If it works Puppy should be installed and you should see boot menu when booting from this hard drive.

[bigpup]

Just noticed this:

[rcrsn51]

[MrDyne]

Yes I know you can put a CD iso on a DVD but the laptop computer is 13 years old.. It's just a small T20 Thinkpad laptop. CD drive only..