How to boot from USB, save to HD?

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mgraham
Posts: 20
Joined: Sun 15 Jul 2012, 21:57
Location: San Jose, California

How to boot from USB, save to HD?

#1 Post by mgraham »

I have tried with both Slacko 5.5 and Slacko 5.6 to boot from a usb memory stick, and setup the save file on the hard drive. I have 2 reasons why, and from the wiki, it should be an option.
reason 1. I want to use a notebook that does not have a cdrom.
reason 2. Any save file on a memory stick is painfully slow to shutdown.

I have tried on several brands and ages of computers with the same results. If I boot from CDrom, i can create save file on HD. I then make a bootable usb memory stick from this same system, but it will not use the save file on the HD.
If i shut down it wants to make a save file, and if I say yes, it will only make it to the usb memory stick.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.
btw, I've even tried editing the syslinux.cfg and update the line to this:
append initrd=initrd.gz pmedia=satahd Pdev1=sda2 pfix=copy

watchdog
Posts: 2021
Joined: Fri 28 Sep 2012, 18:04
Location: Italy

#2 Post by watchdog »

Copy to the hard drive at root dir with the savefile from the usb stick the main files needed to boot: initrd.gz, vmlinuz, the main sfs of your puppy, syslinux.cfg.
Open with geany syslinux.cfg copied to the hard drive and change pmedia=usbflash with pmedia=atahd. Boot the usb stick and at the first screen type:

Code: Select all

boot: puppy pmedia=atahd
When you complete the boot you can now remove the usb stick.
You can frugal install your puppy on the hard drive in a subdir and boot it by the usb stick.

Sylvander
Posts: 4416
Joined: Mon 15 Dec 2008, 11:06
Location: West Lothian, Scotland, UK

Re: USB Save issue

#3 Post by Sylvander »

mgraham wrote:Any save file on a memory stick is painfully slow to shutdown.
This is only true IF there is a save/copy of the session changes from RAM back to the pupsave file.
I have my Puppy set up so I can CHOOSE TO NOT SAVE any session changes.
[No auto-save during the session; offered the option at shutdown "to save or not to save", with "not save" as the default]
I normally do not save, and when not saving, shutdown takes only a few seconds [10?]
Actually, I can do an "improper-power-off" [press->release the on/off button] with no ill effects, and that's as quick as you can get, though I don't normally do it, because "Precise-5.6.1" will then auto-scan&fix the host PFS and pupsave filesystem at next boot.
Sometimes I deliberately poweroff to get the scan&fix; it fixes stuff [ext3 filesystems].

It's possible to do this even if the pupsave is on the HDD.
All my pupsave files are on my desktop PC's internal HDD, but are treated as though on a Flash drive.
I do this by editing the isolinux.cfg file [in my case, on bootable CD-RW] to include:
pmedia=ataflash

Would you like to do this?
Want to know how?

mgraham
Posts: 20
Joined: Sun 15 Jul 2012, 21:57
Location: San Jose, California

thanks

#4 Post by mgraham »

thanks to both replies. I will try them. i just realized i was not getting email when people reply, Thanks again,
I like the idea of not auto saving. I may need help on that. I'll try to figure it out.

mgraham
Posts: 20
Joined: Sun 15 Jul 2012, 21:57
Location: San Jose, California

update on how to

#5 Post by mgraham »

I found that I had to also edit the syslinux.cfg on the usb memory stick, to make pmedia=atahd.
thanks for your help!

Sylvander
Posts: 4416
Joined: Mon 15 Dec 2008, 11:06
Location: West Lothian, Scotland, UK

Re: update on how to

#6 Post by Sylvander »

mgraham wrote:I found that I had to also edit the syslinux.cfg on the usb memory stick, to make pmedia=atahd.
When you do this, do you get a "Save" icon on the desktop?

mgraham
Posts: 20
Joined: Sun 15 Jul 2012, 21:57
Location: San Jose, California

Save link on Desktop

#7 Post by mgraham »

Yes, the save link is on the desktop. However when I shutdown, i see the message that the partition is mounted at the top, so it is already saved.

So, I have not tested the save link on the desktop. I assume it would probably work.

Before I changed the syslinux.cfg on the usb memory stick, it would boot straight away using the save file on the memory stick, with no pause to allow me to enter "puppy pmedia=atahd". Perhaps I should delete the save file on the usb memory stick? Anyway it works nicely now.

Also, as per Sylvanders suggestion
I used the modification to the rc.shutdown script to ask whether to save back to memory stick and set the puppyscheduler to 0 to disable autosaves on another memory stick I use alot.

thanks to everyone for the support. Puppy is a very useful distro!

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