USB Booting FC6

[nilesh vaghela]

The following may Help you.

I have not tried yet.

Keyword: USB EXTERNAL REDHAT LINUX RHEL BOOT INITRD INSTALL

     1. Install RedHat RHEL 4 AS to the USB Hard Drive

Boot RHEL4 Installation CD, enter "expert". Partition your USB Hard
drive manually. In my case, I created 1GB /dev/sda1 mounted as /boot and
/dev/sda5 mounted as / (root), I also have /dev/sda7 SWAP partition.

After installation, boot from the RHEL4 Installation CD again, type
"linux rescue", don't let the installer mount the USB hard drive
partitions.


     2. Mount partitions


mount /dev/sda5 /mnt/source
mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/source/boot
chroot /mnt/source


     3. Restore initrd image


cp /boot/initrd-2.6.9-5.EL.img /tmp/initrd.gz
cd /tmp
gunzip initrd.gz

mkdir /tmp/a
cd /tmp/a
cpio -i < /tmp/initrd
(Output: 2078 blocks)


     4. Edit init script to load USB drivers


vi /tmp/a/init

#!/bin/nash
mount -t proc /proc /proc
setquiet
echo Mounted /proc filesystem
echo Mounting sysfs
mount -t sysfs none /sys
echo Creating /dev
mount -o mode=0755 -t tmpfs none /dev
mknod /dev/console c 5 1
mknod /dev/null c 1 3
mknod /dev/zero c 1 5
mkdir /dev/pts
mkdir /dev/shm
echo Starting udev
/sbin/udevstart
echo -n "/sbin/hotplug" > /proc/sys/kernel/hotplug
echo "Loading scsi_mod.ko module"
insmod /lib/scsi_mod.ko
echo "Loading sd_mod.ko module"
insmod /lib/sd_mod.ko
echo "Loading libata.ko module"
insmod /lib/libata.ko
echo "Loading ata_piix.ko module"
insmod /lib/ata_piix.ko
echo "Loading jbd.ko module"
insmod /lib/jbd.ko
echo "Loading ext3.ko module"
insmod /lib/ext3.ko

*
############################## ########
echo "*** Loading usb-storage ***"
insmod /lib/usb-storage.ko
echo "*** Loading usb-uhci ***"
insmod /lib/ehci-hcd.ko
echo "*** Sleeping 5 seconds ***"
/bin/sleep 5
*

/sbin/udevstart
echo Creating root device
mkrootdev /dev/root

*
echo "*** Reread partition table ***"
/sbin/sfdisk -R /dev/sda
*

umount /sys
echo Mounting root filesystem
mount -o defaults --ro -t ext3 /dev/root /sysroot
mount -t tmpfs --bind /dev /sysroot/dev
echo Switching to new root
switchroot /sysroot
umount /initrd/dev


     5. Copy USB drivers



cd /lib/modules/2.6.9-5.EL/kernel/drivers
cp usb/host/ehci-hcd.ko /tmp/a/lib
cp usb/storage/usb-storage.ko /tmp/a/lib
cp scsi/scsi_mod.ko /tmp/a/lib
cp scsi/sd_mod.ko /tmp/a/lib


     6. Copy executables and dependent libraries



ldd /bin/sleep
ldd /sbin/sfdisk
cp /lib/tls/libm.so.6 /lib/tls/librt.so.1 /lib/tls/libc.so.6
/lib/tls/libpthread.so.0 /tmp/a/lib/tls
cp /lib/ld-linux.so.2 /tmp/a/lib/
cp /bin/sleep /sbin/sfdisk /tmp/a/bin/


     7. Re-Make the init image


cd /tmp/a
find . | cpio -c -o | gzip -9 > /boot/usbinitrd.img
(output: 6077 blocks)


     8. Edit grub.conf to boot from the new usbinitrd.img


vi /boot/grub/grub.conf

Reboot your system, Modify your BIOS to make USB Drive boot first, Enjoy!


     Questions?


Email me: liulijian at gmail.com

Lijian Liu,
Sendmail, Inc.


On 11/14/06, Rupesh <rupeshn at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 11/14/06, Cannon, Andrew <Andrew.Cannon at amecnnc.com> wrote:
> >
> > 1) You installed GRUB on the laptop's internal drive and GRUB hasn't got
> the
> > USB drivers to see the USB disk.
>
> No it's installed on Maxtor, I thought I had this problem first time,
> so i re-installed the OS to verify the above but it didn't work the
> 2nd time.
>
> > 2) You are not booting from the USB disk (as set in the BIOS).
>
> I use F12 option and manually choose to boot from the Maxtor (USB DISK).
>
> > 3) You are trying to boot from the USB disk as set in the BIOS, but you
> > haven't got a boot sector set up on the USB disk (possibly because of
> 1))
> > and so the system thinks that there is no boot media on the external
> drive.
> >
> > What options are you using for the BIOS and where is GRUB installed?
> >
>
> Answer as in Point 2.
>
> --
> Rupesh
>
> --
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-- 
Nilesh Vaghela
ElectroMech
Redhat Channel Partner and Training Partner
74, Nalanda Complex, Satellite Rd, Ahmedabad
25, The Emperor, Fatehgunj, Baroda.
www.electromech.info