Several versions of Linux won't work on two different brands of thumb drives

[andrew_...@yahoo.com]

I used to use Linux Mint and Puppy on my pen drive, but now neither one of them and at least three others will work.

I even tried another brand of pen drive.

I liked puppy linux because it ran so fast.

Any ideas ?

Andy

[kcGSH6nC]

dmesg after you plug it in would be helpful.

[unruh]

Maybe you should tell us what you mean by "neither...will work". What
does that mean? They burst into flames? They display pornographic pictures on the
screen? They do not boot at all (on what machines?) There is some error
message (what is it), etc.
>
> Any ideas ?
No You need to give more information.

>
> Andy

[andrew_...@yahoo.com]

Did you misspell something ?

[andrew_...@yahoo.com]

What other info do you need ?

In my case, not working means when I booted from the pendrive,it went to the Windows Operating System.

[Auric__]

andrew_kennedy7 wrote:

> On Sunday, January 13, 2013 10:44:20 PM UTC-6, kcGSH6nC wrote:
>> andrew_...@yahoo.com wrote:
>>
>> > I used to use Linux Mint and Puppy on my pen drive, but now neither
>> > one of them and at least three others will work.
>> >
>> > I even tried another brand of pen drive.
>> >
>> > I liked puppy linux because it ran so fast.
>> >
>> > Any ideas ?
>>

>> dmesg after you plug it in would be helpful.
>
> Did you misspell something ?

No, but I believe kcGSH6nC assumed you were plugging in the thumb drive while
booted into one of those systems, while I read your post to say that you're
trying to boot one of them from the thumb drive (which your response to unruh
confirms).

As for dmesg...

NAME
dmesg - print or control the kernel ring buffer

SYNOPSIS
dmesg [-c] [-r] [-n level] [-s bufsize]

DESCRIPTION
dmesg is used to examine or control the kernel ring buffer.

The program helps users to print out their bootup messages. Instead
of copying the messages by hand, the user need only:
dmesg > boot.messages
and mail the boot.messages file to whoever can debug their problem.

Of course, this will only do you some good if you can get Linux booted...

--
*There's* a hole with no bottom.

[Richard Kettlewell]

andrew_...@yahoo.com writes:
> In my case, not working means when I booted from the pendrive,it went
> to the Windows Operating System.

Sounds like you need to tell your BIOS to boot from USB first.

--
http://www.greenend.org.uk/rjk/

[crankypuss]

Then either (a) you only thought you were booting from the pendrive but
were not, or (b) somehow the boot-loader on the pendrive has been modified.

It seems most likely that you forgot to hold down the F12 (or
equivalent) key while booting so you could select the boot device from
the menu your BIOS presents.

[Deepfriedice]

It also might be worth considering HOW you put those images on the pen
drive (FS copy vs raw copy), but I'd save that until after you try
accessing the boot menu / adjusting the BIOS.

[andrew_...@yahoo.com]

> accessing Bboot menu / adjusting the BIOS.

I already instructed the BIOS to boot from the pendrive.

There are many versions that install the many versions of Linux. :-)

Is there a version which checks if it has been installed CORRECTLY and is bootable ?

[unruh]

That is a start. That may mean you forgot to tell the computer bios to
try booting from the pen drive before booting from the hard drive. If
you do not know what I am talking about then that is almost certainly
the problem.

[unruh]

On 2013-01-14, andrew_...@yahoo.com <andrew_...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> On Monday, January 14, 2013 5:11:28 AM UTC-6, Deepfriedice wrote:
>> On 14/01/13 19:47, crankypuss wrote:
>>
>> > On 01/14/2013 01:40 AM, andrew_...@yahoo.com wrote:
>>
>> >> On Monday, January 14, 2013 1:53:37 AM UTC-6, unruh wrote:
>>
>> >>> On 2013-01-14, andrew_...@yahoo.com <andrew_...@yahoo.com>
>>
>> >>> wrote:
>> >>>> I used to use Linux Mint and Puppy on my pen drive, but now neither
>> >>>> one of them and at least three others will work.
>> >>>> I even tried another brand of pen drive.
>> >>>> I liked puppy linux because it ran so fast.
>> >>> Maybe you should tell us what you mean by "neither...will work". What
>> >>> does that mean? They burst into flames? They display pornographic
>> >>> pictures on the
>> >>> screen? They do not boot at all (on what machines?) There is some error
>> >>> message (what is it), etc.
>> >>>> Any ideas ?
>> >>> No You need to give more information.

>> >> What other info do you need ?
>> >> In my case, not working means when I booted from the pendrive,it went
>> >> to the Windows Operating System.
>> > Then either (a) you only thought you were booting from the pendrive but
>> > were not, or (b) somehow the boot-loader on the pendrive has been modified.
>> > It seems most likely that you forgot to hold down the F12 (or
>> > equivalent) key while booting so you could select the boot device from
>> > the menu your BIOS presents.
>> It also might be worth considering HOW you put those images on the pen
>> drive (FS copy vs raw copy), but I'd save that until after you try
>> accessing Bboot menu / adjusting the BIOS.
> I already instructed the BIOS to boot from the pendrive.
> There are many versions that install the many versions of Linux. :-)
> Is there a version which checks if it has been installed CORRECTLY and is bootable ?

You have trouble imagining how someone else will read your messages. Is
there a version of WHAT which checks...? There are many versions of
WHAT?

[kcGSH6nC]

Auric__ wrote:
> No, but I believe kcGSH6nC assumed you were plugging in the thumb drive while
> booted into one of those systems, while I read your post to say that you're
> trying to boot one of them from the thumb drive (which your response to unruh
> confirms).

That is correct. That said, you really didn't provide enough
information. I'm sure one of the dozens of other replies has asked you
how it doesn't work, so I'll just butt out. My apologies.

[andrew_...@yahoo.com]

I will try somewhere else.

I thought I was posting to a group who had some members that have installed Linux to a pendrive.

Andy

[Deepfriedice]

> I already instructed the BIOS to boot from the pendrive.

Great.

> There are many versions that install the many versions of Linux. :-)
> Is there a version which checks if it has been installed CORRECTLY and is bootable ?

Many versions of what? Copy utilities?


Lets back up a bit.

What Distro are you trying to boot to, and how exactly did you put it on
the flash drive?

[unruh]

It has lots of people who installed Linux to a pendrive. It has very
very few people who are mindreaders. The only information we have about
your problems is what you tell us, and you seem determined not to tell
us much. As you can see, lots of people are very confused with your
problem, and though they might like to help, they cannot, since they
have no idea what your problem is, except it does not work.

(PS, your emailer sticks blank lines between your postings, which means
that if you quote, you rapidly have a huger file, mostly of quoted blank
lines.. Perhaps a better mailer? I have removed the blank lines in the
above.)

[unruh]

Apparently he is not interested in telling us what he did, or providing
details. He only wants to talk to people who are mindreaders.

[andrew_...@yahoo.com]

Good, someone who is cool and calm and isn't determined to be combative.

I had Linux Mint installed SUCESSFULLY on a Verbatim 4 Gb pendrive.

I used Universal USB Installer to install it.

Best regards,
Andy

[unruh]

On 2013-01-15, andrew_...@yahoo.com <andrew_...@yahoo.com> wrote:

OK, is this what did not work? What do you mean "installed
SUCCESSFULLY"? This was on a Windows machine? Did your laptop boot with
this one, or was it what you had trouble with?

Note you still have not answered the questions which you were asked by a
number of people.

Can you describe exactly what happened when you put in the pendrive and
switched on the laptop?

[Deepfriedice]

Okay, First of all, it doesn't sound like you installed Mint to the
flash drive - you probably copieed it the the flash drive. (yes those
are different things).

There are five possibilities I can see here:
1) The ISO image is corrupt.
2) The flash drive is broken.
3) The program you are using failed to copy the image to the flash drive.
4) You aren't accessing the boot menu properly.
5) You're computers Bios is messed up.

For the sake of simplicity, lets remove them all.

Re-download Mint
Burn it to a CD
Reboot the PC with the disk inserted.

Then lets see what happens.

[Deepfriedice]

On 15/01/13 12:45, andrew_...@yahoo.com wrote:

Oh, and I just noticed another thing:
It's possible the issue is with the disk imaging program you used.

Looking around, win32diskimager is pretty well regarded and happens to
be recommended by the RPi folk. (writing a ISO file to USB is the same
as writing a RPi OS to a SD card)

https://launchpad.net/win32-image-writer/0.5/0.5/+download/win32diskimager-binary.zip

I would recommend giving it a go using this program, it might just fix
the problem.

[andrew_...@yahoo.com]

Have a good night.

[Jasen Betts]

On 2013-01-14, andrew_...@yahoo.com <andrew_...@yahoo.com> wrote:

>
> In my case, not working means when I booted from the pendrive,it went to the Windows Operating System.

sounds a lot like some sort of bios limitation, or possilby the
incorrect method of installing the OS on the drive.



--
⚂⚃ 100% natural

--- news://freenews.netfront.net/ - complaints: ne...@netfront.net ---

[kcGSH6nC]

andrew_...@yahoo.com wrote:
> Good, someone who is cool and calm and isn't determined to be combative.

You've got an odd definition for combative. Asking for more information
is not combative, it's the second step in the troubleshooting process.
The first step is to figure out if you have what you need. The answer to
that was "no," hence our asking for more information.

"Not working" is not very useful. "Just boots into Windows," is actually
very helpful. The next step is to verify that your BIOS is configured to
boot USB, and if possible determine if it's even trying to do that. I've
seen BIOS that outright ignored the user telling it to boot from USB -
while the menu entries were there, the actual code was never written
into the BIOS (so it just nop'ed and moved on to the next boot entry)

Along those lines, have you ever gotten -anything- to boot off this
machine (or these machines, if plural) via USB?

[kcGSH6nC]

andrew_...@yahoo.com wrote:
>
> Have a good night.
>

Help us help you. None of us can wave a magic wand and make it work for you.

This applies: http://preview.tinyurl.com/bavkdge

[Jasen Betts]

On 2013-01-15, Deepfriedice <Deepfr...@gmail.com> wrote:

> On 15/01/13 12:45, andrew_...@yahoo.com wrote:

>> Good, someone who is cool and calm and isn't determined to be combative.
>>
>> I had Linux Mint installed SUCESSFULLY on a Verbatim 4 Gb pendrive.
>>
>> I used Universal USB Installer to install it.

from the "UUI site"

.Feel free to inform me of unlisted Live Linux distributions, and or
.version revisions for listed distributions, and I will do my best to
.update the UUI tool to support them.

that doesn't sound very universal to me

> First of all, it doesn't sound like you installed Mint to the
> flash drive - you probably copieed it the the flash drive. (yes those
> are different things).
>
> There are five possibilities I can see here:
> 1) The ISO image is corrupt.
> 2) The flash drive is broken.
> 3) The program you are using failed to copy the image to the flash drive.
> 4) You aren't accessing the boot menu properly.
> 5) You're computers Bios is messed up.

6) the ISO image you installed is not in the format expected by UUI

Eg: Debian recently switched to an ISO format that natively supports
both flash and optiocal boot.

--
⚂⚃ 100% natural

[andrew_...@yahoo.com]

> ⚂⚃ 10I0% natural

#1 Doubtful since I have used several different iso images
2 I use it currently to store other files
3. I see the image on the pendrive
4. That might be a possibility, I have puppy linux on A cd, will try it it out to see if it still works ok.
5. Will have to read up on UUI

[andrew_...@yahoo.com]

Jasen,

I am typing this after successful booting from a CD containing Linux puppy.

I will try installing it to my pendrive using the Disk Imager program that was suggested.

Andy

[andrew_...@yahoo.com]

I put the Linux Puppy on the pendrive, but it would not boot to that drive when picked from the BIOS.

These files were on the pendrive.

I am going to take a break from the matter, it works from a CD and that is good enuf for now.

Thanks for your help.

Directory of F:\

01/26/2009 02:21 AM 13,671 ldlinux.sys
01/15/2013 10:25 AM 49 syslinux.cfg
01/15/2013 10:25 AM 2,868,400 vmlinuz
01/15/2013 10:25 AM 1,875,085 initrd.gz
01/15/2013 10:25 AM 164,270,112 puppy_slacko_5.4.sfs
01/15/2013 10:32 AM 805,306,368 slackosave-Puppy_Save_Session.2fs

[unruh]

On 2013-01-15, andrew_...@yahoo.com <andrew_...@yahoo.com> wrote:

>> ?????? 10I0% natural

>
> #1 Doubtful since I have used several different iso images
> 2 I use it currently to store other files
> 3. I see the image on the pendrive
> 4. That might be a possibility, I have puppy linux on A cd, will try it it out to see if it still works ok.
> 5. Will have to read up on UUI

Please please fix your mailer. Your emails are coming out with huge
numbers of quoted blank lines. (I have removed them in the above) making
your posts very very hard to read.

"I use "it" to store other files. -- What does the the it mean? That
same pen drive?
What do you mean "I see the image on the pendrive" mean. You should NOT
see the image on the pendrive if that means an iso image. What do you
see on the pendrive? The filesystem used by live cds is not a standard
filesystem.

[Auric__]

unruh wrote:

> On 2013-01-15, andrew_...@yahoo.com <andrew_...@yahoo.com>
> wrote:

[snip]

>> #1 Doubtful since I have used several different iso images
>> 2 I use it currently to store other files
>> 3. I see the image on the pendrive
>> 4. That might be a possibility, I have puppy linux on A cd, will try it
>> it out to see if it still works ok. 5. Will have to read up on UUI
>
> Please please fix your mailer. Your emails are coming out with huge
> numbers of quoted blank lines. (I have removed them in the above) making
> your posts very very hard to read.

Andrew's using Google Groups. I've been seeing this elsewhere recently. I'm
not sure what they've done or what the fix might be.

--
- You call yourself a patriot, and loyal subject to the Crown?
- I do not call myself subject to much at all.

[Deepfriedice]

Um I'm pretty sure that that looks wrong; Windows shouldn't be able to
read a flashdrive with live system on it.

You need to do a raw copy from the image onto the flash drive, not just
move the contents of the image onto the fat32 file system.

[Jasen Betts]

On 2013-01-16, Deepfriedice <Deepfr...@gmail.com> wrote:

>> Directory of F:\
>>
>> 01/26/2009 02:21 AM 13,671 ldlinux.sys
>> 01/15/2013 10:25 AM 49 syslinux.cfg
>> 01/15/2013 10:25 AM 2,868,400 vmlinuz
>> 01/15/2013 10:25 AM 1,875,085 initrd.gz
>> 01/15/2013 10:25 AM 164,270,112 puppy_slacko_5.4.sfs
>> 01/15/2013 10:32 AM 805,306,368 slackosave-Puppy_Save_Session.2fs
>>
>
> Um I'm pretty sure that that looks wrong; Windows shouldn't be able to
> read a flashdrive with live system on it.

that looks about right to me for a syslinux boot.

syslinux is a dos device driver that performs the task of a linux
bootloader, and boots from a FAT filesystem.

[kcGSH6nC]

Agreed. Note though you've got to run the syslinux tool to actually put
that boot code into the first "sector" of the device. Once the BIOS
loads that, it can get to the rest of the files on the stick.

Basically the same thing as isolinux, just designed for non-ISO filesystems.

[andrew_...@yahoo.com]

You love to complain, don't you ?

[unruh]

You want help. I am pointing out to you that there are things you are
doing that get in the way of your getting help.
1) You do not tell us exactly what you did that got you into trouble.
2) Your posts are unreadable due to the formatting

Please if you do not want help, let us know so we can ignore you. If you
do want help, surely you want to maximize the chances that you will get
it.
I am trying to help you, both with your original problem, whatever it
is, and with your trying to get help.

[TJ]

He's the one doing most of the complaining. Looks to me like he's
already let you know that he only wants help under his terms. He isn't
interested in doing what he needs to do to get the help he seeks. The
above post plainly shows that.

You made a valiant effort, but it's time to turn away. You can't educate
someone who doesn't want to be educated.

TJ

[TJ]

On 01/15/2013 03:48 PM, Auric__ wrote:

> unruh wrote:
>
>>
>> Please please fix your mailer. Your emails are coming out with huge
>> numbers of quoted blank lines. (I have removed them in the above) making
>> your posts very very hard to read.
>
> Andrew's using Google Groups. I've been seeing this elsewhere recently. I'm
> not sure what they've done or what the fix might be.
>

He's lucky he's getting any attention at all. Many longtime Usenet users
ignore anything coming from Google Groups.

TJ

[Auric__]

I did that for a while, but I decided, WTH, it can't be any worse than the
September that Never Ended.

--
This group is especially hopeless today.

[TJ]

I get that. I never did killfile GG, though some of its users made me
think about it. But there are idiots with attitude everywhere, not just
Google Groups. I would have attempted to help this guy too, had I the
expertise required. But it would only have taken one rebuff of the sort
he's been handing out for me to leave again.

At least with E-S my posts get through and the spam filters are pretty
good. Another "free" service I used for a short while, Tera News, did
poorly on both counts.

TJ

[cipher]

On Thu, 17 Jan 2013 07:27:19 -0500, TJ Inscribed upon the Golden Tablets
of Usenet thusly:

He seems a classic Stealth Troll...



--
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
)\ ( ) /( Cipher/Proud Member, Netscum Alumni Association
)-(0^^0)-( Bungmunch U./AHM Memorial Institute of F@x0r1n6/Dean
)/ \\// \( Colonel/1st Virginia Volunteers/CeSium Brigade
(oo) Registered Linux User #556617
/ ~~ \ Empire of APDD/#6-5p07/VLNOC Cohort #1407
o@o o@o Keeper of the alt.CeSium FAQ
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[J G Miller]

On Thursday, January 17th, 2013, at 21:02:44h +0000,
Cipher suggested:

> He seems a classic Stealth Troll...

With carbon fiber coating? ;)

Here is some good advice on how to deal with trolls --

<http://www.medhelp.ORG/tags/health_page/146/Autism/How-to-Deal-With-Forum-Trolls?hp_id=47>

[Auric__]

TJ wrote:

> At least with E-S my posts get through and the spam filters are pretty
> good. Another "free" service I used for a short while, Tera News, did
> poorly on both counts.

I've been using Tera for around 10 years now, for binary groups. Between the
killfile and a functioning brain on my end, I deal with spam pretty decently.
(But yeah, their throughput with posting sucks. I've had a post take a week
to show up before.)

--
Maybe it was not a real "noble purpose"
but it would do for the time being.

[andrew_...@yahoo.com]

Not hopeless.

Andy

[Auric__]

It's a quote from the game Baldur's Gate. ;-)

--
NEVER ever lie to the police. It makes a bad situation worse.

[andrew_...@yahoo.com]

OKee Dokee.

Andy

[Gordon]

On 2013-01-14, andrew_...@yahoo.com <andrew_...@yahoo.com> wrote:

> I used to use Linux Mint and Puppy on my pen drive, but now neither one of them and at least three others will work.
>
> I even tried another brand of pen drive.
>
> I liked puppy linux because it ran so fast.
>
That is because it loads and runs from/in memory.

[Gordon]

On 2013-01-15, andrew_...@yahoo.com <andrew_...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>

> #1 Doubtful since I have used several different iso images
> 2 I use it currently to store other files
> 3. I see the image on the pendrive
> 4. That might be a possibility, I have puppy linux on A cd, will try it it out to see if it still works ok.
> 5. Will have to read up on UUI

Do you have a working Linux system to create the USB? If is Unetbootin is
also worth a go. Bit of a catch 22 if you do not.

[Gordon]

On 2013-01-15, Auric__ <not.m...@email.address> wrote:
> unruh wrote:
>
>> On 2013-01-15, andrew_...@yahoo.com <andrew_...@yahoo.com>
>> wrote:
> [snip]
>>> #1 Doubtful since I have used several different iso images
>>> 2 I use it currently to store other files
>>> 3. I see the image on the pendrive
>>> 4. That might be a possibility, I have puppy linux on A cd, will try it
>>> it out to see if it still works ok. 5. Will have to read up on UUI
>>
>> Please please fix your mailer. Your emails are coming out with huge
>> numbers of quoted blank lines. (I have removed them in the above) making
>> your posts very very hard to read.
>
> Andrew's using Google Groups. I've been seeing this elsewhere recently.

That is as maybe, but his one line response "You like to complain alot" over
rules this. If he said that he used GG then fine, we could all swear at
Google and carry on.

The interesting point is that we all just have walked around the flame bait
and said Nah! Not taken it.

After it is all over, the problem may remain, despite the collective
knowledge which is able to fix it.

[Gordon]

On 2013-01-17, TJ <T...@noneofyour.business> wrote:
> On 01/17/2013 09:13 AM, Auric__ wrote:
>> TJ wrote:
>>
>>> On 01/15/2013 03:48 PM, Auric__ wrote:
>>>> unruh wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Please please fix your mailer. Your emails are coming out with huge
>>>>> numbers of quoted blank lines. (I have removed them in the above) making
>>>>> your posts very very hard to read.
>>>>
>>>> Andrew's using Google Groups. I've been seeing this elsewhere recently.
>>>> I'm not sure what they've done or what the fix might be.
>>>>
>>> He's lucky he's getting any attention at all. Many longtime Usenet users
>>> ignore anything coming from Google Groups.
>>
>> I did that for a while, but I decided, WTH, it can't be any worse than the
>> September that Never Ended.
>>
> I get that. I never did killfile GG, though some of its users made me
> think about it. But there are idiots with attitude everywhere, not just
> Google Groups.

Indeed.

> I would have attempted to help this guy too, had I the
> expertise required. But it would only have taken one rebuff of the sort
> he's been handing out for me to leave again.

Nice summary. When asking for help one needs to "do as one is told" and
report back in detail.

With several people working on the problem, it is very likely it will be
solved.