Dual Boot Pendrive

[Octavia Leithoff]

Ihave an Ubuntu 10.10 / Windows 7 dual boot environment. Occasionally, I want to boot directly off a USB stick or USB-connected portable HD and either by-pass the dual-boot GRUB loader or add a boot option for the bootable USB device(s).

The BIOS priority setting is not ignored. Your USB is likely registering as a HD in the BIOS - try reordering which HD device boots first (usually labelled USB-something) rather than setting USB to boot first.

I don't think it has anything to do with dual-booting grub. I have Xp & Mint and I just tested setting USB as default boot entry and it worked. Maybe you should try restore BIOS setting and then give it another shot.

That said, your usb device can register as a HDD (as another poster said). Quite often, you can press a button during the BIOS splash to select you boot device manually (often F12). I find this way easier, as it is the exception that I boot off a usb, and therefore don't want my computer to boot from it if I forget a usb key in there.

I want to install Ubuntu on my laptop that doesn't have a CD-ROM drive and I have no spare USB disk. I've tried Wubi, but that doesn't seem to work (since it prompts me to have the CD in the drive, which I don't have).

Note that bootmgr is entered as such; that's not a notation for a variable. Also, change refind_x64.efi to refind_ia32.efi on systems with 32-bit EFIs. Such computers are rare, and most of them are tablets. Check your Windows bit depth to determine which binary you should use.

Instead of using WUBI, you can create an additional partition, or use an additional hard drive to write the liveCD image to, using unetbootin.Then you boot from this partition and continue the same way you would as if you'd be booting from a USB or CD.

You can use UNetbootin to install Ubuntu 15.04 from Windows 7 into a dual boot system without the use of a cd/dvd or a USB drive. I am writing this from a fresh Ubuntu 15.04 install using the method below.

Create Unallocated Unformatted free space on the C drive[Control Panel> Administrative Tools>Computer Management>Disk Manager>right click the C drive>Shrink Volume]I believe the suggested space for a full Ubuntu install is 16 Gig, I made 41,000 MB about 40 Gig. Just type the size into the already selected box. The wording MS uses is confusing be assured typing 41000 will make 40Gig free space. click next if it asks to format DON'T Also Do Not assign a letter to the newly made volume.

Run UNetbootin [choose disk image radio button and select the Ubuntu ISO image you downloaded. Make sure that Type: Hard Disk is selected in the drop down. Make sure Drive: C:\ drive is selected in the drop down. Click OK] The program will run through 4 steps and then ask to reboot now...Comply

After you look around a bit you will notice an Install Ubuntu 15.04 shortcut on the desktop [start the install, I think the 4th step of the install shows the main volume with Windows and the free space you created using Disk Manager. [Make sure you click the free space and set it for "/", click continue install] Takes a few minutes then it will reboot automatically. If you don't press any keys it will default to the Ubuntu OS. Let it boot. setup your WiFi look around a bit then reboot when you are ready. Upon reboot arrow to Windows and it will boot Windows 7 boot loader where you will see the UNetbootin is still a choice. Windows will be the default there and allow to boot.

As I stated before I am typing this from Chromium running on Ubuntu 15.04. I wrote all this so you wouldn't be worried about using other partition software such as Gparted or Parted Magic. No need to purchase anything Windows already has a good tool> Disk Manager

You need to turn of fast boot in Windows. You need to turn of TPM and Secure boot in UEFI ( what some people still but incorrectly call BIOS ) to install Ubuntu. You can install Ubuntu ( or another .iso ) if you install e.g. Grub2Win and make it your primairy bootloader. You need to add the option to boot from .iso in the bootmenu.

Then when booting choose the .iso.

Delete all the partitions where you'll install linux. On Windows 7 / 8 do it from "Computer Management". (some partitions are protected, and windows won't allow VMWare to access the disk if they're not removed first).

This answer will explain how to use Windows CMD to boot from the Ubuntu ISO file in the C partition without needing a USB flash drive or creating another partition.

This step is optional. if you don't want to install sudo, you can open cmd as administrator, delete sudo word from any command in this guide, and go to step 2.To install sudo for Windows, open Windows cmd and apply this command:

"gsudo is a sudo equivalent for Windows, with a similaruser-experience as the original Unix/Linux sudo. Allows you to run acommand (or re-launch your current shell) with elevated permissions,in the current console window or a new one."

Save and exit notepad. make sure that is C partition the first partition in your hard disk. if it is the second partition, replace set root='hd0,msdos1' by set root='hd0,msdos2' in the second menu entry.

create imaging resource on bootable USB drive (256 GB) which will contain finalized laptop configuration. This is to say, I want to boot from the flash drive and use the same flash drive to store the image created by clonezilla and as needed, to restore the image at a later date.

Limited. I've used bootable optical media for both clonezilla and gparted, as well as bootable Linux Live CD media, but I'm not a qualified *nix operator. My capabilities are akin to a code kitty(?) / kiddie in that I copy others' work in order to accomplish my occasional *nix objectives, often using Ubuntu.

A number of sites providing tutorials/guidance to create dual (or multi-) boot USB drives using Windows utilities (my choice at this stage). I've also found the source .ISO files for both clonezilla and gparted. I've found this answer, which appeared when I created the subject line but it doesn't appear to solve the objective.

One of the laptops does not have an optical drive. I'd prefer to have both machines to use a bootable flash drive for ease of storage. I'm aiming for a minimum *nix install on the flash drive, to allow greater storage for the created image file. The image file will be of the entire drive, all partitions, as the laptops contain multiple partitions which support manufacturer's nuances (Dell Alienware).

I'd like to avoid having to boot from one flash drive and store the image file to a second flash drive, simply to avoid the creation of three drives (one boot, two image), but as a last resort, that's acceptable. It is also the route that I can travel without additional support from SE, but the challenge of learning something new vanishes.

If such a solution involves a bootable drive that contains both clonezilla and gparted, I'd find that acceptable, especially as it would provide greater capacity remaining for the image file. My current approach of creating a multi-boot flash drive would eat up twice as much as I'd expect would be necessary.

When creating the configurations suggested above, will the process use a minimum partition size on the drive, allowing the remaining space for image storage? Adjunct to that, will I have to manually create the unused space for that purpose?

Let's say that I can do without the gparted aspect of this project. This means that I can use the canned utilities for Windows to create a bootable USB for clonezilla. I'm comfortable using that program.

I think I might have fallen into the x/y question trap. Based on the comments, I realized that my objective was poorly founded. I accomplished my objective with a different approach than the dual boot.

By creating the flash drive on another (ubuntu) machine, which I realize now could have been a LiveCD boot but was not, I was able to also use gparted to resize and format a second partition on the clonezilla boot USB drive.

The boot went without problems and the cloning also created the necessary image files on the second partition. I discovered that the high compression option creates a process which lasts about eight hours!

John has provided some great resources on his site along with the modified BIOS needed to make installing Linux on a Chromebook possible. For dual booting on a Chromebook you should use the RW_LEGACY BIOS mod. You may find my post about the difference between BOOT_STUB and RW_LEGACY useful as well.

I seem to be missing steps from tutorials I am seeing online about how to move HiveOS from the USB over to the SSD and ensure that it only attempts to use the 32GB of unused space on the 444.3G Microsoft basic data, while still retaining the correct information to allow for the dual boot.

Thats true - it can be done either way - but in general any windows under 7 uses mbr and 8 or newer can use either, but prefers gpt. Linux can use both. As well, the hive os on usb genrally is a gpt format. The basic difference is that mbr only allows up to 4 primary partitions, gpt allows more. But using mbr - onecna make 3 primary and the fourth partion is also primary but extended - meaning you can have numerous logical drives on it. Linux generally has no problem to run from a logical drive - windows generally prefers not to.

To find which device is which use fdisk -l

The drive sizes shown should tell you which is usb and which is hard drive

When finished it will have a message saying 800 in and out and this may take a while.

To have it all connect and run on boot with worker, farm, rig and wifi all setup , edit the rig.conf file and the wifi connect file in windows on usb - instructions are in the folders on the USB.

its not a matter of can, you HAVE to partition the drive if you want to dual boot. The thing is how to get fydeos installed in that partition without having booted into it. It is doable it will just take a lot of imagination and scripting ability.

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