Booting from a usb pen drive

[Sk!mD4Rk]

Hi all, happy new year....

I just bought a USB pen drive 128mb, usb2..... And i'm not sure how i go about booting from it.

My bios supports booting from USB floppy, Hd, Cdrom, zip, etc...

Thanks in advance.

[marc_ellis]

Why do you want to boot from a USB pen drive? flashing bios or something? if so a foppy disk will do.

[DaftpuNk]

All sorts of magical things could be done if you could.

[5cupa]

wouldent u just disable everything else booting apart from usb periphals or network?

[Agent]

Your mobo must support USB boot - not just USB floopy boot (although, iirc there is some software to format a pendrive so it emulates a floppy drive)

[Sk!mD4Rk]

Thats the software i'm looking for if anyone can help.

As for why, why not? like a mountain because it's there i spose. I want a floppyless system and would use the pen drive like a floppy amongst other things.

[Pita^Norf]

I've made bootable CDs that have emulated floppies before, but this is only possible due to the fact that the BIOS supports booting from a CDROM.

I'm not sure that it will work booting from a pendrive - correct me if I'm wrong but isn't there a need for a driver in order for a pendrive to work?

[knock_knock]

Originally posted by Pita^Norf
I've made bootable CDs that have emulated floppies before, but this is only possible due to the fact that the BIOS supports booting from a CDROM.

I'm not sure that it will work booting from a pendrive - correct me if I'm wrong but isn't there a need for a driver in order for a pendrive to work?

If a USB keyboard can be read why not a USB pendrive? Don't know a lot on this but I am sure I have heard of people booting off USB hard drives, surely it's same meat different gravy

[Pita^Norf]

Originally posted by knock_knock
If a USB keyboard can be read why not a USB pendrive? Don't know a lot on this but I am sure I have heard of people booting off USB hard drives, surely it's same meat different gravy

If you read my post carefully, I don't think I ever said the USB pendrive won't be recognised, I just questioned whether it required a driver for it to operate properly !

Have you ever had the problem when you plug a pendrive into an OS the first time and it has'nt worked without the proper drivers ?

[Enverex]

Originally posted by Pita^Norf
If you read my post carefully, I don't think I ever said the USB pendrive won't be recognised, I just questioned whether it required a driver for it to operate properly !

Have you ever had the problem when you plug a pendrive into an OS the first time and it has'nt worked without the proper drivers ?

Pen drives work without drivers on XP and 2k but require drivers for 9x.

To know if your machine supports booting from USB drives, plug it in, restart, and directly after the Post when you get a table of information (Award/Phoenix BIOS only) it should display the info about the plugged in USB Drive (regardless of whether it is formatted or anything).

[Pita^Norf]

Originally posted by Enverex
Pen drives work without drivers on XP and 2k but require drivers for 9x.

I was under the same impression, until I found out otherwise.

[Howard]

Pita, but it's true :S They're all detected as Mass Storage Devices.

[Enverex]

Originally posted by Pita^Norf
I was under the same impression, until I found out otherwise.

Oh? Do explain. As not only do they state this, but it has always been this way for me. They worked without extra drivers on XP and 2k, but asked for drivers when tried on 98 and ME.

[Swafe]

is it possible to boot off a SM card?

[knock_knock]

Originally posted by Pita^Norf
If you read my post carefully, I don't think I ever said the USB pendrive won't be recognised, I just questioned whether it required a driver for it to operate properly !

As a rule if my rig knows what it is it knows how to work it

And yea what the guys said, I have only ever used a pen drive via the NT kernel based OSes and it's always been plug and go