USB Flash Drive sized distribution of Linux.

[Workaholic]

As title, I am also looking at flash drives sized distributions as I can use it in different computers without having to copy/move files between....

However, if I move the drive into a 'new' computer i.e. one its never been used in before how long will it take to locate and install drivers. Is there a way so that it doesn't save the new settings, saving space (remembering that flash drives aren't as biig as Hard Drives).......?



Any recommendations on any good distros are welcome, I know of Knoppix and Floppix..

[peterb]

I suppose in theory you could copy a Knoppix CD to a 1G flash drive as an ISO file and boot off that, if the MOBO allows booting off a USB drive... Otherwise you would need a floppy disk with teh USB drivers on to really boot the system from scratch to the point where you could load the main OS from the USB drive. Think you may need to do some research... Google is your friend, as is the Knoppix home page.

[TheAnimus]

Damn Small Linux
DSL.

[ikonia]

this is a bit of a problem.

booting from usb has to be hardware supported by the machine.

Basiclly your looking for a livecd product, on a USB flash drive.

How big is your flash drive (eg: 1024mb = just copy knoppix into the flash drive) using the "make your own bootable cd" process.

To be honest, you'll find it much easier using a livecd. Its just as portable, and pretty much any computer will boot from cdrom by default.

unless you have a REAL need to use a usb drive, maybe you'r going overkill

[Workaholic]

this is a bit of a problem.

booting from usb has to be hardware supported by the machine.

Basiclly your looking for a livecd product, on a USB flash drive.

How big is your flash drive (eg: 1024mb = just copy knoppix into the flash drive) using the "make your own bootable cd" process.

To be honest, you'll find it much easier using a livecd. Its just as portable, and pretty much any computer will boot from cdrom by default.

unless you have a REAL need to use a usb drive, maybe you'r going overkill

I need to save 'homework' onto it as well as not all computers its intended to be used on has floppy or CD/DVD writer drives.

[directhex]

you're more likely to have things work by booting any livecd, then just saving to a usb pendrive

[ikonia]

to just make crystal clear what directhex said

boot from a livecd but mount say /home as a USB pen drive so that no matter what PC you run the livecd on you an always mount your /home from your portable pen drive.

If you plan to do work for periods of time or sustained usage, I'd consider not using a livecd. Your obviously keen to try to use linux hence your wanting to save your work, in this senario working from a livecd will beomce frustrating.

[peterb]

I agree with ikonia. However you can boot from a Knoppix CD but save your workspace and environment variables into a USB flash drive. That works very well, and means that most computers can be used (provided they will boot from CD) as the Knoppix CD does NOTHING to the hard drive. The Knoppixhome pages has the details. In practice all you need is the CD and the Pen drive, and any computer can be used. Even in cases where a computer won't boot from the CD, you can make a boot floppy which loads the CD drivers first, then allows the CD to run.

[TheAnimus]

TRY DAMN SMALL LINUX!

you people are making me shout! a 64meg pen is the minimum, but you'll get OO easily on a 512 with some nice headroom.

Its based on debian, so you can use debian packages. Its fairly straight forward to use, and is quite well designed as a linux to run off a USB stick/buisness card CD.

[ikonia]

don't think the distro matters to much, in terms on DSL, Knoppix, Ubuntu, Suse etc etc, all are acceptable size distros.

What I was saying was that for using it to work on, on a regular basis, a LiveCD may become frustrating, but as I said and peterb somehow missread me, you can use a usb pen to save your work from a livecd allowing you a portable distro, the problem I was pointing at before this was that to use a USB pen distro, your board needs to be able to boot from a USB device before harddisk, which not many PC's have enabled by default, which is why I suggested a livecd.

[peterb]

Soz Ikonia I did mis-read your post - I think we are in violent agreement DSL looks interesting in that you could fit it on a 'business card' CD so it would be easier to carry about. Problems booting from a Pen drive remain, whether it's DSL, Knoppix or any other CD distro.