Making bootable UBS Help

[Diekan]

Hello all,

Been trying to get working install of Mint on a UBS stick to use with my laptop. So far no good.

I have an ASUS G60V gaming laptop with Windows 7.
I downloaded Lisa.
I used an 8 gig thumb drive.
I used "Startup Disk Creator" to installed the version on the thumb drive.

Plugged it in and fired up the laptop - went right to Windows.

Rebooted and went into the BIOS - changed the boot sequence to look for removable drives first.

Rebooted - went right into Windows.

Decided try a CD to see if the problem was with the USB or the laptop.

Made an install CD with Lisa - popped it in the laptop drive - and it booted right to Windows. This is after I changed the boot sequence to look for CD ROM first.

Again it booted right to Windows.

So, finially I used the CD I used to install Lisa on the machine I am writing this from. Agian, booted right to Windows.

Tried an old Ubuntu installtion disk - booted right to Windows.

Am I missing something? Any ideas?

Thanks in advance.

[jonnycat]

In my BIOS I had to set "Hard Drive Priority" to boot from the USB drive before the existing HDD in addition to setting the boot order sequence. In other words, my BIOS considers the bootable USB stick to be an HDD.

[odo5435]

In my BIOS I had to set "Hard Drive Priority" to boot from the USB drive before the existing HDD in addition to setting the boot order sequence. In other words, my BIOS considers the bootable USB stick to be an HDD.

Yes. My ASUS netbook is the same. When the USB stick is attached the BIOS offers another Option under the Device Priority where you select either the internal HDD or the USB to boot from. The option only shows when a unit is attached. Without the USB stick attached it doesn't appear. Had me stymied for ages too.

[Diekan]

Thanks for the adivce.... tried it - still no go. I went ahead and put Ubuntu 12.04 on it. Actually, impressed with how smoothly it went. I hate Unity, but I am amazed at how easy Ubuntu installed - no tweaking, no extra work - just bam done.

Anyway, I will keep Mint on my desktop and maybe mess around with it later. I love to tweak and play around with technology, but at times I don't have time to "figure it out." I need it to work when I need it to work.

Which begs the question....

Why do you think different distros are more friendly to differnet platforms?

Desktop - Mint rocks.
Laptop - can't even install it.

Laptop - Ubuntu is fantastic.
Desktop - Ubuntu was a nightmare.

Interesting to say the least.

[caf4926]

On my eeepc
I have to hit Esc. at the BIOS splash to get the boot device menu to select the USB
Though if you used Unetbootin, this method doesn't seem to be necessary.

Mint 13, and LMDE both installed no issue on it
As did Ubu 12.04

[odo5435]

I've just re-read your original post.

I used "Startup Disk Creator" to installed the version on the thumb drive.

When I first tried to install LMDE on my ASUSeee I used 'Universal USB Installer' to install the version on the flash drive as per the instructions I'd found and had the same sort of problems you're encountering (although I can't say for certain they were exactly the same).

After many attempts and reading and re-reading of the numerous threads on the subject, one thread eventually mentioned occasional problems with Universal USB and suggested trying 'UNetbootin' to write to the flash drive. It was then I discovered the obscure Boot Device Option selector in the BIOS mentioned in my previous post. After all that, everything went ahead as it should. It'd only taken me weeks to get there!

UNetbootin is free to download from here and seems to overcome most of the problems associated with installations of Mint flavours using USB drives. I can't say for certain that it'll work for you, but if you're at the hair-pulling stage, it might be worth a try.

[Diekan]

Thanks for the tips all. I have tried the suggestions listed about, but still to no avail. Odd thing is that I even made a few bootable disks with Gentoo, Fedora, and a few other Linux distros. None of them will boot - even with the boot settings listing the CD ROM as first. I think this is an ASUS issue. The ONLY OS I could get installed on this laptop was Ubuntu. The USB installed I wanted to use on this computer are no gos - yet they work with my desktop just fine.

Still can't figure out why this ASUS refuses to read anything other than HD first for booting.... and why only Ubuntu will install.

[odo5435]

Still can't figure out why this ASUS refuses to read anything other than HD first for booting.... and why only Ubuntu will install.

Neither can I. How did you get Ubuntu to install? Was it already somewhere on your HD?

Just a suggestion, but have you tried looking for an answer in one of the ASUS forums as you seem to think the problem is hardware or BIOS related?

[Diekan]

During the Ubuntu install - it installed a boot loader, or something to the effect there of. Only then would then would it install Ubuntu - yeah I am going to check out the ASUS forums to see if there is anything there....

[odo5435]

During the Ubuntu install - it installed a boot loader...

OK, how did you get to that point? I mean, how did you get your laptop to read the Ubuntu flash drive to perform the installation?

[Diekan]

OK let me walk you through the whole story... I think I might have left a couple of things out.

I decided to learn something new with Linux - so I decided to make a bootable install of Mint on a thumb drive that I could use on my laptop - the ASUS. I have two systems. The laptop and a home built gaming system (desktop box).

Now this is going to be out of order - but it's a summation of everything.

So, I got an 8 gig stick and downloaded the Mint 12 iso. First tried Start Up DiskCreator - that didn't work so I used UNetbootin to install 12 on the stick.

Popped the stick into the laptop and rebooted. It booted straight into Windows. Rebooted again and went into the BIOS - changed the boot sequence to start with the USB stick. Rebooted and again it booted straight into Windows. For both the installs created with Start Up DiskCreator and UNebootin.

Figured there might be something up with the way ASUS reads the thumb drives even though I haven't had any other issues with them.

I figured I would try something else. So, I downloaded the ISO's for Fedora, Ubuntu, Debian, and Gentoo. Used Brasero to burn the images.

Changed the boot sequence of the laptop from the USB option to CD ROM. Popped in Gentoo - rebooted - went right to Windows. Popped in Fedora - rebooted - went right to Windows. Popped in Debian - rebooted - went right to Windows - Mint same same.

Thought maybe there was something wrong with the disks - I used Brasero. So, I tried each of the disks on my desktop - they ALL booted to the live CD desktop. So, it wasn't the disks.

Finally, I popped in the Ubuntu disk. It went right to Windows (as predicted), but this time it did something the others didn't. It started up and gave me an option (while I was loaded in Windows) to install some sort of boot loader - I am assuming it was GRUB. But, regardless - rebooted the machine and it went right into Ubuntu Live CD and I was able to install it without any problems.

Figured since I had GRUB now that the other CD's would work. They didn't. I pop them in, set the BIO to read CD ROM first, reboot and it will go right to my selection slash screen asking whether to boot into Ubuntu or Windows.

I brought my work laptop home - and popped in the Gentoo disk (just to see) and it booted right into the Gentoo Live CD desktop.

As pointed out earlier - I don't think this is a "Linux" issue as much as an ASUS problem.

I browsed the ASUS pages and couldn't find anything related to this particular issue. But, I will keep looking.

[Diekan]

Flashed the BIOS - twice - and now I can boot.

Just so odd...

[jonnycat]

Flashed the BIOS - twice - and now I can boot.

Just so odd...

Odd indeed; maybe try changing the BIOS battery, sometimes they do really weird things when they get low. In any case, at least you narrowed it down to the BIOS, and are able to do your thing now.

[Diekan]

Indeed - I think I will take a look at the battery... it's time I pull the back off for a quick cleaning anyway.

Yep - I got Mint 13 installed on the laptop without a hitch. Even got my primary game up going (Everquest II) without a single problem. This OS is just amazing.