Help Me Create a Live USB Drive

[plumtreed]

I have been unable to make a persistent live USB. I used Ubuntu9.04 'USBcreator' which seems to be effective with most Ubuntu based iso's, Ubuntu, Crunchbang, Masonux, Spri...maybe others. It does the job in that I get it to boot and Mint goes really well.

Is there a trick or did I do wrong

[optimize me]

Very first result.

[plumtreed]

That was well done!

I guess I didn't give enough info because I don't have any sort Windows. Pendrivelinux provide details for installs while using Windows. Unetbootin seem to not be able to provide a persistent version. Ubuntu9.04 doesn't require Windows and it usually provides a persistent USB. I guess I was interested in why it doesn't work with Mint.

I can't put my finger on it but there certainly was something creepy about your reply

[optimize me]

I can't put my finger on it but there certainly was something creepy about your reply

I get that a lot.

I think it's my non-use of smilies.

[plumtreed]

Yah, that would be it.

[atlef]

I just did this today using USB Startup Disk Creator and Mint 7 64bit. No problems here.

atlef.

[plumtreed]

Many thanks for your reply. I don't use 64bit but I can't see how that would affect things. Other than that, there are not very many steps in using 'USB Startup Disk Creator'. I am reassured now that I know it works for you.

I was in Ubuntu9.04 to start with and opened 'Creator' while in Ubuntu. I selected 'Other' and used the Mint7 iso on file. I did not burn or use a live CD. I did not search for nor download 'Creator' from the Synaptic repositories in Mint7.

I allowed 1.02GB storage on a 4GB USB pendrive. 'Creator' progressed normally and cleanly, clearly claiming to be setting up a persistent file. It completed the task and the drive boots efficiently and Mint7 performs well except that it does not retain the settings, such as the Date&Time for this region. The Wireless connection works smoothly but again has to be re-established on each boot-up.

(This procedure worked for Crunchbang Linux and was immediately persistent.)

Does this replicate the steps you took? I thought that If I did things exactly as you have done perhaps it will also work for me.

Thank you for your help.

[atlef]

I have not had the time to test anything else than confirming that it works and that it booted. Will do some more testing later to day.

atlef.

[ddalley]

Persistence has been a problem with USB sticks.

One of the solutions for Mint 6 (I think) found here in the Mint forums was to add "persistent" to something like one of the lines in menu.lst.
Try it. It worked for me, at the time. (You should be able to find it with a simple search.)

[plumtreed]

Thanks, ddalley but we are talking about using USB-Creator as found in the repositories, both in Mint and In Ubuntu. This doesn't involve Grub or the 'Menu.lst' as we know it.

I have used USB-Creator for other Ubuntu based OS's, including Crunchbang, and it has always produced a persistent result. It has not done so with Mint and I am trying to determine why. It may just be a 'bad download' or a boot problem!

It is a very handy program and makes the live USB concept very simple. I wanted to use Mint on a USB drive because it seems so complete.

Have you used the USB-Creator with success?

[hernando]

Have you tried http://www.linuxliveusb.com ?

[gees]

plumtreed and others,
I can confirm that the created LiveUSB pendrive is working, but NOT persistent!

I followed the procedure described here: http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.p ... 86#p192086
It was persistent with Ubuntu 8.10 (32bit) when I followed the same procedure some months ago. (9.04 seems to be buggy according to some posts in the Ubuntu forums).
Hopefully it will be repaired in Karmic (Helena).

[plumtreed]

Hello Hernando, I am one of those people that don't have Windows OS in any form. Your suggestion needs Windows. Thanks very much for your ideas.

Thanks Gees, I am hearing more and more talk about the existence of a bug, especially in 9.04. The noise on various forums
makes this a very strong possibility. I used USB-Creator in Ubuntu 9.04 and successfully burned persistent examples of Crunchbang, Masonux, Spri, and Ubuntu.

Using Ubuntu 9.04, I managed to get Mint burnt and running but it is not persistent. In your recent attempt, did you use USB-Creator in Mint or Ubuntu?

[gees]

Plumtree,

Using Ubuntu 9.04, I managed to get Mint burnt and running but it is not persistent. In your recent attempt, did you use USB-Creator in Mint or Ubuntu?

My recent attempt was with a 2GB USB stick on Mint Gloria 32bit.

As far as I can remember, I could get a persistent USB pendrive with Ubuntu 8.10 32bit. At that time (about may '09) I was fiddling with Ubuntu 8.10 and 9.04 LiveCds in order to recover and undelete WinXP partitions. I also remember that the 8.10 LiveCd was more "smooth" than 8.10. Finally I used a Ubuntu 8.10 persistent LiveUSB pendrive , because it was faster, "more stealth" and because the RAM on the XP box was limited, I could tweak the setting in order to save resources. Later when I found Mint I created a Mint LiveUSB, but probably I never checked persistence

I googled yesterday and found a lot of remarks on the buggy usb-creator in Ubuntu 9.04. I also tried some of the given workarounds, but without succes.

Due to the fact that Mint Felicia is based on Ubuntu 8.10, I would assume that with Felicia there is high possibily to get Mint Felicia persistent on a LiveUSB pendrive. I will try when I can find some time ...

[plumtreed]

Your comments and other references suggested that the 'persistence' difficulty arose in 9.04 so I used my other, v/old, PC which runs Ubuntu 8.04LTS. To my surprise, I found a USB Creator in synaptics and went through the process and came up with a persistent USB drive.

I have no idea why this would happen! Must be a Bug in 9.04?????

Thanks for your guidance and help.

[pdc_2]

I have stuck with older 8.04 versions of ubuntu derivatives: eg easy peasy, a derivative for notebooks: EP 1.0 and 1.1 created excellent persistent versions; the latest version (1.5) crumbled under minor programmes being added to it; similarly with MoonOS for an ASUS Eee;

[gees]

Finally I found the solution here: http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?f=42&t=23516

Searching the forums especially How-to/Tutorials would have saved me some time ...I learned my lesson!

So with Mint7 Gloria 32bit & usb-creator I finally could create a PERSISTENT LiveUSB pendrive.

I just had to edit the syslinux.cfg file as described in the link above.
Just the word "persistent" is missing in one line of the file. A bug in this version of usb-creator?

Thanks goes to ianjb and to the friendly people of mint-chat who showed me the link. Problem solved.