Using same USB drive with multiple computers.

[Paul Johnson]

On 12/11/06, James Wilkinson <fedora at aprilcottage.co.uk> wrote:
> monty19@ hotmail.com wrote:
> > I have Fedora installed on a USB drive and use it with a laptop. It
> > works very well, but what I would like to be able to do is plug it
> > into a desktop or another laptop and be able to use the same install,
> > without having to completely reconfiguer the system each time I move
> > it. I am wondering if there are any programs out there to save the
> > system configurations for multiple hardware configurations. I tried
> > doing some google searches but did not come up with anything, was
> > wondering if anyone here knew about anything?

I have done this and it works fine much of the time.  In the install
with FC6, it is no longer needed to mess around with adding usb
support to mkinitrd--it is in there.  It is, however, necessary to
tell the installer to reverse the order of the drives as seen in the
BIOS. This makes your USB drive hd0 and then when the computer boots
off the usb, then all is well.  That reverse the drives thing in the
FC6 install is not described very well on screen, but it really does
work.


For me, there are only 2 customization questions.  The video driver
and the network driver.  On systems that have a video card that Xorg
recognizes, then I find that the system automatically changes the
driver in /etc/X11/xorg.conf and it "just works".  On Intel video, for
example, the "i810" driver is used, it is all good.  On some Nvidia
systems, the drivers do not work automatically and I have to manually
fix the xorg.conf.

If you have DHCP service, then all you need to do is configure the usb
drive to use DHCP to get network information for ethX and then it will
always work fine.  I do not run NetworkManager at all, because in the
past I thought it was no good, but since one person has recommended it
here, I may try again.  But I don't need it, as long as the DHCP
server gives me what I need.

In other words, this is getting easier and easier.



-- 
Paul E. Johnson
Professor, Political Science
1541 Lilac Lane, Room 504
University of Kansas