installing Fedora 10 from USB Disk On Key

[Mike Cloaked]

Mark Ryden wrote:
> 
> 
>   I have downloaded Fedora 10  installation iso.
> 
>   I want to install it from USB disk on key as my DVDrom is not working.
> 
> Will this work:
> first:
>  dd if=linux_f10_iso.iso of=/dev/sdb and boot will start installation ?
> and then boot from the USB disk on key (after setting the BIOS to boot
> from USB disk on key, which is possible with my motherboard)
> 
> 

Do you have a running Fedora system on that machine already?

If so there is a good alternative way to do it which I will detail below.
You simply copy the iso file as an iso file onto the usb key first (i.e. not
using dd).

Then if you have more than one partition on your machine you can copy the
iso onto a non-root partition on your machine, as an iso file.

Then make a directory such as /mnt/tmp and then loop mount the iso onto that
mount point by doing as root:
# mount -o loop   /path/to/Fedora-10-i386-DVD.iso    /mnt/tmp

Now as root still, copy the two key boot files from the iso  into the /boot
area:
# cd /boot
# cp /mnt/tmp/isolinux/vmlinuz f10.install
# cp /mnt/tmp/isolinux/initrd.img f10.install.img

Now you have these two files in /boot
Now add a suitable grub stanza to your grub.conf by doing
# cd /boot/grub
# vim grub.conf

Once in the editor add a set of lines after the last normal stanza in this
file that boots Fedora, in the form:
title Fedora 10 Install
        root (hd0,5)
        kernel /boot/f10.install
        initrd /boot/f10.install.img

Make sure that the line with root (hd0,5) matches the line in the previous
stanza so that it picks the correct partition to boot from. i.e. select the
correct drive and partition. Making it the same as the values from another
stanza that boots your normal previous Fedora should be fine.

Exit vim using the "esc" button followed by ":" to get a command prompt and
then "wq" to write the changed file to disk.

Now check the partition and path to the Fedora install iso file that you
have on disk and write it down.

eg Let's say that you have /opt mounted on /dev/sda7 (check using "df -h")
and the path was /opt/isos/Fedora-10-i386-DVD.iso

You need to remember /dev/sda7 and the "relative" path will be
/isos/Fedora-10-i386-DVD.iso

Now all you need to do is to reboot the machine and interrupt grub so that
you can select "Fedora 10 Install" to boot instead of the normal boot
process.

If all has gone well you should now start to boot the Fedora 10 installer -
and be able to start off the install. If you select a hard drive install,
then select /dev/sda7 (or whatever it is on your machine for the partition
containing your iso) and your correct relative path, then the install should
proceed as normal.  Note that you will not be able to format the partition
containing your iso during the install.

If you use LVM then you will have to modify this approach accordingly.

This approach allows a full normal install.  

If you do not have Linux already on the machine but just Windows then an
alternative is to make a Live usbkey and boot that, and then once running
you can select to install to HD from the desktop, but this has a much
smaller selection of packages available than the DVD install.

On certain netbooks the advertised method of making a Live usbkey may not
work - eg in my Samsung NC-10 that did not work when I first got it - and it
does not have a DVD drive at all!  So I ended up making a live usbkey using
Unetbootin (google for it), and that worked fine.

So the basic message is that there are alternative methods to using optical
media for installing Fedora - and of course there are also http, vnc, or
network boot options also.  However the DVD iso method from HD I described
above as served me well for some years.

I hope this helps.

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