bootable usb

[Rick Stevens]

On Thu, 2006-05-18 at 15:32 -0400, Mark Hammerton wrote:
> thanx Rick i might have to make the iso over again but this sounds
> like it will work

No problem, Mark.  The most common problem is that people forget that
they have to boot SOMETHING...and that's the "El Torito" image.

BTW, we prefer bottom posting on this list.

> On 5/18/06, Rick Stevens <rstevens at vitalstream.com> wrote:
>         On Thu, 2006-05-18 at 14:35 -0400, Mark Hammerton wrote: 
>         > I have created a custom iso RHEL 4 that i will be using to
>         install on
>         > a number of servers, however none of tem have cd rom drives,
>         I would
>         > like to put it the iso on a 2gb and install from there.  2gb
>         is more 
>         > than enough for me. Also i have created the kickstart file
>         for this.
>         >
>         > I want to ask for help in putting the iso on to the 2gb
>         stick and
>         > ensuring that stick is bootable.
>         >
>         > I know the servers that i plan on installing on can boot
>         from usb 
>         
>         Are you certain the ISO image is bootable?  Remember, you need
>         to
>         specify a bootable, "El Torito" image as part of the mkisofs
>         command
>         (see the "-b" "-hard-disk-boot" and "-no-emul-boot" options
>         for 
>         mkisofs).
>         
>         If the image IS bootable, then verify what device your system
>         uses
>         for the USB stick.  Plug it in and check the output of dmesg
>         to see
>         what device is used.  If your system is IDE based, the stick
>         will 
>         probably show up as /dev/sda.  Now, you need to copy the ISO
>         image to
>         the stick using "dd".  Note that you must write the image to
>         the RAW
>         stick device--not a partition on it ("/dev/sda" NOT
>         "/dev/sda1"). 
>         
>         The "dd" command will look like:
>         
>                 # dd if=name-of-ISO-image of=/dev/sda bs=512
>         
>         When that completes, you should write-protect the stick if you
>         can (some
>         have a write-protect tab on them) before using it.  Then try
>         to boot 
>         from it and see if it works.
>         
>         > my LAN is your LAN
>         
>         Now that just INVITES hack attempts!  :-)

----------------------------------------------------------------------
- Rick Stevens, Senior Systems Engineer     rstevens at vitalstream.com -
- VitalStream, Inc.                       http://www.vitalstream.com -
-                                                                    -
-   Whoever said "Money can't buy friends" obviously never brought   -
-                        donuts to the office.                       -
----------------------------------------------------------------------