I think it is having trouble with the order of hardware devices. On Tue, Nov 30, 2010 at 11:10 PM, Steve Holmes wrote: > The drive boots after all but only as far as grub.  I found out > earlier today that the grub menu comes up but it fails to find the > file systems for booting the actual system.  It looks like I will have > to rebuild the grub configuration or something.  So yes, you're right; > the drive should boot and the MBR does work; it's just the rest of it > that doesn't but that sounds more like a grub issue now rather than > booting from the USB drive.  Somehow while preparing this disk with > the Arch Linux installer, I think grub's identification of drives may > have been off or something.  I almost wrecked my windows internal disk > doing this some how but at least I salvaged that for now so I need to > walk on some egg shells while doing this I guess. > > On Tue, Nov 30, 2010 at 05:34:31PM -0700, Lisa Kachold wrote: >> If the drive is bootable, it will boot. >> >> Check the bios to ensure you have allowed boot from bios, and use spare >> systems before rebuilding your drive. >> >> You should be able to fdisk -l /dev/sdN  (or whatever it is) plugged in and >> verify the boot.  You should be able to verify your MBR and GRUB settings >> also.  You can always REPEAT setting up the MBR? >> >> If you can't boot it, it's not built. >> >> Rebuild with a better set of instructions! >> >> On Tue, Nov 30, 2010 at 9:57 AM, Stephen wrote: >> >> > newer machines should be able to boot directly to USB hdd just fine... >> > just never have had a drive that really worked with that. >> > >> > On Tue, Nov 30, 2010 at 9:24 AM, Steve Holmes >> > wrote: >> > > That's rather annoying when some drive manufacturer forces us to leave >> > > their junk on the drive when we wish to do otherwise with it. >> > > Actually, my drive came out of an old laptop and I stuck it inside a >> > > portable drive enclosure so I would think we should be able to boot >> > > with it.  I used grub to make this disk bootable or at least attempt >> > > to do so. >> > > >> > > I might have to do a grub-install to the /dev/sda MBR but I hesitate >> > > to do so at the moment. >> > > >> > > On Tue, Nov 30, 2010 at 07:25:08AM -0700, Stephen wrote: >> > >> I have an external drive that has the same issue. in my case there is >> > >> a small "firmware" that resides on the USB-PATA bridge that has about >> > >> 3-400 MB of stuff on it and mounts as a CD. this definitely fouled all >> > >> my attempts at booting to the device. >> > >> >> > >> On Tue, Nov 30, 2010 at 3:23 AM, Steve Holmes >> > wrote: >> > >> > I got a new machine which (of course) has Windows pre-installed and >> > >> > I'm not ready to dump it entirely just yet so in the meantime, I built >> > >> > out a complete Arch Linux 64-bit system on a portable USB external >> > >> > drive.  I also used or tried to use grub to set it up to boot.  During >> > >> > the original settup session, it appeared to do all this OK but I can't >> > >> > get the laptop to recognize or boot from this device.  I did not >> > >> > modify the master boot record on my laptop; instead, I figured on >> > >> > using the boot menu on the laptop to choose the USB drive; this method >> > >> > works beautifully with an ISO image I burned to a small thumbdrive but >> > >> > I cannot do the same with my larger USB portable drive on which I >> > >> > installed Arch Linux.  Do I have to do anything else to make this >> > >> > thing bootable? >> > >> > --------------------------------------------------- >> > >> > PLUG-discuss mailing list - PLUG-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us >> > >> > To subscribe, unsubscribe, or to change your mail settings: >> > >> > http://lists.PLUG.phoenix.az.us/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss >> > >> > >> > >> >> > >> >> > >> >> > >> -- >> > >> A mouse trap, placed on top of your alarm clock, will prevent you from >> > >> rolling over and going back to sleep after you hit the snooze button. >> > >> >> > >> Stephen >> > >> --------------------------------------------------- >> > >> PLUG-discuss mailing list - PLUG-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us >> > >> To subscribe, unsubscribe, or to change your mail settings: >> > >> http://lists.PLUG.phoenix.az.us/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss >> > > --------------------------------------------------- >> > > PLUG-discuss mailing list - PLUG-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us >> > > To subscribe, unsubscribe, or to change your mail settings: >> > > http://lists.PLUG.phoenix.az.us/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss >> > > >> > >> > >> > >> > -- >> > A mouse trap, placed on top of your alarm clock, will prevent you from >> > rolling over and going back to sleep after you hit the snooze button. >> > >> > Stephen >> > --------------------------------------------------- >> > PLUG-discuss mailing list - PLUG-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us >> > To subscribe, unsubscribe, or to change your mail settings: >> > http://lists.PLUG.phoenix.az.us/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss >> > >> >> >> >> -- >> Network Operations Center Engineer >> Atjeu Hosting >> >> (503) 754-4452 >> (623) 688-3392 >> >> http://www.it-clowns.com | http://www.obnosis.com > >> --------------------------------------------------- >> PLUG-discuss mailing list - PLUG-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us >> To subscribe, unsubscribe, or to change your mail settings: >> http://lists.PLUG.phoenix.az.us/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss > > --------------------------------------------------- > PLUG-discuss mailing list - PLUG-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us > To subscribe, unsubscribe, or to change your mail settings: > http://lists.PLUG.phoenix.az.us/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss > -- A mouse trap, placed on top of your alarm clock, will prevent you from rolling over and going back to sleep after you hit the snooze button. Stephen --------------------------------------------------- PLUG-discuss mailing list - PLUG-discuss@lists.plug.phoenix.az.us To subscribe, unsubscribe, or to change your mail settings: http://lists.PLUG.phoenix.az.us/mailman/listinfo/plug-discuss