[Cialug] boot floppy to boot from usb

[Don Cady]

On Sun, Dec 20, 2009 at 8:56 PM, Dan Hockey <icepuck2k at gmail.com> wrote:
> I found ubuntu moblin remix and now I'd like to try it on an older P1 75mhz
> laptop(no cdrom), but the problem I ran into is I need something to boot
> from a floppy that can then boot linux from the usb flash drive.
>  Dos boot floppy with usb drivers didn't work so I'm guessing some form of l
> inux with usb drivers is what's needed?
>
> http://linux.dell.com/files/ubuntu/moblin-remix/dev-edition-2.0/

Thoughts; Does the BIOS have a "legacy USB" feature? I'd be surprised,
but then I'm half surprised this P1 has USB at all. If it does, you
_might_ be able to use that to emulate your flash drive as a hard
drive or floppy. Then you needn't worry about USB support, and could
use grub, syslinux, gujin, or whatever you choose on the floppy. A
bunch of maybes, but we're talking about 15 yr old hardware.
You could try manually walking through the boot with 'Super Grub Disk'
(skipping the repair/restore functions) to see if Grub will see the
flash drive.
DSL, puppy, and pendrivelinux used to have pre-made floppy images that
did exactly what you're trying to do, but for passing off to a flash
drive with one of those on it. You might be able to get one of those
to work.
You could make what you're looking for with a bootloader and a kernel.
Speaking of, does 'Tom's Root Boot' see the USB? If not, replace the
kernel with a newer one.
Of course by this point pxe boot would be easier if it's available to you.

Don