Universal USB installer

Universal USB installer

We can use Universal USB installer to create Live USB images from Live CDs. For example we can create bootable USB disk for system rescue CD with universal USB installer.

Note:

• When using Universal USB installer for creating live System Rescue CD choose version as system-rescue-cd 1.5.4 even if version of system-rescue-cd that you are converting is 2.0
• Do not waste time in steps mentioned on:
  • http://kintoandar.blogspot.com/2008/09/live-usb-system-rescue-cd.html

  Such steps do not work at all

• The working procedure has been learned from http://www.pendrivelinux.com/put-system-rescue-cd-1-5-4-on-usb-using-windows/

One can also use 'Linux live USB creator' to create live USB images from ISO images of CDs. Linux live USB creator will even allow installation of virtual box so that live USB can be used directly in Windows without persistent storage

For system rescue CD steps are mentioned on http://www.sysresccd.org/Sysresccd-manual-en_How_to_install_SystemRescueCd_on_an_USB-stick. Automated steps to install from linux using shell script do not work. Detailed steps that work are:

• Create folder for USB - 'mkdir /mnt/usbstick'
• Mount USB (Fat32) partition: 'mount -t vfat /dev/sdf1 /mnt/usbstick'
• Remove all files: 'rm -rf /mnt/usbstick/*'
• Download latest system rescue CD image and mount it on /mnt/cdrom using 'mount -o loop <iso_file> /mnt/cdrom'
• Use following commands to copy files to USB

cp -af /mnt/cdrom/* /mnt/usbstick/
rm -rf /mnt/usbstick/syslinux
mv /mnt/usbstick/isolinux/isolinux.cfg /mnt/usbstick/isolinux/syslinux.cfg
sed -i -e 's/scandelay=1/scandelay=5/g' /mnt/usbstick/isolinux/syslinux.cfg
mv /mnt/usbstick/isolinux /mnt/usbstick/syslinux

• Make disk bootable using

umount /mnt/usbstick
syslinux /dev/sdf1
sync