External USB CD Drive Boot?

[NeoSeeker 0]

I messed up the internal DVD drive in my laptop a while ago, and so bought a USB external CD-RW drive. It's just come to the point where I want to install Linux, MDK 10 Official, since I can't install it on my fave pc But I've just realised that I can't boot from the external CD :S I was wondering if anybody knew if there are some drivers, or some kind of floppy boot disk that I can use to boot from the external USB CD, so I can install Linux?

 

Thanks in advance if anybody can help

[NeoSeeker 0]

Since posting I've tried using the hdcdrom_usb.img loader, but still can't get it to work Does anybody know a way that I could even get just Mandrake Move to load up?

[martouf 0]

good. you're on the right track.

 

I guess this means you've not only discovered the images directory

but also the dosutils directory provided by the Mandrake distro. 8)

 

If the "cdrom.img" on a floppy disk doesn't help you, then you might try the

"boot.iso" image burned to a disc. Given the size of the boot.iso image,

I'll guess it has an initrd with lots of drivers in addition to the kernel.

 

The floppy disk images are best for systems having hardware the kernel recognizes

right away, without needing additional modules loaded.

 

You also may need to switch to one of the other virtual terminals as the hdcdrom_usb.img

loads to see the information about your external CD drive you need to help

the kernel find the install media. (CTRL-ALT-F1 is the vty you've been looking at..

the others are CTRL-ALT-F2 through -F6 and -F9 through -F12)

 

 

 

 

[NeoSeeker 0]

kk, thanks for that, I'll try it later. I've decided to strip down my DVD rom and try to get it working again, I've luckily found what the problem is, the internal casing has been warped out of shape when it overheated one time, and so the disc jams on the top of the case, and not spinning But I shall try what you have told me, since I simply just used the main menu before

[Marlon Vargas 0]

What's the answer to post No. 143373

[danleff 0]

Marton, it depends on your situation. If the bios in the system does not support booting from an external USB source, then you can boot using a boot floppy image that seeks the external cdrom drive and allows it to start the distro's install cdrom disk.