HowTo Put Multiple Live Images On One USB Memory Stick
Contents
Overview
The livecd-iso-to-disk program is used by Fedora based distributions (like NST) to transfer the contents of a Live ISO image to a USB memory stick. The livecd-iso-to-disk program works well and offers some extra features (such as persistent storage). However, it is primarily used when you want to put a single Fedora based distribution onto a USB memory stick.
It is often desirable to create a USB memory stick with multiple Live images to choose from (NST 32 bit, NST 64 bit, Ubuntu, Debian, ...). To accomplish this, you must:
- Create a primary bootable partition on a USB memory stick.
- Format the partition as FAT 32 (if you want easy access to the files from non Linux based systems).
- Install the GRUB 2 boot loader onto the USB memory stick.
- Transfer ISO images (Debian based distros) or contents from the ISO for other distributions (Fedora based distros).
WARNING: Know What You Are Doing
The partitioning and formatting steps of this process assume that you know what you are doing. If you are new to Linux, make sure you understand how to identify the device entry associated with your USB memory stick (like: /dev/sdx). If you blindly copy/paste commands from this page you will likely destroy data on your system.
We have chosen to use /dev/sdx and /dev/sdx1 in our examples below as this device probably won't be present on your system to reduce the chance of a data destruction. You will need to substitute the device entry of your USB memory stick for this value.
Prepare Your USB Memory Stick
You only need to perform these steps once. In other words, skip the USB preparation section when you want to add additional distributions to your USB memory stick.
Partition Your USB Memory Stick
You can use fdisk, gparted or one of the many other partition tools to partition your memory stick. A single primary partition marked as bootable works well.
Here's an example of what fdisk will show if you have a single primary partition marked as bootable (substitute the device entry of your USB memory stick for the /dev/sdx shown below):
[root@cayenne ~]# fdisk -l /dev/sdx Disk /dev/sdx: 15.6 GB, 15606349824 bytes 255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 1897 cylinders, total 30481152 sectors Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes Disk identifier: 0x000230dd Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System /dev/sdx1 * 34 30481118 15240542+ c W95 FAT32 (LBA) [root@cayenne ~]#
Create A File System And Label
The following command demonstrates how to create a FAT 32 file system on partition /dev/sdx1 with a label of "multboot" (you will need to adjust this command based on the device entry for your partition):
[root@cayenne ~]# mkfs.vfat -F 32 -n multboot /dev/sdx1
Install GRUB 2 Boot Loader
The following command demonstrates how to mount your partition and install the GRUB 2 boot loader (again, you will need to change /dev/sdx for your USB memory stick):
[root@cayenne ~]# [ -d /mnt/vfat ] || mkdir /mnt/vfat [root@cayenne ~]# mount LABEL=multboot /mnt/vfat [root@cayenne ~]# grub2-install --force --no-floppy --root-directory=/mnt/vfat /dev/sdx [root@cayenne ~]# umount /mnt/vfat
At this point you should have a bootable USB memory stick. It would be a good idea to verify this by booting from the USB memory stick and make sure that you can at least get to GRUB 2.