I think many of us would like to install Moblin in order to test it
deeply. Installation allows to play with personal configuration,
further program installs/updates and so on.
The problem is, how to do it without wiping out the native drive. When
this is enough big, one can remake the partitioning in order to free
some room for Moblin. But in the case of tiny SSD, this is not
possible.
So the only possibility is to install Moblin on other USB drive.
Installation is generally OK, but some hard tweaking should be done
for correct booting from it.
I give a brief tutorial on the matter, based on Dell Mini 9 with
native SSD and Ubuntu. It worked for me, but I can't guarantee it will
work for others; I decline any responsibility on damage or data loss.
It is mandatory to have aside a Linux-box. It could be the Dell Mini
itself, with the original Ubuntu.
1) Choose an empty USB-stick >= 4GB ATTENTION: if not empty, any data
on it will be blown up!
2) Boot with Moblin USB-image; select "boot & install"; plug the
target USB stick while booting.
3) Be careful not to select your native SSD/HD drive for installation
(sda)! Select the new drive (may be sdb or sdc...)
4) Select the default option for partitioning and so on (i.e. let the
program do)
5) In the menu about MBR, be careful not to select your native drive
(sda)! Select the other proposal (sdc1/sdb1...). This actually DOES
NOT install any functioning MBR but it is safe for your system ;-)
6) Plug the just created installation stick on your Linux-box. You
will see two new partitions; one has a general name (say /media/disk)
, and the other has a long name with hyphens (I think it is
/media/netbook-ux-bet-i)
7) In a terminal type:
sudo gedit /media/disk/grub/grub.lst
Modify the text under the commented area in this way:
default=0
timeout=5
splashimage=(hd0,0)/grub/splash.xpm.gz
#hiddenmenu
silent
title Moblin (2.6.29.3-13.1.moblin2-netbook)
root (hd0,0)
kernel /vmlinuz-2.6.29.3-13.1.moblin2-netbook ro rootdelay=8
root=/dev/sdb2 ht=on hpet=disabled
The keys of this change are the options "root (hd0,0)", "rootdelay=8
", "root=/dev/sdb2"; comment the "hiddenmenu" option in order to hack
a bit during booting.
8) Modify the MBR on the root partition of your stick. Type
sudo grub
and then you will on grub terminal where you should do:
grub> root (hd1,0)
grub> setup (hd1)
grub> quit
Note that "hd1" refers in my system to the plugged USB-stick; if you
feel it is wrong on yours, change to the adequate.
9) Modify fstab. Type
sudo gedit /media/netbook-ux-bet-i/etc/fstab
Modify the /dev/sdxx lines to /dev/sdbx:
/dev/sdb2 / ext3 defaults,noatime,barrier=1 1 1
/dev/sdb1 /boot ext3 defaults,noatime,barrier=1 1 2
/dev/sdb3 swap swap defaults 0 0
10) Now you can boot form your stick. Plug it on your Dell Mini and
(re)boot. At the earliest boot stage press "0" and select the option
"USB Storage". You should be done!
Note: there are some ways to make "fstab" and "grub" independent from
the exact device name of your stick partitions in /dev . Google about
UUID to get more information.
Note 2: sorry for my stumble English!
--
Manuel Pancorbo Castro
http://bitakoro.blogdns.org/
_______________________________________________
Moblin dev Mailing List
[email protected]
To manage or unsubscribe from this mailing list visit:
https://lists.moblin.org/mailman/listinfo/dev or your user account on
http://moblin.org once logged in.
For more information on the Moblin Developer Mailing lists visit:
http://moblin.org/community/mailing-lists
