Have you try new Debian 5.0 (Lenny)?, i'm using it in my another x86 PC. I got bored install with CD/DVD-ROM image, that means you must burn the image file and you will need a blank CD/DVD. Is there any other method? (who said that). Cool, Debian also support network and USB disk installation. 256MiB of USB disk's size is enough if you prefer netinstall image, 1GiB for CD image. So here i go:
1. Unmount first if the USB disk already mounted.
2. Create a MBR into the USB disk using mtools utility: install-mbr:
#install-mbr /dev/usb_disk
1. Prepare your USB disk, create a FAT16 filesystem:
#mkdosfs -n lenny -F 16 -I /dev/usb_disk
2. Mount the USB disk.
3. Install syslinux.
#syslinux /dev/usb_disk
4. Create a simple syslinux.cfg:
default vmlinuz
append initrd=initrd.gz
5. Transfer all installation image (kernel, initrd) and a CD or netinstall ISO image:
#cp vmlinuz initrd.gz debian-lenny.iso /mnt/usb_disk
If all in set, the USB disk is now ready! Happy Debian.
NOTE: This maybe works in Ubuntu distribution since Ubuntu based on Debian... We should try ;p
Debian GNU/Linux
