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This page has a few of my blog entries about linux, but my main linux page is here
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2010/08/21 Installing both UBCD (with linux) and UBCD4WIN on a 2GB USB key
π 2010-08-21 01:01 in Linux
First, if you don't know them, it's a mashup of http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/ and http://www.ubcd4win.com/ . Very convenient for recovery of systems.

I wanted to have a USB key that could boot both UCBD and UBCD4Win, the two award winning ultimate boot CDs for rescue and other things. Turns out however that making a bootable USB key is not that simple, XP is not even meant to boot from USB apparently.

To make things simple, UBCD boots with syslinux and UBCD4WIN boots with grub. However, copying the files from UBCD4WIN on a UBCD bootable USB stick does not allow to boot XP from grub anymore (it complains about a missing boot.ini it didn't need before).

After some research and work, here's what I was able to find and come up with. I'd love to be able to just share my image with you, but because of the XP license and requirement that you use your own XP media to generate it, I can't do that unfortunately.

  • Make use ubcd4win image
  • In my case, I already a ubcd4win CD image and didn't want to make a new one since it takes a while, but apparently if you make a new one, there is an option to make it usb compatible ( see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jdIKHdcMA0Y#t=6m10 ).

  • make ubcd4win installed/bootable for usb with bartpetoUSB: http://gocoding.com/page.php?al=petousb
  • However this setup forces the windows boot and ignores boot.ini/config.sys and grub, so there is no way to boot anything else that I could find.

  • get grub4dos: http://grub4dos.sourceforge.net/wiki/index.php/Grub4dos_tutorial and http://sourceforge.net/projects/grub4dos/
  • Then install gldr.mbr/gldr on the USB key (maybe only one is needed)

  • use grub4dos installer: http://www.themudcrab.com/acronis_grub4dos.php
  • The trick is to select disk, not select a file and chose whole disk/don't search floppy. This causes grub to boot instead of ntldr

  • copy ubcd files over (I used an existing ubcd ISO image from http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/download.html and copied the files over to my USB key).
  • I then had to modify menu.lst on the USB key to launch UBCD options too (you'll probably need some ^M's in there when you save it on your FAT filesystem).
  • color black/cyan yellow/cyan
    default /default
    default     0
    timeout     10
    

    title Launch "The Ultimate Boot CD for Windows" fallback 1 find --set-root /ntldr chainloader /ntldr savedefault --wait=2

    title pause

    # doesn't work without patched grub #title UBCD menu #chainloader /boot/isolinux/isolinux.bin #savedefault --wait=2

    title BIOS configfile /ubcd/menus/grub4dos/bios.lst

    title CPU configfile /ubcd/menus/grub4dos/cpu.lst

    title HDD configfile /ubcd/menus/grub4dos/hdd.lst

    title Memory configfile /ubcd/menus/grub4dos/memory.lst

    title Others configfile /ubcd/menus/grub4dos/others.lst

    title Peripherals configfile /ubcd/menus/grub4dos/periph.lst

    title System configfile /ubcd/menus/grub4dos/system.lst

    title Parted Magic V4.10\n Linux distro for manipulating partitions (eg. create, resize). Includes\n TestDisk, PhotoRec, Partition Image...) configfile /pmagic/boot/grub4dos/grub4dos.lst

    title UBCD FreeDOS R1.38 (Based on NwDsk V3.40)\n FreeDOS boot disk used to run many of the other DOS apps on the UBCD. map --mem /ubcd/images/fdubcd.img.gz (fd0) map --hook chainloader (fd0)+1 rootnoverify (fd0)

    title User-defined configfile /ubcd/custom/custom.lst

    title pause

    title Reboot\n Reboot the PC. reboot

    title pause

    title commandline savedefault --wait=2 commandline

    title floppy (fd0) chainloader (fd0)+1 rootnoverify (fd0) savedefault --wait=2

    title reboot savedefault --wait=2 reboot

    title Darik's Boot And Nuke v2.0 ~ Submenu configfile /dban-Grub4dos.ini

    title FreeDos map --mem (hd0,0)//Images/freedos.img (fd0) map --hook chainloader (fd0)+1 rootnoverify (fd0)

    title GOBACK Removal Tool map --mem (hd0,0)//Images/goback.ima (fd0) map --hook chainloader (fd0)+1 rootnoverify (fd0)

    title Memtest86 v3.5 (iso boot) map (hd0,0)//Images/memtest.iso (hd32) map --hook chainloader (hd32) boot

    title NTFS-Dos map --mem (hd0,0)//Images/ntfs4dos.img (fd0) map --hook chainloader (fd0)+1 rootnoverify (fd0)

    title Launch "Windows(tm) Recovery Console" fallback 1 find --set-root /cmdcons/setupldr.bin chainloader /cmdcons/setupldr.bin ##################################################################### # write string "cmdcons" to memory 0000:7C03 in 2 steps: ##################################################################### # step 1. Write 4 chars "cmdc" at 0000:7C03 write 0x7C03 0x63646D63 # step 2. Write 3 chars "ons" and an ending null at 0000:7C07 write 0x7C07 0x00736E6F savedefault --wait=2

    Other random links I found:

  • Install WinNT and maybe more (Vista?) from USB key, also add grub/bartpe: http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?showtopic=20089
  • Multiboot with usb_multiboot_10.cmd: http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?showtopic=20089&st=11
  • More than 2GB key needs the HP usb disk storage option: http://tsukasa.jidder.de/blog/2009/07/29/short-notice-installing-grub4dos-on-usb-thumbdrives
  • Make boot on device bigger than 2GB (not FAT32): http://ubcd4win.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=9668
  • 2010/08/10 Linuxcon 2010
    π 2010-08-10 01:01 in Linux
    The 2nd Annual LinuxCon, aka the new OLS, was in Boston this year. I was invited to speak about svn and source control systems.

    While the conference is still young, they did a good job and attendance was good.



    my source control system was _this_ big :)
    my source control system was _this_ big :)


    software patents are both interesting and depressing
    software patents are both interesting and depressing


    I remember vmware 1.0 :)
    I remember vmware 1.0 :)

    the questions on geeks vs nerds were a bit disappointing though
    the questions on geeks vs nerds were a bit disappointing though

    It was cool to have run into Maddog again. It had been 14 years since we first met.

    Maddog and me 14 years later
    Maddog and me 14 years later


    that was the linux pavillion at Comdex in 1996
    See more images for Linuxcon 2010
    2010/08/03 Spinning Down WD20EADS Drives and Fixing Load Cycle
    π 2010-08-03 01:01 in Linux
    Like others, I've had the problem with my WD20EADS's load cycle is shooting through the roof (I'm already past a tenth of its parking/unparking lifetime (130,000 Load Cycles) after just a few months of use). This is apparently a problem with many recent WD green drives.

    One would think that hdparm -S 254 /dev/device or something close would take care of it like it would on any laptop hard drive that supports head parking, but no.
    Western Digital: what's up with this? Why does your firmware have to be so different and auto head parking after 6 (or is it 8?) seconds not be turned off?

    Now, there is an unsupported and technically "void your warranty" solution (which is ironic considering that not doing anything will kill the drives and cause warranty returns within about 1 to 2 years for me): wdidle3 from their site and also wdspinup .

    Now, the other problem is that those are green drives and they were taking more power than my other drives because I could not spin them down (I don't use my drives more than a few times a day in a machine where they are on all the time).

    The sad thing is that my solution to this was to write a quick program that checks whether the drive has been used recently (using iostat) and manually spin it down with hdparm -y if it has not.

    You can get swdisksusp.


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