external hard drive

[random guy]

hey i just got an external hard drive, usb, 160gb. i want to set aside 20gb for an linux distro on it basically to take around with me from time to time and show off some stuff like beryl

i am not sure which distro to use on it though. i fear that if i use sabayon the the packages on the live cd are built may be ok for 32 bit but not work well for 64 or vice versa. and supposedly people have trouble with doing this because sometimes the installer installs grub to first hd even if the os is installed to a different drive.

maybe someone can enlighten me on some of these things, either suggest a distro or what i can do for sabayon.

thanks for the help.

[johnnyhay]

Correct me if I'm wrong but doesn't the x86 version work on any 64 bit processor?
Also, I'm not sure if this might work but try just installing it on your external drive then move it to another computer and see if it boots.
And try seeing if it works when you try turning it into a liveUSB.

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http://www.sabayonlinux.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=3008

[senf]

I always had problems installing 64bit-Sytems, be it debian or gentoo. Anytime I tried, I ended up using 32bit-versions with much less efforts.
machine: ath64, k8t800pro, 6600gt, currently installed: 32-bit PCLOS and 32bit Sabayon (OK, and Bill's I must admit)

You will need BIOS(es) which properly boot from USB, not a bootmanager I'd assume.

[random guy]

well this is a live usb, from what i understand it basically will need tgo go through the whole process of extracting the live disk and all.

any way i can just do a regular install? like disableing my internal hd (to protect my main mbr) and doing an install on sda1?

i got plenty of space since it is an external hard drive ratehr than a flash drive.

EDIT: hmmm this idea is actually starting to grow on me because after you finish the isntall process i guess you could replace the iso for the mini edition with the full dvd edition by renaming the dvd one as the same name as the mini and putting it in the same directory. right? i never got to use the dvd edition since i dont have a dvd drive but i guess this would make it possible. i guess it could do the trick for non live dvd install disks too.

i can imagine having multiple installed systems pretty easily this way just by having the isos on the drive and configureing the grub menu a bit right? (can they all use same kernel or would i need seperate kernels from all the isos in the /boot dir we made in this setup?

and whenever a new version comes out all i would have to do is recopy isos over their originals and i guess just recopy the kernels/edit grub.

by the way how is the speed. is usb hard drive faster or slower than live disk. will it be slow as a dvd? thanks.

[senf]

When the machine is able to boot from USB, you could also install a boot manager to the mbr of your external hd.
A method to boot into an ISO-image I don't know. Usually it should be a proper installation, although there might (or will) be some differences. Make sure you have your data backed up before trying to install.