Re: bootable USB drive creation
On 10/26/2016 10:35 AM, Matyas A. Sustik wrote:
> I need to boot into a hard drive diagnostic tool which is provided only as
> an ISO image by the manufacturer. Since my laptop does not have a CD drive,
> I hoped I could use a USB flash drive to run this tool from.
>
> My search turned up resources on this, but it seems the answers were about
> booting a Linux rescue disk or such.
>
> I tried just to dd the iso to the usb drive (/dev/sdc) but that did not do
> the trick. Was that supposed to work just like that?
>
> There is unetbootin, but I rather do not install more software until I can
> run the hdd diagnostic. My drive is dying according to smartmon. (Also it
> is only for sid and I am on stable.)
There are two related, complex topics involved:
1. Bootable media.
2. Operating systems.
Someone please correct me if I'm wrong, but there is no general method
or tool for converting a bootable CD image with a given operating system
(with applications) into a bootable USB flash image (with the same
operating system and applications). But, there may be methods and/or
tools for specific operating systems (with applications).
Do you know what operating system the HDD manufacturer diagnostic
bootable CD is based on? I've seen DR-DOS and FreeDOS variants for
such. 'UNetbootin' looks like it is targeted at Linux.
I suggest:
1. Ask the manufacturer for a bootable USB flash drive ISO.
2. In the mean time, buy an external optical drive with an interface
that is supported by your computer (e.g. USB 2 or USB 3), burn the HDD
manufacturer's CD ISO image to CD-R media, and boot that.
Reading between the lines, it sounds like you have only one computer.
The computer hobby is similar to the automotive hobby -- you need at
least two, so that you always have a ride while wrenching on the others.
David
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