New Minimal Install ISO Not Bootable From USB?

AustinMatherne

The new amd64 minimal install ISO is problematic when placed on a USB drive. I don't have a CD drive, so it may be buggy when booting from a CD, as well.

If I use UNetbootin it isn't bootable (I verified the SHA-512 sum). I would like to attempt to manually load it onto a USB drive; however, the file placement in the ISO has changed and no longer matches that which is described in the Gentoo Linux LiveUSB HOWTO.

Does anyone know how to load the amd64 minimal install ISO onto a USB thumb drive? None of the guides I found from searching work with the latest ISO. Otherwise I guess I'll just use the minimal instal ISO from June or SystemRescueCd.

NeddySeagoon · Posted: Mon Oct 01, 2012 8:12 pm Post subject:

AustinMatherne,

Use SystemRescueCD instead. Its Gentoo, it has /mnt/gentoo already, it has both 32 bir and 64 bit kernels. It provides Xorg of you want it.
Oh and the cover art includes the words "Don't Panic!" in large friendly letters :)

OK - one of the above is an exaggeration
_________________
Regards,

NeddySeagoon

Computer users fall into two groups:-
those that do backups
those that have never had a hard drive fail.

AustinMatherne · Posted: Mon Oct 01, 2012 8:19 pm Post subject:

I already have SystemRescueCD on a USB stick, so I'll probably just use it (I was already going to use it before the minimal install CD to setup a btrfs partition). Is there anything I need to keep in mind that might be different when using it?

The alternative installation HOWTO has some extra steps for using Knoppix. I take it SystemRescueCD doesn't require any extra steps because it's based on Gentoo?

http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/altinstall.xml#doc_chap3

NeddySeagoon · Posted: Mon Oct 01, 2012 9:28 pm Post subject:

AustinMatherne,

There are no extra steps as SystemRescueCD provides the /mnt/gentoo mount point and you a root from boot.
_________________
Regards,

NeddySeagoon

Computer users fall into two groups:-
those that do backups
those that have never had a hard drive fail.

pidsley · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 09 Jun 2012 Posts: 80

If you use SystemRescueCd, you can just use the install instructions in the Gentoo Handbook.

AustinMatherne · Posted: Tue Oct 02, 2012 5:28 am Post subject:

I'm just going to use the SystemRescueCd, but I figured I should update this thread anyway.

I am able to create a bootable CD from the latest minimum install ISO in a Linux system using the standard HOWTO; however, there are the following errors during boot:

SuperTek · n00b Joined: 20 Apr 2003 Posts: 17 Location: Brazil

I am trying to install Gentoo again after many years and I'm also getting these erros during boot. Can anyone help?

Mythy · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 17 Jul 2012 Posts: 75

Hello,

Same problem, using last minimal ISO, USB FAT32 formatted and unetbootin-windows-578

djroot2 · n00b Joined: 22 Sep 2003 Posts: 25

There is definitely an issue with the current AMD64 minimal install cd.
I got these same errors and just created the missing folders once I got a shell and started the processes manually. It took a while to get autoconfig going. After the initial wait and various things timing out, I checked rc-status and saw gpm was crashed so i issued a restart on that. rc-status showed autoconfig was stopped again so I told it to start and everything seemed to be good again.

Mythy · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 17 Jul 2012 Posts: 75

I did your fix and it works for the rc-status, all is now green.

But when I want to start SSHD, I got this error :

likewhoa · Posted: Wed Oct 03, 2012 2:22 am Post subject:

@AustinMatherne and @thosethatdontknowalready *all* Gentoo minimal isos are capable of becoming hybrid isos that can be dd to a removable device with only two steps.

# isohybrid image.iso
# dd if=image.iso of=/dev/sdb bs=8192k

where /dev/sdb is your removable device. DO NOT point to a partition, also keep in mind all data will be destroyed on it!!! you have been warned.

SuperTek · n00b Joined: 20 Apr 2003 Posts: 17 Location: Brazil

I've found this on bugzilla: https://bugs.gentoo.org/show_bug.cgi?id=421839

Unfortunately this bug is around for quite some time. Hope the developers fix this soon...

AustinMatherne · Posted: Wed Oct 03, 2012 3:31 pm Post subject:

I just got done installing using SystemRescueCd last night. I ran into an unrelated problem with btrfs, but SystemRescueCd worked like a charm.

SuperTek: Nice find.

likewhoa: That creates a bootable usb drive; however, it still suffers from the same issue.

likewhoa · Posted: Thu Oct 04, 2012 2:36 pm Post subject:

faustoab · n00b Joined: 17 Oct 2012 Posts: 2

The same happens here.
You can reproduce it by trying to boot the last gentoo amd64 minimal iso at a VirtualBox machine.

At the boot, after config the keyboard:

* WARNING: rc_sys not defined in rc.conf. Falling back to automatic detection

* ...

* Configuring kernel parameters ...
mkdir: cannot create directory '/var/run': File exists
* failed to create needed directory /var/run
*ERROR: bootmisc failed to start

And from now on, lot of errors happening:
if you try: syslog-ng
=> Error creating persistent state file; filename=' /var/lib/misc/syslog-ng.persist-' ', error='No such file or dicrectory'

Obs: theres no /var/lib/misc path

I notice that with this release:
http://distfiles.gentoo.org/releases/amd64/autobuilds/current-iso/install-amd64-minimal-20121013.iso

And the release before this one, it also happened.

cach0rr0 · Posted: Thu Oct 18, 2012 4:19 am Post subject:

FWIW - as of a day or two ago I was able to use Grub2 installed to my thumb drive, booting the livedvd iso directly. havent tried with the minimal - sysrescuecd is always the correct choice if you were otherwise planning on using the minimal .iso

anyone that cares about the livedvd on a thumb drive (i actually have a thumb drive that has sysrescuecd, gentoo livedvd, and backtrack5, on my car keychain), the short version was (making this thumb drive from a gentoo laptop, btw)

-unmount my laptop's *real* /boot partition
-partition thumb drive as one massive ext2 volume
-mount massive ext2 partition as /boot
-do a "grub2-install /dev/sdb" where /dev/sdb is the thumb drive
-copy the iso to /boot/ (which is actually just the root of the thumb drive)
-manually set up a /boot/grub2/grub.cfg (again, this grub.cfg is *on* the thumb drive, i dont want grub2 to be used for my laptop) like so

faustoab · n00b Joined: 17 Oct 2012 Posts: 2

The "gentoo amd64 minimal" iso worked using a previous version like:
http://distfiles.gentoo.org/releases/amd64/autobuilds/20120524/install-amd64-minimal-20120524.iso

I installed gentoo right now from stage 3 and it worked ok.
Obs: I am accostumed to use UNetbootin (http://unetbootin.sourceforge.net/) from my Ubuntu to install any iso boot in my pendrive.

naviathan · Apprentice Joined: 12 Dec 2004 Posts: 231

The problem with the minimal disk is several broken symlinks in the /var directory. You can manually delete these links and create the necessary folders and everything works fine.

EDIT
Symlinks to delete and recreate as directories:
/var/lock
/var/run
/var/mail
/var/lib/misc

Once you've created these directories run:
/etc/init.d/syslog-ng start
/etc/init.d/dhcpcd start

Everything should be functioning as needed to continue your Gentoo install using the minimal x86_64 cd.
_________________
I respect faith, but doubt is what gives you an education.
-- Wilson Mizner

khayyam · Posted: Mon Oct 22, 2012 1:28 pm Post subject:

... to follow on from cach0rr0's post, the current sysrescuecd iso can be booted similarly with the following:

h017ah · n00b Joined: 18 Apr 2007 Posts: 46

Tested today with install-amd64-minimal-20121013.iso, even if you fix the issue with missing /run-folder, you still cannot start sshd due to missing ECDSA-related symbols. I get the error described in this post here: https://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-907592-highlight-eckeynewbycurvename.html

It has been like this for some weeks, seems a bit silly :)

kanafan · n00b Joined: 08 Jun 2011 Posts: 1

This problem persists (install-amd64-minimal-20121107.iso)

/run is missing, several errors about it, etc.

I am using a USB drive.

iamben · Apprentice Joined: 10 May 2004 Posts: 278

The sshd & /var/run errors are known bugs and are not related to USB boot. They are being worked on.

chemonz · n00b Joined: 07 Jul 2012 Posts: 8 Location: Brasil

chemonz · n00b Joined: 07 Jul 2012 Posts: 8 Location: Brasil

I have customized my spec stage1 and stage2 of the catalyst using liveCD

Strange but use systemd for init I solved the problem with the directory /run. Everything works perfectly now after generating the liveCD using the catalyst
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clavko · n00b Joined: 02 Aug 2008 Posts: 25

Using advice from likewhoa about hybridiso and 20121210 minimal cd
there are no more problems for me, i guess