UNetbootin

[saturnian]

I believe that UNetbootin runs only a single distro. If you want to run multiples, stick with MultiSystem.

I think you're right, but I guess there's a script out there that supposedly you can use to create a multi-boot image, and then use that with UNetbootin.http://multicd.tuxfamily.org/http://jeysundar.blogspot.com/2009/06/boot...-usb-flash.html

[sunrat]

My best Linux pal, however, uses Debian and only Debian, and I guess he thinks I'm kinda nuts with how I approach things!

Very smart pal you have. I've had less problems with Debian than anything else I've tried. aptosid, which I use now, is basically 99% Debian.Debian rules! You will be assimilated!

[securitybreach]

Very smart pal you have. I've had less problems with Debian than anything else I've tried. aptosid, which I use now, is basically 99% Debian.Debian rules! You will be assimilated!

Hehe I like your Emoticon

[saturnian]

Very smart pal you have. I've had less problems with Debian than anything else I've tried. aptosid, which I use now, is basically 99% Debian.Debian rules! You will be assimilated!

LOL! Yeah, Debian is great. So is Mepis, which is really just Debian Stable made a bit easier to install and set up. But I can't see myself ever having only one distro installed. Maybe it's a personality flaw!

[ichase]

In that case, go for one FAT (32) partition (or NTFS if you think the FAT file size limit is going to be a problem).Oh and... you might want to laugh a little – from The Archives:http://forums.scotsnewsletter.com/index.php?showtopic=17625

Great advice Urams. Thanks for linking to that discussion. That was a GREAT read that I actually cut and pasted and printed for my Linux notes folder. I actually learned a lot from your experience. I only wish I had the honor of knowing Bruno in life from reading his replies with-in that thread you can really see awesome patience and understanding. Then on top of that, thanking you for your patience. He was truly an awesome individual. :)Ian

[ichase]

OK, really needing opinions. Don't hold back. :)1st question needs to be, is 20 GB a reasonable partion for each distro if I leave /home with each distro like Frank suggested. Leaving the 84 GB for data and backup files? Not planning on saving much in regards to Windows. As mentioned before in my response to Urmas, the only reason I have it is so that the wife can use it to get on the internet when we are away from home. She does not DL anything and there is still room in the Windows partition after partitioning the internal last night.If I install Mandriva 2010.1 KDE on the internal (duel booting with Windows XP Home) can I still use the same code in konsole that you use in Ubunto. I have 2010.0 installed in my tower and it did not have sudo installed, had to grab it from the repos. Have not checked to see if 2010.1 has it or not. I could just install UE 2.8 on the internal and this would be a moot point right?

sudo grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg

sudo grub-install /dev/sda

Should I format each of the distro partitions to Ext3 or Ext4? I have read pros and cons of using Ext4 and it's been pretty much 50% down the board.

250 GIG External HDDPartition Plan- Swap Partition – 6 GB (6144 MB)- Linux Distro Partition – 20 GB (20480 MB) Ultimate Edition 2.8- Linux Distro Partition – 20 GB PCLOS 2010.11- Linux Distro Partition – 20 GB OpenSUSE 11.3 KDE- Linux Distro Partition – 20 GB Mint 10 Julia (Gnome)- Linux Distro Partition – 20 GB Fedora 14 KDE- Linux Distro Partition – 20 GB Debian 5.0.6 KDE- Linux Distro Partition – 20 GB SLAX 6.1.2- Linux Distro Partition – 20 GB Archlinux 2010.05- FAT 32 Partition – 84 GB (86016 MB)Total = 250 GB

Like I said, let me have it. If I am an I_D_10_T by all means let me know that as well. :hysterical:Thanks ladies and gentleman for your continued guidance and support.All the best,Ian

[Frank Golden]

OK, really needing opinions. Don't hold back. :)1st question needs to be, is 20 GB a reasonable partion for each distro if I leave /home with each distro like Frank suggested. Leaving the 84 GB for data and backup files? Not planning on saving much in regards to Windows. As mentioned before in my response to Urmas, the only reason I have it is so that the wife can use it to get on the internet when we are away from home. She does not DL anything and there is still room in the Windows partition after partitioning the internal last night.If I install Mandriva 2010.1 KDE on the internal (duel booting with Windows XP Home) can I still use the same code in konsole that you use in Ubunto. I have 2010.0 installed in my tower and it did not have sudo installed, had to grab it from the repos. Have not checked to see if 2010.1 has it or not. I could just install UE 2.8 on the internal and this would be a moot point right?

sudo grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg

sudo grub-install /dev/sda

Should I format each of the distro partitions to Ext3 or Ext4? I have read pros and cons of using Ext4 and it's been pretty much 50% down the board.Like I said, let me have it. If I am an I_D_10_T by all means let me know that as well. :hysterical:Thanks ladies and gentleman for your continued guidance and support.All the best,Ian

In my experience 20 GB is plenty big enough.Even the distro with one of the largest footprints out there (Ultimate Edition) only uses about 11 GB on my setup.Most use 5 GB or so after adding all the software I usually use.I've not tried ext4 yet so I don't have an opinion on that subject.Actually Ultimate Edition 2.8 is a very good choice to have dual booted with XP on your main drive.Because it is an Ubuntu variant it uses sudo, one of the things I like most about Ubuntu.I would have the 6 GB swap on the internal drive and share it with the external distros.The installers will find it and automatically use it.Most if not all distros can install from a Live CD\USB flash device so you would choose the manual install method when asked where to install each distro.This is of course after you've prepared the drive with Gparted or whatever you choose for partitioning.The 85 GB Fat 32 partition should be adequate but you should have it auto mounted when any of the external distrosare booted especially if you plan on having a folder full of mp3's available for play from there.If they are automounted you can configure the media player in each distro to have a "permanent" playlist.You would need to have each distros fstab file edited to ensure this.Be aware that Fat 32 has a file size limitation (no individual file can be larger than 4 GB) if thats an issue then NTFS is the choice.Most distros these days can read\write NTFS no problem.If you store system images made by Partimage or Clonezilla on your Fat 32 partition the limitation isn't an issue because the imaging programs will automatically split then resulting image files into sub 4 GB pieces.It would be an issue if you have video files greater than 4 GB however.Your choice.Anyway you seem to be figuring it out pretty well, keep up the questions.Hermans dual boot site below is a great source of info especially about setting up GRUB (either GRUB 2 or legacy)or editing fstab to automount partitions.http://members.iinet.net/~herman546/index.html

[securitybreach]

Good information Frank :thumbup:As far as ext4, I use it on all my machines and it seems to work very well.

[Frank Golden]

Good information Frank :thumbup:As far as ext4, I use it on all my machines and it seems to work very well.

I guess I'll have to give it a try, Josh.Next time I install a distro I'll opt for ext4.

[sunrat]

1st question needs to be, is 20 GB a reasonable partion for each distro if I leave /home with each distro like Frank suggested....

20GB is heaps. On my main everyday distro (aptosid) I only use a 10GB partition as / , with /home included, but I clean it out regularly and keep most data on a separate /data partition. Edited December 17, 2010 by sunrat

[abarbarian]

I have been using ext4 on Mandy 64 and have come across no problems. The commands in buntu's and Mandy are different. My data drive is NTFS and have had no problems with access from a variety of distros.

[ChipDoc]

20 gigs is PLENTY. I'm running Ultimate Edition 2.8 and making less than 12 gigs of footprint. As far as ext4 goes, I've been running it exclusively since September with no problems whatsoever.

[ichase]

First off, thank you all for the great advice!! I see this being a lot of fun and a great learning experience.Slight change, nothing of extreme importance. I installed PCLOS 2010.11 to duel boot with XP. My UE 2.8 DVD (ended up ordering it from linuxcd.org) is corrupted. Tried it on 2 different machines. I may try to DL it manually but at over 2 Gigs, that is one big DL. I tried finding a torrent for it, and I am sure it is out there but could only find direct .iso image to DL. I'm going to look again.In the mean time, I am going to start partitioning this drive and you can rest assured, there will be more questions. :hysterical:Thanks again everyone!Ian

Edited December 17, 2010 by ichase

[sunrat]

The .iso file is the one you want. Burn it to a DVD, use Burn Image NOT Data DVD. K3b or Brasero will do it in Linux, ImgBurn or Nero in Windows.The torrent link is at the bottom of this page.

[ichase]

The .iso file is the one you want. Burn it to a DVD, use Burn Image NOT Data DVD. K3b or Brasero will do it in Linux, ImgBurn or Nero in Windows.The torrent link is at the bottom of this page.

Thanks for pointing that out sunrat. Was not paying attention. I know I need the .iso file, I was just looking for a torrent as I feel it provided for a much faster DL.Ian

[ichase]

Well, I partitioned the external, all went well there. Installed Mint 10 Julia on SDB 5, then installed OpenSUSE 11.4 on SDB 6. After the OpenSUSE finished installing, it went to reboot like normal. I then got this.

GRUB Loading Stage1.5.GRUB loading, please wait...Error 21

Now NOTHING will boot. I obviously screwed something up. No big deal, I can wipe the drive and re-install but need to figure out what I did so that I do not do it again. :angry:Ian

[abarbarian]

"Error 21 means "Can not find disk" So it probably will be a hardware problem, loose cable, dead hdd etc etc . Or more likely a Grub problem. Start the pc with a LIVE CD Linux and check that all the drives and partitions are showing. Then fix the Grub entry that is causing the problem. This might help with that,http://www.supergrubdisk.org/

[ichase]

Thanks for sharing the link abarbarian. I am wiping the internal on this lappy now and installing XP Pro then probably going to install a couple of other distros on the internal as well. DL UE 2.8 and HOPEFULLY this burn works. The one I ordered did not. Once I get the internal set up and set up right, I will re-attempt setting up the external. I need to beef up on installing the distros more. If I go to install on 1 of the 20 GB partitions, making sure that I pay closer attention to how to install it, so it does not try installing stuff to the other partitions. I think that is what OpenSUSE was doing.Ian

[ChipDoc]

I may try to DL it manually but at over 2 Gigs, that is one big DL.

Be careful what you wish for, Ian. I pulled down the Ubuntu 11.04 Alpha release last weekend and that turned out to be 4 gigs! Took over a half hour even on the lickety-split connection at work!

[Frank Golden]

Be careful what you wish for, Ian. I pulled down the last weekend and that turned out to be 4 gigs! Took over a half hour even on the lickety-split connection at work!

It sounds like you D\L'd the entire database, Paul.The release should have been a 700MB .iso not 4 GB.The database would have included several different versions on the .iso like the desktop, alternate and 32 bit 64 bit versions.I won't use torrents when I can obtain the file(s) directly especially with my fairly quick connection.If offered a choice from a D\L site I will always use the direct D\L.Even with my modest connection a 2 GB D\L like the Ultimate DVD .iso only takes about an hour or so.I don't trust peer to peer.I don't even have torrent software installed.

[sunrat]

I don't trust peer to peer.I don't even have torrent software installed.

There's really nothing wrong with the torrent protocol itself. It has just got a bad rap because it is used for sharing of pirate copyright-infringing files, and it's quite easy to infect say a pirated game file and then seed it to naive users. Newsgroups and ftp have also been used extensively to distribute pirate and infected files.If a torrent for a legitimate file has been seeded by it's originator, there is almost no chance of anything nefarious, as the torrent client checks the file's integrity.I've downloaded many distros using torrents and had no problems ever. I consider it good form to use torrents if they are available, particularly for the lesser known distros who may struggle to pay for massive http/ftp uploads from their servers. Edited December 18, 2010 by sunrat

[abarbarian]

Torrents rock. They are a very good way of sharing files and give everyone a chance to help out at a very low almost negligible cost to themselves. They also help to decentralise the flow of content which in turn helps to keep the net free from facist government/big business control.As with any file you get from anywhere you would be wise to scan for nastys.

[ichase]

I very rarely DL via torrents. But when I do, I scan for the "nastys" as you mentioned abarbarian. So, wanted to give an update to what I have done thus far. As mentioned earlier, I wiped the internal clean and partioned. Set 4 partitions. 1st being the NTFS partition with XP Pro (legit copy), then a 4 gig Swap file and 2 other partitions formated ext4 (figured I would give that a try) The UE 2.8 I DL via torrent burned great so that is installed on the 3rd partition. The 4th partition will be for another distro, but have not decided which one I plan on installing yet. More than likely Mandy. :)Here is the setup for the internalI then went ahead and set up the external.Let me know what you think. If you think there is a better way, please by all means let me know. I do hope you all know by know how much I value your guidance and advice and I have already learned ALOT from you all.Thanks,Ian

[securitybreach]

Hey Ian, if you do not mind, could you use one of the image hosting websites and post the bbcode instead of the full image? This will allow you to post a smaller click-able image. The reason being there are people who are bandwidth impaired (slower connections)and we try to be considerate of those users. I personally use http://www.imagebam.com but there are others likehttp://www.imageshack.us etc. Thanks Ian

[ichase]

I actually did use a image hosting site, can't remember which one. Sorry about them being so big. That was not my intent. :)I will use imagebam from now on.

Edited December 18, 2010 by ichase

[securitybreach]

I actually did use a image hosting site, can't remember which one. Sorry about them being so big. That was not my intent.

Hey, no problem bro

[Frank Golden]

I actually did use a image hosting site, can't remember which one. Sorry about them being so big. That was not my intent. :)I will use imagebam from now on.

I bet it was Photobucket, they just made major changes and the large "thumbnail" is one of them.

[sunrat]

I actually did use a image hosting site, can't remember which one.

You used imagehost.org. Haven't heard of it before and I'm not sure what functions it offers. Imageshack and Imagebam give you automatic thumbnail code, so you can copy/paste the code into the forum and have it display a thumbnail linked to the full-size image.Oh, and back on topic, your partition schemes look fine, although I doubt you'll use 20GB for most of you distro installations.Happy installing! Edited December 19, 2010 by sunrat

[ichase]

Oh, and back on topic, your partition schemes look fine, although I doubt you'll use 20GB for most of you distro installations.Happy installing!

You are right, 20 GB will be more than enough space for any distro out there. Does anyone know off hand what distro Parted Magic is based on? Reason I ask is, I can easily configure wireless on it and figured the distro it is based off of would do the same.Ian

[securitybreach]

You are right, 20 GB will be more than enough space for any distro out there. Does anyone know off hand what distro Parted Magic is based on? Reason I ask is, I can easily configure wireless on it and figured the distro it is based off of would do the same.Ian

Well DIstroWatch says:

Based on: IndependentOrigin: USA Architecture: i486Desktop: OpenboxCategory: Live Medium, SpecialistStatus: Active

http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=partedmagicSo it looks like it a independent distro and is not based upon any distro.