Linux USB

[Hellowpplz]

Has anyone tried running linux off of a usb 3.0 stick? Wanted to try this, just for the sake of being able to access it easily without having to dual boot on a 512gb ssd.

[Levent]

Yes it works fine. Been doing it for a while. As long as Linux kernel supports your usb controller you are good.

[jaslion]

Its like one of the main ways people run linux often. In live usb mode, portable os or just installed directly.

 

Do keep in mind this will shorten the life of the usb drive as rhey arent made for constant read/write as is common with running an os.

[Hellowpplz]

3 minutes ago, Levent said:

Yes it works fine. Been doing it for a while. As long as Linux kernel supports your usb controller you are good.

 

1 minute ago, jaslion said:

Its like one of the main ways people run linux often. In live usb mode, portable os or just installed directly.

 

Do keep in mind this will shorten the life of the usb drive as rhey arent made for constant read/write as is common with running an os.

And how big would the usb drives need to be? Also I only have one usb 3.0 drive and and one usb 2.0 drive, what should I use the one usb 3.0 drive for? For the setup process or for holding the OS?

[jaslion]

1 hour ago, Hellowpplz said:

 

And how big would the usb drives need to be? Also I only have one usb 3.0 drive and and one usb 2.0 drive, what should I use the one usb 3.0 drive for? For the setup process or for holding the OS?

I mean ir all dependa on the os you choose. Some will fit on even a 128mb usb stick. Others will need a 4gb stick or a bit more.

 

Really just depends on what os you want. I prefer kubuntu myself ans that works on a 8gb stick with ease.

[Hellowpplz]

4 hours ago, jaslion said:

I mean ir all dependa on the os you choose. Some will fit on even a 128mb usb stick. Others will need a 4gb stick or a bit more.

 

Really just depends on what os you want. I prefer kubuntu myself ans that works on a 8gb stick with ease.

Linux *distros naming* is confusing


I'll get there some day

Edited May 15 by Hellowpplz

[jaslion]

23 minutes ago, Hellowpplz said:

Linux is confusing


I'll get there some day

I mean its not really?

 

Linux is just the core of a linux distro.

 

Everything else gets built on top of that. Its why you have multiple buntu distro's, linux mint,... all that stuff.

 

You just pick one and go from there.

 

I pick kubuntu because its what I like the most.

 

Then once you pick your flavour you make a bootable usb drive with rufus or whatever and well off to the races.

[Kilrah]

It's fine, ideally get a USB drive that's based on an SSD and not just "a cheap flash drive". The latter will be terribly slow and wear out quick.

[Sauron]

6 hours ago, Hellowpplz said:

And how big would the usb drives need to be? Also I only have one usb 3.0 drive and and one usb 2.0 drive, what should I use the one usb 3.0 drive for? For the setup process or for holding the OS?

You should definitely use the faster 3.0 drive for the OS, most flash drives aren't very fast anyway but 2.0 really holds you back.

 

As for size, it all depends on how much you intend to use them. I wouldn't go below 32Gb if you want to actually use it, 128 is probably a better choice considering they're all so cheap anyway.

[Hellowpplz]

6 hours ago, jaslion said:

flavour

this term is still funny to me, also

[Guest]

Flavour is the proper British spelling of the American word 'flavor'. Also the colour grey for the color gray, a fanny refers to a woman's vagina, boot is what we in the US call a trunk.

I could go on for a couple hundred more misspellings, but you get the point.

[Hellowpplz]

6 hours ago, Thomas4 said:

Flavour is the proper British spelling of the American word 'flavor'. Also the colour grey for the color gray, a fanny refers to a woman's vagina, boot is what we in the US call a trunk.

I could go on for a couple hundred more misspellings, but you get the point.

I didn't mean the spelling, I meant just that term for different versions of linux in general


"What's your favorite flavour?" 
"Kubuntu"
"Cool- Wait what"

[Hellowpplz]

8 hours ago, Thomas4 said:

Flavour is the proper British spelling of the American word 'flavor'. Also the colour grey for the color gray, a fanny refers to a woman's vagina, boot is what we in the US call a trunk.

I could go on for a couple hundred more misspellings, but you get the point.

 

16 hours ago, Sauron said:

You should definitely use the faster 3.0 drive for the OS, most flash drives aren't very fast anyway but 2.0 really holds you back.

 

As for size, it all depends on how much you intend to use them. I wouldn't go below 32Gb if you want to actually use it, 128 is probably a better choice considering they're all so cheap anyway.

 

20 hours ago, Kilrah said:

It's fine, ideally get a USB drive that's based on an SSD and not just "a cheap flash drive". The latter will be terribly slow and wear out quick.

 

21 hours ago, jaslion said:

I mean its not really?

 

Linux is just the core of a linux distro.

 

Everything else gets built on top of that. Its why you have multiple buntu distro's, linux mint,... all that stuff.

 

You just pick one and go from there.

 

I pick kubuntu because its what I like the most.

 

Then once you pick your flavour you make a bootable usb drive with rufus or whatever and well off to the races.

 

23 hours ago, Levent said:

Yes it works fine. Been doing it for a while. As long as Linux kernel supports your usb controller you are good.

I have four usb's, all at least 32gb. I decided on trying Kubuntu and for the sake of performance testing, absolute linux. Tried Absolute linux first and uhhhhh it's stuck in a terminal screen where I can't type and all it says is:

   Booting 'Absolute (Slackware) 15.0 huge.s kernel'

Loading huge.s kernel and installer initrd.   Please wait...


How long do I wait it's been almost an hour now

[jaslion]

1 hour ago, Hellowpplz said:

I didn't mean the spelling, I meant just that term for different versions of linux in general


"What's your favorite flavour?" 
"Kubuntu"
"Cool- Wait what"

A flavour can be the indication of something. Hence why it is correct to use it in this tone.

 

Its why manners of speech like "flavourful words" and such are a thing.

 

I like using it sparingly but will do so when the opportunity arises

 

5 minutes ago, Hellowpplz said:

   Booting 'Absolute (Slackware) 15.0 huge.s kernel'

Loading huge.s kernel and installer initrd.   Please wait...


How long do I wait it's been almost an hour now

Ran into an error and crashed. Happens. Could be media creation fault, hardware driver issue, weird crash,...

 

Its why I do recommend sticking a bit closer to the big names the first time using a linux distro as those tend to be the easiest to run on basically anything.

[Hellowpplz]

10 minutes ago, jaslion said:

A flavour can be the indication of something. Hence why it is correct to use it in this tone.

 

Its why manners of speech like "flavourful words" and such are a thing.

 

I like using it sparingly but will do so when the opportunity arises

 

Ran into an error and crashed. Happens. Could be media creation fault, hardware driver issue, weird crash,...

 

Its why I do recommend sticking a bit closer to the big names the first time using a linux distro as those tend to be the easiest to run on basically anything.

Ah okay
I forcee shut it down and tried multiple times

 

Dang this one is NOT good

[Guest]

Sorry, I thought you meant the spelling, but for whys, clipped from an old article that I had pick up somewhere:

Original Distros vs Derivatives vs Flavours

Now that you have understood what Linux Distros are, let’s go and look at 2 main types of distros

• original distros and
• derivative distros

Original distros

Making a Linux distro from zero involves a lot of work to put all the packages and the Linux kernel together into a single “distributable” Operating system.

Original distributions are those that are made this way from zero. In other words, these original ones take the kernel, GNU utilities, application software, etc. and combine them into an installable operating system and distribute them to the end-users usually over the internet. Popular examples of original distros include Debian, RedHat, Slackware, etc.

Derivative distros

Derived distros are ones that take one of these original distributions, make some changes to it, so that its more suitable for a specific purpose and then distribute them as an installable operating system.

For example, Debian is an original distro and all the distros derived from it like Ubuntu, Mint, Knoppix, etc are derived Distros.

Derived Distros have different goals as compared to their originals. They usually depend on the original Distros to some extent (for the parts that have not been changed), but they tend to take on their own routes when it comes to future developments, to make it suitable for the purpose it was created for.

Flavors

Flavors, on the other hand, share the same goals of the original and usually are simple changes made to the Original Distro to accommodate the wishes of a certain division of users.

For example, some people dislike the Unity desktop environment of Ubuntu, but they are happy with everything else the distro has to offer. So for making these users happy several flavors of Ubuntu came out like Xubuntu which uses Xfce desktop, Kubuntu which uses KDE desktop, etc.

Other than the desktop environment, all of these Distros share the same core packages, same init system, same package management system, same goals as Ubuntu and they all use the same repositories to download and install software.

Let’s have a look at our table again.

original Distros	Derived Distros	Flavors
These are usually put together from zero	These are forks (Taking a copy and making changes)of original Distros. The core packages need not be the same as the original distro	They have the same core packages as the original Distro they are flavors of.
Have their own Repositories	They usually have their own software repository for hosting packages.	They usually share the same software repository as the original
–	They support downloading and installing most of the packages that original distro supports but not all of them	They support downloading and installing all the packages that work on the original distro.
–	They are usually maintained by a different set of people as the main goal of the derivative differs from the main goal of the original distro.	They are usually maintained by the same people that maintain the original distro as the main goal of the flavor is usually the same as the main goal of the original distro.
Examples: Debian, SUSE, RedHat Enterprise Linux, Slackware	Example: Linux Mint is a derivative of Ubuntu	Examples: Kubuntu, Xubuntu etc are flavors or Ubuntu

Edited May 19 by Thomas4
Edited to remove supererogatory information.