How to change boot loader target drive to sdb for full USB install?

[linuxbeliever]

Hi! Everybody

I did what dolphin_oracle told me and i did not work. it outputs a lot of errors. This is what I see.

"demo@mx1:~
$ sudo apt update

We trust you have received the usual lecture from the local System
Administrator. It usually boils down to these three things:

#1) Respect the privacy of others.
#2) Think before you type.
#3) With great power comes great responsibility.

[sudo] password for demo:
Hit:1 http://security.debian.org stretch/updates InRelease
Get:2 http://iso.mxrepo.com/antix/stretch stretch InRelease [25.6 kB]
Hit:3 http://mxrepo.com/mx/repo stretch InRelease
Hit:4 http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian stretch-updates InRelease
Ign:5 http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian stretch InRelease
Hit:6 http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian stretch Release
Err:2 http://iso.mxrepo.com/antix/stretch stretch InRelease
The following signatures were invalid: EXPKEYSIG DB36CDF3452F0C20 antiX (antix repo) <antix@daveserver.info>
Reading package lists... Done
W: GPG error: http://iso.mxrepo.com/antix/stretch stretch InRelease: The following signatures were invalid: EXPKEYSIG DB36CDF3452F0C20 antiX (antix repo) <antix@daveserver.info>
E: The repository 'http://iso.mxrepo.com/antix/stretch stretch InRelease' is not signed.
N: Updating from such a repository can't be done securely, and is therefore disabled by default.
N: See apt-secure(8) manpage for repository creation and user configuration details.
demo@mx1:~
$ sudo apt install mx-installer
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
Some packages could not be installed. This may mean that you have
requested an impossible situation or if you are using the unstable
distribution that some required packages have not yet been created
or been moved out of Incoming.
The following information may help to resolve the situation:

The following packages have unmet dependencies:
mx-installer : Depends: partition-info (>= 1.7) but 1.4 is to be installed
E: Unable to correct problems, you have held broken packages.
demo@mx1:~
$
"
Any ideas? Thanks for the time and help. Have a nice day.

[JayM]

Running this in a command line should fix those unsigned errors:

Code: Select all

sudo -v ; wget 'https://download.tuxfamily.org/antix/releases/antix-archive-keyring.asc' -O- | sudo apt-key add - ; sudo apt-get update

[dolphin_oracle]

what Jay said. I forgot that the partition-info tool is in the antiX repo, which has an expired key on the iso.

[linuxbeliever]

HI! Everybody

I successfully updated mx-installer, but the installer keeps detecting sda drive only . See screenshot, please. Any ideas? Thanks for the time and help. Have a nice day.

[fehlix]

HI! Everybody

I successfully updated mx-installer, but the installer keeps detecting sda drive only . See screenshot, please. Any ideas? Thanks for the time and help. Have a nice day.

As I have just yesterday done such an unusual full install onto an USB-stick, I know that it works.
Please post Quick System Info from menu (type quick), with the plugged-in USB-stick.
And also partition layout in those two ways:

Code: Select all

lsblk -f

and

Code: Select all

fdisk -l

Might be we can spott the differences within your setup.
Thanks
Please do post those text-outputs between the code-tags [code]text out put here[/code] ( click on </> above editor)
Thanks

[linuxbeliever]

Hi! Fehlix

Here is the output of the commands, you posted. The first run is from the host machine, the second run is from virtualbox client, that I use to install to usb sticks according to this web site https://www.linux.org/threads/linux-ful ... ick.20921/, I already successfully created a kubuntu distro this way. Okay, here it goes:

Here is the ouput from my host machine:

Code: Select all

 maverick@TopGun ~ $ lsblk -f
NAME        FSTYPE LABEL    UUID                                 MOUNTPOINT
sda                                                              
├─sda1      vfat            7A76-EEDC                            /boot/efi
├─sda2      ext4            ab19021e-f8a5-4384-acc7-a9b0f5002c1e /
├─sda3      ext4            d9552c42-b3c1-41d1-a6d0-fa6ac143a68b /home
└─sda4      swap            899a84c9-dbb0-42b8-9721-3f6d62c1728d [SWAP]
nvme0n1                                                          
├─nvme0n1p1 vfat   SYSTEM   E67D-9ED5                            
├─nvme0n1p2                                                      
├─nvme0n1p3 ntfs   OS       18BA7F45BA7F1F06                     
├─nvme0n1p4 ntfs            9818853B18851A00                     
└─nvme0n1p5 ntfs   RECOVERY 3474119C74116242                     
maverick@TopGun ~ $ sudo fdisk -l
[sudo] password for maverick: 
Disk /dev/nvme0n1: 477 GiB, 512110190592 bytes, 1000215216 sectors
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disklabel type: gpt
Disk identifier: 6D0BDE2D-96BF-4DE8-B198-1757A85A2094

Device             Start        End   Sectors   Size Type
/dev/nvme0n1p1      2048     534527    532480   260M EFI System
/dev/nvme0n1p2    534528     567295     32768    16M Microsoft reserved
/dev/nvme0n1p3    567296  996887434 996320139 475.1G Microsoft basic data
/dev/nvme0n1p4 996888576  998574079   1685504   823M Windows recovery environment
/dev/nvme0n1p5 998576128 1000214527   1638400   800M Windows recovery environment


Disk /dev/sda: 465.8 GiB, 500107862016 bytes, 976773168 sectors
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disklabel type: gpt
Disk identifier: D39FDFA7-A13F-45FE-AC6D-968868C533A4

Device         Start       End   Sectors   Size Type
/dev/sda1       2048    194559    192512    94M EFI System
/dev/sda2     194560  41209855  41015296  19.6G Linux filesystem
/dev/sda3   41209856 896694271 855484416 407.9G Linux filesystem
/dev/sda4  896694272 927944703  31250432  14.9G Linux swap
maverick@TopGun ~ $ 

Here is the virtualbox client in live mode:

Code: Select all

demo@mx1:~
$ lsblk -f
NAME   FSTYPE   LABEL      UUID                                 MOUNTPOINT
loop0  squashfs                                                 /live/linux
sda                                                             
├─sda1 vfat                B641-125D                            
├─sda2 ext4     rootMX18.1 83c1869b-a0c3-48c2-832a-61af8de88119 
└─sda3 swap     swapMX     e9d7b12f-f410-4cbe-b8c1-a5e1fdf12dda 
sr0    iso9660  antiXlive  2019-02-09-13-48-11-00               /live/boot-dev
demo@mx1:~
$ fdisk -l
fdisk: cannot open /dev/loop0: Permission denied
fdisk: cannot open /dev/sda: Permission denied
demo@mx1:~
$ 
demo@mx1:~
$ lsblk -f
NAME   FSTYPE   LABEL      UUID                                 MOUNTPOINT
loop0  squashfs                                                 /live/linux
sda                                                             
├─sda1 vfat                B641-125D                            
├─sda2 ext4     rootMX18.1 83c1869b-a0c3-48c2-832a-61af8de88119 
└─sda3 swap     swapMX     e9d7b12f-f410-4cbe-b8c1-a5e1fdf12dda 
sr0    iso9660  antiXlive  2019-02-09-13-48-11-00               /live/boot-dev
demo@mx1:~
$ sudo fdisk -l

We trust you have received the usual lecture from the local System
Administrator. It usually boils down to these three things:

    #1) Respect the privacy of others.
    #2) Think before you type.
    #3) With great power comes great responsibility.

[sudo] password for demo: 
Disk /dev/loop0: 1.3 GiB, 1421348864 bytes, 2776072 sectors
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes


Disk /dev/sda: 28.7 GiB, 30752636928 bytes, 60063744 sectors
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
Disklabel type: gpt
Disk identifier: 0485D7DD-916B-4C1A-97D6-A214A9A94E53

Device        Start      End  Sectors  Size Type
/dev/sda1        34   524287   524254  256M EFI System
/dev/sda2    524288 55803903 55279616 26.4G Linux filesystem
/dev/sda3  55803904 59998207  4194304    2G Linux filesystem
demo@mx1:~
$ 

Hope this helps Thanks for the time and help. Cheers.

[fehlix]

Thanks. So you now have "hdd"-full install on the usb-device. Not sure what went wrong. Actually it works here.
OTOH, I normaly would rather recommend to make a LiveUSB install. MX LiveUSB installs do provide the persistence feature, which is in a sense like a hdd-full install on USB including updates etc., but with the advantage that the LiveUSB can be used on different systems. So just plug the LiveUSB on any PC/laptop and it shall boot. And it can run even on slow USB-2 ports fairly fast as different boot cheats like toram etc are available.

[fluidvoice]

Something def wrong with installing to a USB destination. Auto install using the whole drive fails. Then custom partitioning would also fail - it would not allow me to select the correct boot partition until I deleted/recreated it with a larger size. Does the install tool check for some minimal partition size for the boot partition?
edit: even after this it would not let me select to NOT install grub and the USB drive. So I did an "apt upgrade" and "apt install mx-installer" then tried again.
This time I was able to install "on whole drive". So the installer in the downloaded ISO seems to have problems fixed if updating it.
edit2: well the installation finished but it created a boot partition on /dev/sdb1 with nothing it it (empty) and /dev/sdb2 has /boot and other stuff in it - looks normal.
Note, I chose not to install Grub. Must I install it to get it to work?

[fehlix]

edit2: well the installation finished but it created a boot partition on /dev/sdb1 with nothing it it (empty) and /dev/sdb2 has /boot and other stuff in it - looks normal.
Note, I chose not to install Grub. Must I install it to get it to work?

First a note for other reading this: Using MX Installer to perform a hdd-like install onto an USB stick, is not what we recommend but rather to install onto USB-stick using MX Live USB Maker.

One point probably to mention when using MX Installer to install onto an USB-stick would be
to make sure to clear the partition table on that USBstick as there are sometimes residual partition table information left on the stick especially when this stick was used before as dd-dumped ISO-boot stick.
To perform a partion clear on the USB stick run:

Code: Select all

sudo live-usb-maker partition-clear

The hdd-like installation performed by MX installer does not require to do a GRUB-install.
Grub install is a separate step, which can be left out. But of course without having a bootloader installed
you might find that booting from the USB stick might not be straight forward.

[fluidvoice]

edit2: well the installation finished but it created a boot partition on /dev/sdb1 with nothing it it (empty) and /dev/sdb2 has /boot and other stuff in it - looks normal.
Note, I chose not to install Grub. Must I install it to get it to work?

First a note for other reading this: Using MX Installer to perform a hdd-like install onto an USB stick, is not what we recommend but rather to install onto USB-stick using MX Live USB Maker.

One point probably to mention when using MX Installer to install onto an USB-stick would be
to make sure to clear the partition table on that USBstick as there are sometimes residual partition table information left on the stick especially when this stick was used before as dd-dumped ISO-boot stick.
To perform a partion clear on the USB stick run:

Code: Select all

sudo live-usb-maker partition-clear

The hdd-like installation performed by MX installer does not require to do a GRUB-install.
Grub install is a separate step, which can be left out. But of course without having a bootloader installed
you might find that booting from the USB stick might not be straight forward.

The boot partition should not be empty, right?
* If the chosen option is to install on the whole drive, arguably the installer should "clear the partition table" and anything else that should be done regardless of the destination drive's type or location. A drive should be treated as any other (regardless of MX having another "Live USB" feature). This is how Manjaro works - no difference if the destination drive is USB or not.
Keep in mind that also people coming from other distro's won't know about some other method of installation... the "MX Live USB Maker"... and if you ask me, this should be integrated into the installer so automate this for the user. Meaning, if the "proper" way to install MX onto a USB drive is this, then that should be an option to choose in the installer tool. Ideally, the installer should detect if it's a USB drive or not, but dunno if that's possible, or needed. But at least putting this front n center to the user during installation makes sense to me.