ReactOS Hybrid-USB Key attempt

[Hermès BÉLUSCA - MAÏTO]

Hi all !

 

In this video :

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BzFtJhksW7viRDRVMzluTnFjMlU/view?usp=sharin
g

(with strong French accent, sorry :P, and it was my first attempt at making
a video with a camera in one hand while doing the other things with the
other hand ^^), I show an attempt to create a hybrid-USB key by configuring
freeldr to load either a livecd (shown in the video) or a bootcd in ramdisk.

 

Many remarks are in order:

 

- there’s a crash when booting the bootcd image, early in phase 1 boot in Io
(can be reproduced locally on vbox for example, with similar freeldr.ini
parameters that I show in the video).

- the whole story consists in loading a ramdisk, so I avoid all the
USB-related storage problems we could (and certainly) encounter if I used
the USB key more like as we do for our current livecds, i.e. permanent reads
to the removable device.

- a ROS livecd that can be removable (in the sense that one can use another
cd to test something, while ROS is still running) should be done with some
kind of hdd image file instead, that is then loaded in memory (so that we
can then read and write to this virtual drive).

- something weird happens when freeldr loads the livecd iso in memory: first
it takes 7 minutes to just try to open the iso file, and then 7 other
minutes to load the iso proper. This problem needs to be investigated.

- we still report strange dates when listing files from the livecd (at least
when it is mounted as ramdisk), see the video.

- finally, when using Standard PC (non-ACPI) HAL, I don’t really think we
reposition HDD heads into “sleep position”, because when I switch PC power
off with the button I can hear the HDD making the noise of the heads quickly
going back to sleep position, whereas I don’t think this should happen if
the heads were being already in the correct position before I switch power
off (when using the “shutdown” command of FreeDOS, the other OS I have
installed in the PC, the noise isn’t produced).

 

Cheers,

Hermès.

 

PS: I keep the right to remove the video at any time if I notice misuses.
And it’s not an official video (even if I was playing around with Windows
Movie Maker with the ReactOS logo during the first seven seconds, and with
the website links at the end) !!

[Pierre Schweitzer]

On 08/01/2015 03:22, Hermès BÉLUSCA - MAÏTO wrote:
>   - we still report strange dates when listing files
> from the livecd (at least
>  when it is mounted as ramdisk), see the video. 
From the video, it appears to only affect directories and not "normal"
files.
Likely some bug in CDFS.

-- 
Pierre Schweitzer <pierre at reactos.org>
System & Network Administrator
Senior Kernel Developer
ReactOS Deutschland e.V.

[Igor Paliychuk]

Some time ago I was doing the same thing(it worked on some machines), but I
was using GRUB4DOS instead of syslinux to generate bootable USB Key (see
here http://diddy.boot-land.net/grub4dos/Grub4dos.htm and
http://sourceforge.net/projects/grub4dos/files/grubinst/)

2015-01-08 13:14 GMT+02:00 Alexander Rechitskiy <art1st-tm(a)yandex.ru>ru>:

>   Hi
>
>  Please check this
>  http://www.syslinux.org/wiki/index.php/Hardware_Compatibility#USB_related_p…
>
>  It could help with boot speed issue.
>
>  08.01.2015, 05:21, "Hermès BÉLUSCA - MAÏTO" <hermes.belusca(a)sfr.fr>fr>:
>
>  Hi all !
>
>
>
>  In this video :
>
>
>  https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BzFtJhksW7viRDRVMzluTnFjMlU/view?usp=shari…
>
>  (with strong French accent, sorry :P, and it was my first attempt at
>  making a video with a camera in one hand while doing the other things with
>  the other hand ^^), I show an attempt to create a hybrid-USB key by
>  configuring freeldr to load either a livecd (shown in the video) or a
>  bootcd in ramdisk.
>
>
>
>  Many remarks are in order:
>
>
>
>  - there’s a crash when booting the bootcd image, early in phase 1 boot in
>  Io (can be reproduced locally on vbox for example, with similar freeldr.ini
>  parameters that I show in the video).
>
>  - the whole story consists in loading a ramdisk, so I avoid all the
>  USB-related storage problems we could (and certainly) encounter if I used
>  the USB key more like as we do for our current livecds, i.e. permanent
>  reads to the removable device.
>
>  - a ROS livecd that can be removable (in the sense that one can use
>  another cd to test something, while ROS is still running) should be done
>  with some kind of hdd image file instead, that is then loaded in memory (so
>  that we can then read and write to this virtual drive).
>
>  - something weird happens when freeldr loads the livecd iso in memory:
>  first it takes 7 minutes to just try to open the iso file, and then 7 other
>  minutes to load the iso proper. This problem needs to be investigated.
>
>  - we still report strange dates when listing files from the livecd (at
>  least when it is mounted as ramdisk), see the video.
>
>  - finally, when using Standard PC (non-ACPI) HAL, I don’t really think we
>  reposition HDD heads into “sleep position”, because when I switch PC power
>  off with the button I can hear the HDD making the noise of the heads
>  quickly going back to sleep position, whereas I don’t think this should
>  happen if the heads were being already in the correct position before I
>  switch power off (when using the “shutdown” command of FreeDOS, the other
>  OS I have installed in the PC, the noise isn’t produced).
>
>
>
>  Cheers,
>
>  Hermès.
>
>
>
>  PS: I keep the right to remove the video at any time if I notice misuses.
>  And it’s not an official video (even if I was playing around with Windows
>  Movie Maker with the ReactOS logo during the first seven seconds, and with
>  the website links at the end) !!
>  ,
>
>  _______________________________________________
>  Ros-dev mailing list
>  Ros-dev(a)reactos.org
>  http://www.reactos.org/mailman/listinfo/ros-dev
>
>
>
>  --
>  Best regards,
>  Alexander Rechitsky aka Jeditobe
>
>
>  _______________________________________________
>  Ros-dev mailing list
>  Ros-dev(a)reactos.org
>  http://www.reactos.org/mailman/listinfo/ros-dev
>

[Hermès BÉLUSCA - MAÏTO]

Yeah. And just a note, now you can do it 100% ROS-way, because of that:
http://svn.reactos.org/svn/reactos?view=revision
<http://svn.reactos.org/svn/reactos?view=revision&revision=66012>
&revision=66012 : no SysLinux / GRUB / whatever else needed!

H.

 

De : Ros-dev [mailto:[e-mail]] De la part de Igor Paliychuk
Envoyé : mercredi 14 janvier 2015 12:34
À : ReactOS Development List
Objet : Re: [ros-dev] ReactOS Hybrid-USB Key attempt

 

Some time ago I was doing the same thing(it worked on some machines), but I was using
GRUB4DOS instead of syslinux to generate bootable USB Key (see here
http://diddy.boot-land.net/grub4dos/Grub4dos.htm and
http://sourceforge.net/projects/grub4dos/files/grubinst/)

 

2015-01-08 13:14 GMT+02:00 Alexander Rechitskiy &lt;art1st-tm(a)yandex.ru&gt;ru>:

Hi

 

Please check this
http://www.syslinux.org/wiki/index.php/Hardware_Compatibility#USB_related_p…

 

It could help with boot speed issue.

 

08.01.2015, 05:21, "Hermès BÉLUSCA - MAÏTO" &lt;hermes.belusca(a)sfr.fr&gt;fr>:

Hi all !

 

In this video :

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BzFtJhksW7viRDRVMzluTnFjMlU/view?usp=shari…

(with strong French accent, sorry :P, and it was my first attempt at making a video with a
camera in one hand while doing the other things with the other hand ^^), I show an attempt
to create a hybrid-USB key by configuring freeldr to load either a livecd (shown in the
video) or a bootcd in ramdisk.

 

Many remarks are in order:

 

- there’s a crash when booting the bootcd image, early in phase 1 boot in Io (can be
reproduced locally on vbox for example, with similar freeldr.ini parameters that I show in
the video).

- the whole story consists in loading a ramdisk, so I avoid all the USB-related storage
problems we could (and certainly) encounter if I used the USB key more like as we do for
our current livecds, i.e. permanent reads to the removable device.

- a ROS livecd that can be removable (in the sense that one can use another cd to test
something, while ROS is still running) should be done with some kind of hdd image file
instead, that is then loaded in memory (so that we can then read and write to this virtual
drive).

- something weird happens when freeldr loads the livecd iso in memory: first it takes 7
minutes to just try to open the iso file, and then 7 other minutes to load the iso proper.
This problem needs to be investigated.

- we still report strange dates when listing files from the livecd (at least when it is
mounted as ramdisk), see the video.

- finally, when using Standard PC (non-ACPI) HAL, I don’t really think we reposition HDD
heads into “sleep position”, because when I switch PC power off with the button I can hear
the HDD making the noise of the heads quickly going back to sleep position, whereas I
don’t think this should happen if the heads were being already in the correct position
before I switch power off (when using the “shutdown” command of FreeDOS, the other OS I
have installed in the PC, the noise isn’t produced).

 

Cheers,

Hermès.

 

PS: I keep the right to remove the video at any time if I notice misuses. And it’s not an
official video (even if I was playing around with Windows Movie Maker with the ReactOS
logo during the first seven seconds, and with the website links at the end) !!

,

_______________________________________________
Ros-dev mailing list
Ros-dev(a)reactos.org
http://www.reactos.org/mailman/listinfo/ros-dev

 

 

-- 
Best regards,

Alexander Rechitsky aka Jeditobe

 


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