[Sugar-devel] Fwd: [Question #81566]: Can't boot MacBooks at GPAfrom CD + USB

[Art Hunkins]

Hello, Caroline,

I've considerable information to report re: CD's booting SoaS on USB.

First, I admit to burning my boot CD wrong; creating the right kind of (.iso) CD makes the process work fine for me. My fairly current desktop system worked fine this way, as well as did an IBM ThinkPad notebook of Pentium II vintage. (I'm by and large a Windows person; no experience with Macs at all.)

I did experience an overwhelming problem with the ThinkPad, however; it took a good 20 minutes or more for it to get from opening blue screen to the opening screen of my activity. It even took more than a minute to change to my initial activity screen from its full-screen icon display. And this machine has 1GB of memory. This admittedly anecdotal evidence leads me to question the total feasibility of running SoaS on vintage equipment. Have you or others had similar experience?

I was prepared for *some* slowdown, as my XO-1 natively runs noticeably faster than the XO-1 under SoaS Strawberry. The IBM ThinkPad however, is a *complete* no-go.

I've another Pentium I/II vintage laptop. It, like my IBM, has only a single USB port - showing that they are from the first generation of USB usage. However, this Hitachi laptop cannot boot from CD. This reminded me that USB ports and bootable CD's came in at about the same time, and do not predate by far bootable USB drives. IOW, bootable CD's are of limited utility for SoaS.

However, bootable (3.5") *floppies* would be altogether a different matter. Floppies have been bootable forever, and all vintage machines have floppy drives - including both my Pentium I/II laptops. A floppy/USB combo, for laptops with a USB port, would at least theoretically render all such machines SoaS-capable. The combo would also work fine for older desktops as long as you could find a USB card for them.

Bottom line: I'd really look forward to the availability of the boot floppy that's being completed by one of our list-members. If you had older desktops or laptops, you could easily configure them to boot first from the A: drive, having inserted the floppy disk and perhaps black-plastic-electrical-taped over the A: drive opening (?!).

But, to restate my question (and fear): who has had bad/good experience with SoaS in older computers?

Art Hunkins 
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Caroline Meeks 
  To: Art Hunkins 
  Sent: Thursday, September 03, 2009 8:35 PM
  Subject: Re: [Sugar-devel] Fwd: [Question #81566]: Can't boot MacBooks at GPAfrom CD + USB


  Hi,


  How are things going getting your computers to boot?  Do you get this consistently or is it intermittent? I've seen it intermittently especially if I use restart not shutdown. If I power down its more likely to take.


  Thanks
  Caroline


  On Mon, Aug 31, 2009 at 10:05 PM, Art Hunkins <abhunkin at uncg.edu> wrote:

    FWIW, on a WinXP system of mine, a helper CD I made and booted from, completely ignored my SoaS and booted into Windows.

    Not very encouraging. I'm finding that quite a few systems I have around here don't have a USB boot option. I've a feeling that most systems more than 4 years old or so fit into this category. 

    Art Hunkins
      ----- Original Message ----- 
      From: Caroline Meeks 
      To: Sugar Devel ; iaep 
      Sent: Monday, August 31, 2009 9:09 PM
      Subject: [Sugar-devel] Fwd: [Question #81566]: Can't boot MacBooks at GPAfrom CD + USB


      Has anyone seen a "Not Responding" error when booting with a CD helper? 


      Also, I'm trying out the LaunchPad Questions functionality to see if this could be a front door where people put in various issues then we triage them to bugs/FAQs etc.


      ---------- Forwarded message ----------
      From: Caroline <question81566 at answers.launchpad.net>
      Date: Mon, Aug 31, 2009 at 8:28 PM
      Subject: [Question #81566]: Can't boot MacBooks at GPA from CD + USB
      To: cmeeks at sugarlabs.org


      New question #81566 on Sugar on a Stick:
      https://answers.launchpad.net/soas/+question/81566

      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ir1A3FH08kQ

      I've been able to boot with a CD and USB other macbooks, such as those at LGF. I've never seen this error before.

      Anurag is going to try a Sugar and Fedora CD tomorrow.

      --
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      -- 
      Caroline Meeks
      Solution Grove
      Caroline at SolutionGrove.com

      617-500-3488 - Office
      505-213-3268 - Fax



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  -- 
  Caroline Meeks
  Solution Grove
  Caroline at SolutionGrove.com

  617-500-3488 - Office
  505-213-3268 - Fax
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