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This pages describes how to create a flash drive that can be used for installing Ubuntu Server. This is for any machine that doesn't have a CD drive but can boot from USB media (i.e. the flash drive).

Note: The methods described below (installation with the hd-media installer) will work for mini and server isos.

The steps are

Comment: Could not get it to work with hardy server iso - it fails to mount /dev/sda and /var/log/syslog says Debian image ubuntu-8.10-server-amd64.iso is not usable Sad :(

Comment2: Get it to work with hardy-server-amd64 iso too. My first try doesn't work too, but because of the false vmlinuz/initrd.gz files. With both from the "installer-amd64"-tree the installation goes around Smile :-)

Notes:

Flash Drive Creation Script

# Replace "sdx" with "sdb" or whatever your flash drive is
#   - If unsure which device is your flash drive then
#     run "sudo fdisk -l | less" in order to identify it

ISOIMAGE=ubuntu-8.04-server-i386.iso

sudo apt-get install syslinux mtools mbr
echo "Use fdisk to manually create a 1GB bootable FAT16 partition."
read -p "Press [Enter] to start the fdisk program..."
sudo fdisk /dev/sdx
sudo mkfs -t vfat /dev/sdx1
sudo mkdir -p /mnt/flash
sudo mount -t vfat /dev/sdx1 /mnt/flash
sudo syslinux -s /dev/sdx1
sudo mkdir -p /mnt/iso
sudo mount -o loop $ISOIMAGE /mnt/iso
sudo cp -R /mnt/iso/isolinux/* /mnt/flash
sudo mv /mnt/flash/isolinux.cfg /mnt/flash/syslinux.cfg
sudo mkdir -p /mnt/flash/install
sudo cp vmlinuz /mnt/flash/install
sudo cp initrd.gz /mnt/flash/install
sudo cp $ISOIMAGE /mnt/flash
sudo install-mbr /dev/sdx
sudo umount /mnt/flash
sudo umount /mnt/iso

Note: If you lose network connectivity during installation, GRUB and LILO may not be installed successfully.

UbuntuServerFlashDriveInstaller (last edited 2017-09-22 19:21:05 by ckimes)