Boot from USB on R40

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Béèm · #1 Post by **Béèm** » Sat Oct 20, 2007 12:44 pm

I think I had read instructions how to do a boot from a USB device (USB stick, HDD or DVD/CD device) but can't remember where.
I did a search in this forum and don't seem to find a hit, so it might not be here.

In the bios of the R40 there seems to be no option to accomplish this.

Can anyone help me?

#2 Post by **ryengineer** » Sat Oct 20, 2007 4:49 pm

There should be an option in the BIOS to change the boot order to USB CD/DVD drive.

Béèm · #3 Post by **Béèm** » Sat Oct 20, 2007 6:36 pm

Thank you for the reply.
I tried via the F12 boot device list option.
I did setup USB bios support to enable boot from a USB device.
Looking furthermore I only see a USB floppy or USB CD-ROM listed.
I try to boot from a USB kinda pendrive. A Creative Zen Micro which is prepared as a 4GB disk and which is made being bootable.
All the files needed to boot PuppyLinux are on that Zen drive.

Could it be that the R40 has resctrictions in recognizing USB boot devices?

I also have an external USB HDD, which I will try later.

Terrahawk · #4 Post by **Terrahawk** » Sun Oct 21, 2007 2:18 pm

I've booted my R40 from a USB drive before. I had to remove the main hard drive to get it to do so though.

Béèm · #5 Post by **Béèm** » Mon Oct 22, 2007 9:42 am

Terrahawk wrote:I've booted my R40 from a USB drive before. I had to remove the main hard drive to get it to do so though.

Did you have to disable booting from the HDD then in the BIOS?

Béèm · #6 Post by **Béèm** » Mon Oct 22, 2007 12:22 pm

For the benefit of those who are interested, this http://www.beezmo.com/ThinkPadR40Dir/TP ... Issues.htm is where I found the info.

Go into BIOS and select boot (with the USB device ready)
Select harddrive and expand - the USB device should be listed as well
Disable the HDD and enable the USB device.

Save and exit.

I tried, but there must be something wrong on the ZEN Micro device as the PC doesn't boot from there.

Will try an external HDD connected on USB.

Terrahawk · #7 Post by **Terrahawk** » Mon Oct 22, 2007 2:22 pm

Béèm wrote:Did you have to disable booting from the HDD then in the BIOS?

I removed the hard drive, formatted the USB drive to have a Master Boot Record (i.e. make it look like a hard drive) and then it booted. I believe the computer was thinking it was booting from a "USB hard drive".

Béèm · #8 Post by **Béèm** » Fri Nov 09, 2007 7:22 pm

Terrahawk, sorry for not responding earlier, but I have been away for a while.

I interupt the boot by pushing F12.
I then get a boor devices list.
I go into setup to adjust the boot devices and sequence.
The Zen Micro as well as the external HDD are listed in Hard Disk.
You have to push enter to see the devices.
With insert the boot of a device is enabled or disabled.
I disable booting from the HDD and leave the Zen Micro (or the external USB HDD) to boot from.
Then F10 save and exit.
I remove the CD and the R40 boots again and I push F12 again.
From the boot device list I choose to boot from the hard disk, which is either the Zen Micro or the external USB HDD

But unfortunately I get the message no operating system found alltho I did put all the necessary files on it to boot , in my case, PuppyLinux.

For the moment I don't know if this problem comes from PuppyLinux being badly prepared to boot from or from something not working quite well in the R40 USB boot.

I am still looking into this.

I didn't try to put another Linux or Windows on one of those USB devices.

Terrahawk · #9 Post by **Terrahawk** » Sat Nov 10, 2007 2:55 pm

I had to physically remove the hard drive from the system, disabling it in the BIOS did not seem to work for some reason. Then I realised that removing the hard drive actually defeated the purpose of me preparing the USB flash boot disk. I gave up and bought a floppy drive after that.

Also, I only tried booting DOS, which was successful.

Boot from USB on R40

Boot from USB on R40

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