Download from USB CF-29 Mark2E YES!

I think this needs it's own thread. I am typing on Ubuntu 10.10 installed from a USB stick. It wouldn't be a big deal except for the fact that the USB is not supported as a download device by Bios on this CF-29E.

This started from a post by Warew01f in the Ubuntu 10.10 thread. He mentioned a tool called Plop. So I had to look. I downloaded their boot manager, burned the iso to a CD and used that small program to install the boot manager to HDD. On re-boot I got the tiny little menu. I had the stick in the port and chose USB and away it went.

This could be done with a floppy. Use the floppy as boot manager installer and boot those larger files with USB. There is also an option to force USB 1.1.

And this, someone tell me what it means. Try it and report:

Below is a short excerpt from the Plop Home Page found at Plop - Bootmanager - Free Boot Manager, builtin usb driver, native usb, boot different operating systems, cdrom, usb, freeware, option rom bios. This is NOT the whole thing by any means. There are a lot of possibilities on that page.

Good program, no issues other than the disappearing touchpad pointer. (covered in Ubuntu 10.10 relating to 855GM chipset) and figuring out what a few things meant.

Thanks to Warew01f.

Jeff

 

Wow so yo u can boot from USB key even though it's not supported on the laptop?

 

Good Job!!

 

This looks interesting, but the only problem I see is writing to the boot rom of a phoenix bios (which toughbooks use) because it specifically does not mention a phoenix bios. When I am off this week I will put my CF-28 MKII back together and see if this will work, before trying it on my MKIII.

I was really interested in the next part where it will allow you to boot from a PCMCIA card that has USB 2.0 or maybe from a PCMCIA SDHC card reader.

 

I can confirm. I was able to boot zorin (ubuntu based) using this technique. Alas I installed Fedora but am having touchpad issues

 

I used PLoP to boot from a USB stick on an older CF-M34, which lacked a USB boot option in the BIOS. Also found a utility that converts a boot able ISO image into a bootable USB stick. Interesting options especially for older models that lack CD drives.