[TriLUG] Boot ubuntu from floppy?

[Joseph Mack NA3T]

On Fri, 7 Oct 2005, Liyun Yu wrote:

> I was trying to figure out how to install Ubuntu on a laptop
> that has no CD drive and no network NIC connections. It is a
> Thinkpad 240. There is an external floppy drive and an external
> USB CD drive is available to host the Ubuntu installation CD
> but won't boot from there.

I do this by putting the disk into another machine with the 
needed hardware eg another laptop or a desktop machine using 
a 2.5" to 3.5" ide cable adapter (I got mine from Intrex). 
This doesn't work real well for installing windows, as you 
know from our previous exchanges, but is fine for Linux.

BIG WARNING: the adapters you get from Intrex are not 
polarised. This is a disaster waiting to happen (why do 
people make and sell this stuff). The 2.5" disk has a 
missing pin in the middle to use for orientation. The 
adapter should have the corresponding hole filled in. It 
isn't. You can put the cable in upside down and nothing will 
work, but nothing will be damaged either. The pins are hard 
to see on the 2.5" disk as you push the adapter in, and you 
can be offset left or right by one set of pins. It turns out 
that the power comes through the pins (rather than a 
separate connector as with the 3.5" disks). If you offset in 
the direction I did, magic smoke comes out of the adapter. 
The disk and the controller on the mobo were OK, but your 
adapter is fried. So it's not always true that the expensive 
parts commit suicide to protect the cheap parts. Sometimes 
you're lucky.

Before you use the adapter, figure out what the orientation 
is (you can only confirm this by plugging it in 
unfortunately) then put a drop of cyanoacrylic resin (crazy 
glue) into the hole that should be filled in. To help the 
glue go down into the connector, you can poke around with a 
staple, while the glue is still liguid.

Joe

-- 
Joseph Mack NA3T EME(B,D), FM05lw North Carolina
jmack (at) wm7d (dot) net - azimuthal equidistant map
generator at http://www.wm7d.net/azproj.shtml 
Homepage http://www.austintek.com/ It's GNU/Linux!