i finally got the t105 the other day and sure enough… i didn’t order the optical drive ($0) when i configured the t105 and dell actually listened and didn’t send one. after trial and error trying to follow the ubuntu live usb how-to, i actually got ubuntu 8.04 to boot off a usb drive.

one of the drawbacks to installing via usb vs cdrom is that you can’t install the alternatives cd and you have to use a ubuntu live cd. i did want to try out the encrypted filesystem support that’s available in the alternatives.

i am glad that i didn’t have to beg/borrow/steal a usb or sata cdrom drive. when going through the how-to make sure that you are using a live cd and also make sure you copy the .disk directory onto your usb drive. if you don’t include the .disk directory you’ll end up at initramfs prompt which won’t do much for you.

here’s what was on my usb drive. i did a $ cp -aR * /media/disk from inside the mounted cdrom, and then removed isolinux just to be safe. remember, you won’t get very far if you don’t also copy over the .disk directory from the live cd.

$ df -h | grep "disk"
/dev/sdb1             939M  695M  197M  78% /media/disk
$ ls -a
.            casper  extlinux    md5sum.txt  preseed             umenu.exe
..           .disk   install     pics        README.diskdefines  wubi.exe
autorun.inf  dists   lost+found  pool        ubuntu
$ du -sm .* *
694     .
11795   ..
1       .disk
1       autorun.inf
682     casper
1       dists
1       extlinux
1       install
1       lost+found
1       md5sum.txt
1       pics
11      pool
1       preseed
1       README.diskdefines
0       ubuntu
1       umenu.exe
2       wubi.exe