Booting from USB-3.0 HDD using USB-3.0 express card (NEC chipset)

[abhijit_biswas]

Hi,

I also tried a lot to boot from USB-3.0 HDD using NEC chipset USB-3.0 controller in different ways with different distributions but only one success I got

MBR & /boot partition I kept iin my internal HDD (hd0)
From the grub.conf of that /boot partition I have given the grub menu entry for the other Linux distributions (Fedora 15, Debian, Ubuntu) present in my external HDD (WD 1TB USB-3.0)

All OS works perfectly if I am connecting my WD 1TB USB-3.0 HDD to my native USB-2.0 port but only Debian works properly if I am connecting the same external HDD to my USB-3.0 (NEC chip express card) port.

None of OS directly boots from the same HDD directly if I keep the MBR to the same external HDD. But I have another Seagate USB-2.0 HDD, which can directly boot pre-installed Linux (Dreamlinux & Ubuntu) from that external HDD.

Thinking that this is the problem related to process of loading the kernel as Debian at least worked indirectly.

Another information to be mentioned as I found NEC chipset USB-3.0 controllers are not bootable
http://wiki.digitus.de/en/USB

So booting from internal HDD and referring external HDD is only the option for running Linux on external HDD with USB-3.0.

Please inform if someone gets some other alternative for Fedora.

[abhijit_biswas]

Hi,

I have found some solution for OpenSuse

http://forums.opensuse.org/english/get-technical-help-here/install-boot-login/458792-boot-problem-nec-bootable-usb-3-port.html

Does any body have tried similar thing on Fedora.

Please let me know.

Thanks.

[abhijit_biswas]

fedora 15 use a the ram disk / file system initialization image to load custom linux driver modules

old fedora (up to fedora13) it used the standard "initrd-***.img" for such purpose
ans mkinitrd tool can create and modify such image file

But from fedora 14 it uses "initramfs***.img" file containing the driver images
and the tool which can create and modify it is "dracut"

to view the driver embedded in "initramfs***.img" the following command can be used

lsinitrd /boot/initramfs-....img > /home/.../initramfs.txt

to add new driver in the image use the following command (--force will over write the existing image in /boot)
*** make a backup of the original before using the following command ***

dracut /boot/initramfs-....img --force --add-drivers xhci-hcd

Make sure all kernel firmware are present or installed your system
if not the new image will not be created


for kernel updation and automatically include the custom driver edit the following line in file "/etc/dracut.conf"

# additional kernel modules to the default
#add_drivers+="xhci-hcd"
to
# additional kernel modules to the default
add_drivers+="xhci-hcd" #remove the '#' at beginning

################################################## ####################################

Now the /boot partition should be in internal bootable HDD which the MBR should refer with all the vmlinuz and initramfs image:)

'/' (main or root) partition can be in kept in USB-3.0 HDD connected through NEC chipset PCI express card which is seemed to be not bootable directly

Here is some typical boot entry for grub:rolleyes:

title Fedora (2.6.38.8-32.fc15.x86_64)
root (hd0,2) # referring the /boot partition
# root=/dev/sdb7 refers the external "/" or root partition
kernel /vmlinuz-2.6.38.8-32.fc15.x86_64 ro root=/dev/sdb7 rd_NO_LUKS rd_NO_LVM rd_NO_MD rd_NO_DM LANG=en_US.UTF-8 SYSFONT=latarcyrheb-sun16 KEYBOARDTYPE=pc KEYTABLE=us rhgb quiet
initrd /initramfs-2.6.38.8-32.fc15.x86_64.img