3 Responses for "January Meeting"

1. Charlie Wertz January 20th, 2009 at 5:15 PM 1

   Maybe someone who sees this will be interested in a usb install story. The very short version of the story is that I had to completely clean a brand new usb device in order to install successfully. The comment is that messing with this stuff does require some knowledge.

   I have Toshiba satellite notebook – el cheapo. It came with (ugh!) vista and I’d like to free it from that.

   I decided to ease into ubuntu by installing to a usb stick. I have an 8.10 live cd I downloaded. The cd seems to work just fine. It is, in fact, the best live cd I’ve tried. It automatically recognizes my wireless adapter and my printer and works them just fine.

   I ran the install to an 8 gb kingston data traveler:
   System–>Administration–>Create a usb startup disk. It seemed to work. When I tried to boot from it, it said, “invalid or damaged boot partition”

   This usb device came with some security software. I figured I needed to get rid of that or something. So, I went to windows and formatted the usb. Then, I went back to ubuntu and ran the install again. I got the same bad result.

   I noted several others have asked about this on the ubuntu forum but have not received any answers. I also saw the same thing on a few other forums.

   Finally, I got creative – at first I thought maybe I was too creative. I booted ubuntu again, and without knowing what I was really doing, started partition manager:
   System–>Administration–>Partition Editor, and selected Create Partition Table. I went for msdos. It told me all data on the device would be destroyed. I said OK. I seemed to have bricked the usb. Neither ubuntu nor windows would do anything with it.

   So, I went back to ubuntu, ran the editor again, and created a 7648mb partition. ext2 came up as default. I decided to go for fat32 instead.

   Then I went back to the install. It said /dev/sdb needs to be formatted. I clicked format. Then I clicked install once again.

   Voila! She flies. Well, she doesn’t fly. Running from the usb is relatively slow, but it does work.

   Now I need to spend some time learning how to work things. Something as simple as installing the Flash plug-in for Firefox is different from what I’ve been used to.

   Charlie Wertz

2. Bob Lucas July 20th, 2009 at 12:57 PM 2

   I have been struggling with learning linux ..and your note from 1-20-09 is and example…. althiough I have been a windows/dos user for well over 20 yrs your note sounds all greek to me. I need a sitdown but am unable to find out when you guys meet… Is there someone in the group who can help me out?
   windowsweenie (Bob)

3. XT January 24th, 2010 at 9:29 PM 3

   If you click on the Meetings tab on the top of the page….

   Meetings are held the second Wednesday of every month.

   Meeting Times : 6:30PM – 9:00PM

   Meeting Location : The PCA Group, 455 Cayuga Road, Suite 200, Buffalo NY 14228 (Right near the Buffalo airport)

   Next Meeting : February 10 2009