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Sagar_R
Asked: 2013-04-29 03:26:46 +0800 CST

Reliable bootable USB creator in Ubuntu

  • 772

I need a reliable application which will make usb pen drives bootable. Recently, I tried creating a bootable lubuntu-13-04-alternate usb on a ubuntu 12.10 system but ended up with 'boot error' when trying to boot. I tried startup disk creator as well as unetbootin. This is not the first time I am experiencing this, rather the above two utilities have always had high failure rates in my experience. Universal-usb-installer, YUMI, LiLi have worked great whenever I tried them, but all of them are windows only! So I have two questions:

  1. What is the method to reliably create a bootable usb in ubuntu?
  2. Why does windows have some of the best bootable usb creators while linux dosent?
boot

11 Answers

  1. Try UnetBootin. Worked everytime for me.
    Install by :-

    $sudo apt-get install unetbootin

    And, always use as root

    $sudo unetbootin
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  2. Year 2020 Update

    Balena Etcher

    Features:

    1. Open Source. Made with JS, HTML, node.js and Electron.
    2. Validated Flashing. No more writing images on corrupted cards and wondering why your device isn't booting.
    3. Hard Drive Friendly. Makes drive selection obvious to avoid wiping your entire hard-drive.
    4. Beautiful Interface.
    5. Cross Platform. Works for everyone.

    I've been using the .AppImage version. Good thing about it is that it is auto-updating and can be used on any linux distro.

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  3. My pain killer is:

    mkusb

    Tested on Ubuntu 15.04 to burn 14.04.

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  4. KDE version of Start-up disk creator works better than the GTK version the times I've used it.

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  5. Try FUSBi.

    FUSBi, the Free USB Installer, downloads free GNU/Linux Distributions for you and creates bootable USB images.

    FUSBi supports automated installation of of all the FSF-endorsed Free Software GNU/Linux Distributions, such as gNewSense, UTUTO, Dynebolic, Musix GNU+Linux, BLAG and GNUstep. You can also use it with your local image files.

    FUSBi is a Free Software itself and is licensed under GNU General Public License version 3 or later.1

    To download and install click Here

    Note: Before executing it by double clicking, make sure you have p7zip-full installed sudo apt-get install p7zip-full.

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    Just click OK

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  6. You can follow the instructions here on the official Ubuntu site: http://www.ubuntu.com/download/desktop/create-a-usb-stick-on-windows

    I know it says Windows but the application which you will need to download say that you need either Windows or Wine on Linux: http://www.pendrivelinux.com/universal-usb-installer-easy-as-1-2-3/#button

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  7. I wouldn't use a creator program myself, I'd make a manual multi-boot usb by installing grub & editing a grub.cfg file to point to the .iso file that's just copied onto the usb.

    Or as a last resort, plain dd to get the iso onto a usb drive (though I don't especially like it's overwriting the usb's default MBR & partitioning).

    Here's pasted quick multiboot usb instructions from my other answer here https://askubuntu.com/a/572023/129271

    I like the multi-boot usb method, described here on Arch's Wiki or here on pendrivelinux.com, for many distros you just copy the ISO file onto the usb and edit grub.cfg. Cliff notes instructions are:

    1. Mount the usb
    2. Install grub grub-install --force --no-floppy --boot-directory=/mnt/USB/boot /dev/sdx (replacing x with your actual USB device & /mnt/usb with mounted dir)
    3. Put demo grub.cfg ( http://pendrivelinux.com/downloads/multibootlinux/grub.cfg ) in /mnt/USB/boot/grub and edit to match your iso's

    Or see the Ubuntu help on creating & installing from bootable USB's, can the Ubuntu tool Startup Disk Creator, Unetbootin, or plain dd.

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  8. I have never had any problems with dd, just open up the terminal run the following command

    sudo dd if=/path/to/iso of=/dev/sdX bs=5M

    replacing "/dev/sdX" with your usb (you can find it with sudo fdisk -l) and "/path/to/iso" with the actual path. MAKE ABSOLUTELY SURE ABOUT YOUR USB DEVICE PATH. Using the wrong path will have ugly consequences! Note that it will only be sdX and not sdX(0-9) (example /dev/sda and not /dev/sda1)

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  9. Try Universal USB Installer. It is specifically used to make bootable USB drives for all Linux distributions. There is a drop down list containing all the Linux distros and several relevant programs. Just choose the one you need and provide the ISO and voila!

    http://www.pendrivelinux.com/universal-usb-installer-easy-as-1-2-3/

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  10. http://multibootusb.org/

    Multibootusb (opensource) works both for windows and linux.

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