Re: [gentoo-user] Booting Gentoo from USB stick

[Jake Moe <jakesaddress@gmail.com>]

  On 10/09/2010 5:27 PM, Maciej Grela wrote:
> 2010/9/10 Jake Moe<jakesaddress@gmail.com>:
>>   Hello all,
>>
>> I've been thinking about creating a Gentoo USB stick for install and rescue
>> purposes (and, of course, just to see if I could).  I've mostly followed the
>> Gentoo handbook (I used a single 4GB partition for the whole system, and no
>> swap).  I've used genkernel for the kernel (so I can have a multi-system
>> capable kernel).  I've gotten GRUB installed and working.  My problem comes
>> in after what I believe is the init process:
>>
>>
>> Gentoo Linux; http://www.gentoo.org
>>   Copyright 1999-2009 Gentoo Foundation; Distributed under the GPLv2
>>
>> Press I to enter interactive boot mode
>>
>>   * Mounting proc at /proc ...                                             [
>> ok ]
>>   * Mounting sysfs at /sys ...                                             [
>> ok ]
>>   * Mounting /dev ...                                                      [
>> ok ]
>>   * Starting udevd ...                                                     [
>> ok ]
>>   * Populating /dev with existing devices through uevents ...              [
>> ok ]
>>   * Waiting for uevents to be processed ...                                [
>> ok ]
>>   * Mounting devpts at /dev/pts ...                                        [
>> ok ]
>>   * Checking root filesystem ...
>> fsck.ext2: No such file or directory while trying to open /dev/sda1
>> /dev/sda1:
>> The superblock could not be read or does not describe a correct ext2
>> filesystem.  If the device is valid and it really contains an ext2
>> filesystem (and not swap or ufs or something else), then the superblock
>> is corrupt, and you might try running e2fsck with an alternate superblock:
>>     e2fsck -b 8193<device>
>>
>>   * Filesystem couldn't be fixed :(                                        [
>> !! ]
>> Give root password for maintenance
>> (or type Control-D to continue):
>>
>>
>> If I give the root password, I can find no /dev/sda1.  However, mount shows
>> /dev/sda1 on /, and there *is* a /sys/block/sda folders, with a sda1 folder
>> in that as well.  It's almost like it had /dev/sda1, but then lost it
>> somehow.
>>
>> Does anyone have any idea what's going on here?  Any help would be
>> appreciated.
>>
> Have you seen http://www.sysresccd.org/Main_Page ? It's based on
> Gentoo, you could check what they did to boot from a usb stick.
>
> Br,
> Maciej Grela
>
Excellent, thanks for that, I hadn't found it in my previous searches.  
I'll have a look there.

Jake Moe