1y ago

[Help] making a persistent Debian live install from Windows

Hello Everyone,

I have a Windows laptop that I want to run Linux on. Due to the drivers being encrypted (on install, from the factory), I can't repartition the drive and dual boot.

My plan is to run a live install from a USB stick. I've tried a live Debian ISO, and it works fine for my purposes (WebDev).

However, the live install isn't persistent, and doesn't use all the space on the 64gb usb stick for storage.

There are tutorials online that show how to make a live install while already running Linux, but for some reason, the live install doesn't see anything plugged into the other usb slots.

So, my question is, how do I get a persistent, usable version of Debian on a USB stick from Windows?

Thanks,

-BX

Edit: Laptop is a HP Envy, with touchscreen. The reason for keeping windows is that (as of yet) I have not found a way to use the touch-screen/pen combo with Linux. Being able to boot off USB will allow me to test solutions without losing what works

13 comments

I remember doing this once, but I'm fairly sure I did It through a live install. Make sure your target USB is properly formatted? I do remember that finding information on this was hard, because it isn't really a viable long-term option.
One thing to note is that you need to make some modifications to limit how often things get written to the drive, and even then you will probably kill your thumb drive pretty fast.

Just use Rufus, dude... You can even set the amount of space your image/deployment/instance (whatever the most correct term is lol) persists in, which makes it more convenient if (like me) you find yourself frequently wanting to play around with new and exciting distros.
Also, not to gang up on ya or anything either, but I'm gonna have to second the other commentor's request for the info on that laptop, as I've never encountered one that prevented you from reformatting it... o_0 I would be returning the fuck out of that garbage... Even the non-ARM old chromebooks would let you do that.
- No preventing me from formatting, but from resizing the disk so I can make space for the linux on the internal SSD.
  
  Sizing the partitions is a step you (can) take when formatting the drive... And from what I can tell the Envy has an M2 nvme in it, and it just seems crazy to me to basically just ignore that to boot off of an SD card/USB drive....
  How sure are you that you want to be using Linux? Lol

Could you share the laptop model, surely there has to be a way to turn off the disk encryption and then dual boot/mess with the laptop normally?
The easiest way to achieve that is to use two USBs, one with the installer, and the other will be your new harddrive. Install to the USB drive and it will be a persistent bootable USB drive. Bootloader (grub/efibootmgr) setup may be fiddly, you may have to try a few times/variations on setting before you get it working.
- It's a HP Envy.
  TBH, I hadn't realised it had also chosen to encrypt the inserted SD card when I added it.
  I would install from a USB to another USB, but the Debian Live USB stick doesn't recognise anything else that I plug into the laptop, so I can't go USB to USB, hence the need to use windows.
  
  I don't know anything about the debian installer, last time I did this I used arch, which is a lot more flexible with partitioning. Is there a manual partitioning option somewhere that will show the USB drive you want to install to?
  For what it's worth, I don't recommend booting from a USB. The performance isn't great, and there are reliability issues. On my USB, if I bump the drive, it can disconnect and cause the root partition to become unmounted, and it doesn't recover from there. If you can backup your files, wipe the internal disk and then re-setup windows and Linux without the encryption that would definitely be the better option in the long run. Especially if you intend on doing important work on the machine.
  Another option is to try out unetbootin. It can create liveusbs with persistence, but I haven't ever tried it. It may, or may not work with debian (Ubuntu may have better support, so worth trying both if you can live with Ubuntu).

I remember being able to create a persistent drive using Rufus and Linux Mint (Not the Debian edition though) , Rufus has a slider for creating a persistent drive when burning the iso, pretty sure you can find some guide online

You go to install the debian live install on another usb and point installation to the desired usb? I think that should do it and you will have a persistent debian install.
If you are planning to use this for the long term there maybe a few better options, because the usb will die very quickly if you use it to run your os.
Use an external ssd, you can get a case for m.2 ssd use that with a m.2 ssd. They are the most compact after a usb drive.
Use external HDD, while slower it's also an option.
WSL? This is something.
Assuming by drivers you mean drive, backup all data on your drive, format drive, ensure drive no longer encrypted, install windows and Linux.

You can install linux on a usb stick instead of your hard disk. i have done it before. But i don't really remember the steps. I have done it trial and error.
- I did it recently. I just plugged a live USB into one USB slot and an empty USB stick into another slot. I unplugged my NVMe while I did it so it wouldn't install grub on my Windows SSD.
- Yes, OP, this is the way. And if you cannot do this on this laptop, do the installation on another and use the resulting USB drive.

I know it isn’t Debian but maybe you could use something like Wubi to install Ubuntu: https://github.com/hakuna-m/wubiuefi

13 comments