Installing FreeNAS to a bootable USB 2 Flash Drive

What can be used to install FreeNAS v. 8.0.4 to a bootable USB flash memory drive from either Win7 Pro 64 bit or OpenSUSE 12.1 KDE or Ubuntu Netbook Edition?

I tried Unetbootin but the server we built (Asus M5A78L-MLXPlus / AMD FX w/ an American Megatrends BIOS) tries to boot from the USB Flash Drive but doesn't find a bootable image.

Thanks in advance.

 

Hi dhinds,

Read the documentation or FAQ, this has already answered a ridiculous number of times.

 

I find it ridiculous that you didn't even bother to provide a link.  I checked the forums before posting and found nothing that mentioned the software used to load a bootable USB flash drive or others having similar problem that was solved.

Thanks for letting me know that I'm not likely to get much support from this source.

If this is all I can expect from the FreeNAS Community I may be better off looking for another NAS solution.

 

Hi,

Not sure if you checked this thread yet:

http://forums.freenas.org/showthread.php?251-How-to-write-the-embedded-FreeNAS-8-image-under-Windows

Also, section 2.3.3 the 8.0.3 manual, has further steps for Windows:

2.3.3 Using physdiskwrite on Windows

Thanks!

 

Thanks - I'll follow that up and report back.

 

The links were in LARGE bleepin letters at the bottom of my post, but like all of the posts that you didn't find while searching, you probably didn't see them either. There are also 3 or 4 sticky posts at the TOP of the NOOBs section that you didn't find while thoroughly searching either.

> > > Unofficial FAQ < < <

> > >  FreeNAS FAQs - Docs - Videos < < <​

 

On checking the links you provided it was clear that they refer to a large number of issues rather than the one I had posted.  IAC, browsing through them didn't produce the simple answer I was looking for, until this one:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7iqHnKd690&list=UU5IMpS_PUb-3YDdLoH4XprA&index=4&feature=plcp

Which indicates that the FreeNAS installation process itself provides the option of installing to a USB flash memory device.  

I assume you knew that.  I don't assume anything however, about what could have motivated you to not say it. (Probably the same reason you chose the bleepin animated avatar you did).

So now we know.

IAC, Thanks for the response.

 

After hours trying to use physdiskwrite and unetbootin, this doco really helped me;
http://doc.freenas.org/index.php/Installing_from_the_Image