Boot from USB Flash Without BIOS Support Using Plop via GRUB2

As result of an accident the netbook has gone to the heaven in the crisis time, so I've turned FreeNAS box to a normal PC with dual boot (Linux and FreeNAS) for working. Unfortunately, the DVD ROM has gone to the heaven, too. There are not to much options:

1. Dual boot, each OS on their disk. Needs 2 devices, not my case.
2. Dual boot on the same disk, still available, but requires skill and time [1].
3. Boot FreeNAS from USB stick.

The last choice is the most convenient, but BIOS doesn't support booting from USB. Fortunately, there are boot managers, which fill this hole. Plop [2] has many features, many options and well-documented, so I chose it.

The system is running Linux, booted via GRUB2. If you like me don't want to destroy GRUB(2), you can run Plop from GRUB(2). You need to download the program, unzip and copy the boot manager binary program plpbt.bin to /boot, then add the following entry to GRUB2 configuration file (/boot/grub/grub.cfg):

# Boot Plop Boot Manager
menuentry "Plop Boot Manager" {
set root='(hd0,3)' #Change to your boot partition
linux16 /boot/plpbt.bin
}

Hold down Shift key while GRUB2 is booting to get its menu, then you can run Plop, from where FreeNAS on USB Flash can be booted.

See [3] for FreeNAS installation on USB Flash. Get the "embedded" (img) file instead of iso.

P.S. of course this is temporary solution. The better is CF to IDE adapter usage.

1. FreeNAS forum on sf.net
2. Plop boot manager
3. FreeNAS USB installation

Install Mustek BearPaw 1200CU Plus Scanner on Debian Lenny

First, we need sane backend, that is what works with your scanner on the apparatus level, include driver, firmware, etc and some utilities, which very help us in configuration and diagnostics. As root:

# apt-get install libsane sane-utils

Then go to get firmware. I have a Mustek BearPaw 1200CU Plus and as shown on SANE home page it uses gt68xx backend. Thus, I went to get firmware from http://www.meier-geinitz.de/sane/gt68xx-backend/, put in /usr/share/sane/gt68xx/, and make sure it is readable for everyone:

# chown root.scanner /usr/share/sane/gt68xx/PS1Dfw.usb
# chmod 755 /usr/share/sane/gt68xx/PS1Dfw.usb

The sane-utils package contain two tools we need. First we use sane-find-scanner to check if kernel support USB scanner:

$ sane-find-scanner
found USB scanner (vendor=0x055f, product=0x021c [USB Scanner], chip=GT-6816) at libusb:003:002

It's seem OK. Let's check if scanimage works:

$ scanimage -L
No scanners were identified. If you were expecting something different,
check that the scanner is plugged in, turned on and detected by the
sane-find-scanner tool (if appropriate). Please read the documentation
which came with this software (README, FAQ, manpages).

But under root, scanimage gives a positive answer:

# scanimage -L
device `gt68xx:libusb:003:003' is a Mustek Bearpaw 1200 CU Plus flatbed scanner

Yes, you guess right. We have permission problem, programs works successfully under root and not as user. Although, Debian Lenny uses UDEV, all we need is to add appreciated users to scanner group, you know how :). Don't forget to logout and login again after that.

Mustek BearPaw 1200 CU Plus doesn't need any manual settings, so editing is no-needed, but take a look at /etc/sane.d/gt68xx.conf or your scanner backend's configuration file.

Now, when scanner is ready, scan your documents, images, etc by:

$ scanimage --device-name gt68xx:libusb:003:003 --resolution 300 --format png > test.png

Or, better, get a GUI frontend like Xsane:

# apt-get install xsane

Additional steps: Here, when configured the hotplug subsystem I needed to get sane-backends source from http://www.sane-project.org/, untar & copy hotplug files in subdir tools/hotplug into /etc/hotplug/usb then restart UDEV:

# /etc/init.d/udev restart

Note: If you have other scanner, just look for other sane backend.
Read more:
1. SANE home page (especially documentations section).
2. http://gentoo-wiki.com/HOWTO_Installing_USB_Scanner
3. Script and configuration files (/etc/hotplug/usb/*, /etc/sane.d/*)

A successful history with Creative Sound Blaster Connect

Yesterday I purchased a new external (USB) sound card from Creative - Sound Blaster Connect (SB Connect). I didn't get it work immediately and search on Google about its supporting under Linux. ALSA project site showed that it seems not have driver for SB Connect although the card is there in the list.



But today I have other working sound system just after ...reboot. My Debian unstable with ALSA v1.0.13 recognized sound card as SB MP3+. In this case we have so call Plug-and-Play device under Linux :). I don't know if other features like recording are working or not. For now I just have no need of them.

See more pictures and info about card from creative site.