Broken Internal Dvd Drive. Bios Doesn't Boot From Usb

Here's the problem.

I have a laptop with a broken internal DVD drive so I bought an external usb DVD drive. Unfortunately, the bios on the laptop doesn't have a 'boot from usb' feature.

How do I install suse? I do have a working floppy drive and ethernet.

Thanks!!

Smart Boot Manager should help with booting. give it a try

Andy

is your machine fairly old(ish)? if you have windows and can find one for your machine a BIOS update might/should solve the problem. my pc had an old BIOS and could only boot from cd, despite it having a dvd drive. i used smart boot manager to start with, then got a BIOS update. but, as you don't have a working cd drive i guess that's out.

edit: just seen the size of the smart boot manager ISO you would burn to disc so you boot from that.... 1.8MB, JUST bigger than what will fit on a floppy :angry:

andy you got there just as i was typing :lol:

i thought about smart boot manager, but his disc drive isn't working so can't boot to it...right?

if he has an external drive, SBM should pick it up, i've pointed him to the floppy version

Andy

if he has an external drive, SBM should pick it up, i've pointed him to the floppy version

Andy
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ah, i stand corrected (said the man in the orthopedic shoes )

sorry andy, didn't look at the link.

Ross.

some additional options for installing linux from hard drive:
http://marc.herbert.free.fr/linux/win2linstall.html
http://www.redhat.com/docs/manuals/linux/R...install-hd.html

obviously it is super easy to install linux if you can boot from cd. Do network installation.

Thanks to everyone for your replies!!!!

The first thing I did was install Smart Boot Manager to a floppy.

After booting the laptop with the broken internal dvd drive from the Smart Boot Manager floppy, I was able to get a boot menu, but from what I'm looking at, Smart Boot Manger doesn't appear to be able to boot from an external USB DVD drive. Deltaflyer (and others) have you ever actually used Smart Boot Manager to boot from an external USB DVD drive?

yep, use it often on old hardware which doesn't always boot from dvd media, i've used it with external usb drives.

Andy

Thanks to everyone for your replies!!!!

The first thing I did was install Smart Boot Manager to a floppy.

After booting the laptop with the broken internal dvd drive from the Smart Boot Manager floppy, I was able to get a boot menu, but from what I'm looking at, Smart Boot Manger doesn't appear to be able to boot from an external USB DVD drive. Deltaflyer (and others) have you ever actually used Smart Boot Manager to boot from an external USB DVD drive?
[/b]

my friend had a similar problem to yours (well, his drive was fine but he only had a cd drive, so saved the .iso to a usb drive and wanted to boot from that), i gave him smart boot manager and it worked for him. i have never used it myself for a usb drive, but my friend said it worked so there must be an option there somewhere.... may just need to take a longer look around i'm afraid, but it can be done which is one consolation you can take

take care and good luck. post back if you get stuck, i'm sure andy (deltaflyer) will be able to help you on the matter. even if he denies it, he is a guru when it comes to this sort of thing