FAQ

Problem booting from USB: Common Causes

There are multiple reasons that your computer will not be able to boot from USB but in any case we will help you to boot from USB with a few tricks :)

  • The USB is min. 4 GB and is from a known trademark (suggestion: Sandisk Ultra or Extreme)
  • You know the Magic “F-num” key to tell the computer to boot from another device, otherwise see this other FAQ
  • You have used the tools that we suggested to load Elive on it, most of the “bootable maker tools” changes the internal structure of the system, which is not reliable most of the time (and in very small cases it can help you to make to boot it)
  • If your computer comes with Microsoft Windows 8 or bigger you may need to disable the UEFI and other options from the BIOS first
  • Your computer is not a Chromebook, see Cause 4
  • Some computers can only boot from one of their USB ports, make sure to try from all of them if doesn’t boots
  • If these solutions fail, try to upgrade your BIOS firmware

Apple / Mac users: You will simply need to power-on the computer with the USB stick inserted while the Option/alt(⌥) key is pressed.

No USB boot?

– You can try the “plop linux bios extender” boot loader which can help making it boot on old computers
– Use the “changedevice” boot parameter to continue the boot from USB if you booted from CD (note: USB 1.0 are extremely slow!)

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Author


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Samuel F. Baggen

Founder and Developer of Elive