How to install Ubuntu Linux from USB Stick

This tutorial describes how to install Ubuntu by copying the contents of the installation CD to an USB memory stick (aka flash drive) and making the stick bootable. This is handy for machines like ultra portable notebooks that do not have a CD drive but can boot from USB media.

In short here’s what you do:

Prepare the USB flash drive

Boot the computer from your USB flash drive.

Install Ubuntu as you would from a normal boot CD

Prerequisites

A running Ubuntu 8.04 or any ubuntu version installation

A USB device (stick, pen-drive, USB hard disk) that has already been formatted with FAT32 and has enough free space to hold your Ubuntu installation image

A Ubuntu CD image downloaded from the Ubuntu servers or mirrors (*.iso file) or from here

Step 1

On the root directory of your USB device, create a folder “install”
Copy the installer kernel and the initramdisk into this folder (Download source below.You need the files “vmlinux” and “initrd.gz”).

Download source for the installer kernel and initramdisk

For AMD64 Download from here
For i386 Download from here

You need to download the files “vmlinux” and “initrd.gz”.

Step 2

Note: You need to have the installer that fits the architecture of your Ubuntu version you want to install. In other words, you need a amd64 installer if you want to install an amd64 Ubuntu .iso image and the i386 installer for an i386 iso.

Step 3

From the installation iso image you downloaded, copy the folder “isolinux” to the root directory of your USB device (right-click on the .iso file, choose “extract here”). Rename “isolinux” into “syslinux”. Go inside the directroy “syslinux”. There, rename the file “isolinux.cfg” into “syslinux.cfg”.

Step 4

Make the stick bootable: Use fdisk to set the boot flag,

Install syslinux using the following command

sudo aptitude install syslinux

Now use syslinux to install a boot sector on your USB device

sudo syslinux /dev/sdbX

where sdbX is the device name and number of your USB device, check with “sudo mount”. A file called “ldlinux.sys” will be created in the root direcotry of the USB device.

Step 5

Copy the Ubuntu CD image in the root directory of your USB device (Contents of USB you can see as follows).If you are using i386 you need to copy the complete .iso image in to the root directory of your USB device.

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64-bit Vista Natively Bulletproofed Against Heap-Based Buffer Overruns

When it comes down to the 32-bit Windows Vista vs. 64-bit Windows Vista, the comparison generally focuses on the added benefits synonymous with handling system memory. Because the address space of 64-bit Vista is not limited to 4GB, users are able to use a maximum of 128 GB of RAM with the Ultimate, Business and Enterprise SKUS. But at the same time, there are added benefits, and one of them is in terms of security. The 64-bit editions of Vista come to the table with PatchGuard (Kernel Patch Protection), Address Space Layout Randomization (ASLR), Heap and Stack randomization, and even heap corruption detection.

As far as Heap Based Buffer Overruns are concerned, both 32-bit and 64-bit Vista offer protection, but only in the x64 versions of the operating system is the even heap corruption detection enabled by default. Michael Howard, Senior Security Program Manager in the Security Engineering group at Microsoft, explained that, in x86 Vista, software developers have to call the HeapSetInformation API in order to enable heal corruption detection. (more…)

Tags: 64 bit windows, defense, exploit, kernel, kernel patch, Microsoft, Security, security engineering, security program, senior security, system memory, vista software, Windows, windows vista

Force windows to load the kernel in memory

This one is the best tweak for windows XP I ever found, and it works very well. With this tweak we will force windows to load kernel and drivers in memory.

Here is what you have to do :

1) Open the regedit tool (Start -> Run -> regedit.exe )

2) Use the navigation in the left and go to HKEY LOCAL MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Memory Management (more…)