Creating Backtrack 3 Live USB Drive

Booting to live CDs seems to be sluggishly slow when compared to booting from a USB drive. I previously posted about creating a Live BackTrack 2 USB drive, and here is the instructions for the new BackTrack 3 Beta. They have a special release specifically for USB drives this time around so it’s getting easier as new versions are released. Keep in mind that BT3 is in Beta and may still have several bugs. If you would like to run the stable version try BT2. So here is my step by step tutorial on how to create a bootable USB drive running BackTrack 3.

Note:
-you should use at least a 2GB USB drive to make bootable. The boot files total around 946MB of space on the drive. You may be able to get by with a 1GB drive but it would be pushing it to the limit on space. Drives are getting cheaper and cheaper that it shouldn’t be a big pain to cough up the extra $5 for the 2GB alternative

1. Go to: http://www.remote-exploit.org/backtrack_download.html Choose the backtrack 3 beta the USB version (unless you want to create a bootable cd choose the CD version).

2. You will need something to extract the files from the RAR archive. WinRAR is my favorite.

3. Once you have a RAR extractor installed then extract all the folders to the destination drive (USB Drive). There should be two folders named “BT” and “Boot” along with a text file called “INSTALL.txt”.

4. After extracting the files power down unit and restart (make sure that boot order is changed so it boots from the USB drive first, and keep in mind that some older machines do not support USB boot, so you may need to use the CD version instead.)

5. the first menu you are presented with is the boot menu. The default is to boot into KDE. (you may want to change to a graphics safe environment if it does not work properly the first time on your system but I have yet to see a case where it doesn’t work properly at first boot).

6. Just wait and it will boot the rest of the way up and show the back track desktop. Click on the 2nd icon that says “System” that looks like an IC chip. Navigate to MEDIA > Your removable drive (names differ) > BOOT folder. Here you will find a file named “bootinst.sh.”

7. Open up “shell” by clicking on the 2nd icon on the left which looks like a monitor with a black screen. Drag “bootinst.sh” to the shell. Click “Paste”. Press ENTER

8. This will now give a warning screen that it will format the drive to boot this distro only. Make sure that the drive listed in that warning is the same as the drive you are browsing (which is shown in the location bar at the top) so that you don’t tamper with the computer’s other drives by mistake. Press ENTER when you are sure.

If task completes successfully your drive is now bootable! If you are having problems or have questions with any of these steps head over to the Back Track Forums.

If you would prefer using the stable BackTrack 2 here is my article pertaining to creating bootable USB drives for BT2: http://maddhat.com/?p=16

Add shortcuts on your desktop automatically when inserting drives or media with Desk Drive

Overview:

Desk Drive™ solves a really annoying problem. You pop a USB thumb drive or DVD into your computer and then you have to open Window’s Explorer and find the mapped drive or folder. Desk Drive adds a desktop icon pointing to the drive automatically. Remove the media and the shortcut goes away. Brilliantly simple and effective.

Desk Drive sits quietly in the system tray. Configuration image at right is just a click away and allows you to specify which types of media to monitor. So simple, it just works. Download it today!

System Requirements:

Windows XP/Vista

.Net Framework 2.0

Review:

So one of the cool things that ubuntu had over windows when i tried it was something so simple like adding a shortcut to a recently inserted media like a CDROM or pendrive, it made knowing what stuff you had inserted in your PC very easy and in addition you could access your stuff without opening the ubuntu explorer. Anyway this functionality can be replicated in windows by using desk drive, it will sit on the system tray and will add a shortcut to whatever stuff you insert in your PC , these shortcuts will disappear once you remove whatever you have put in, you can choose with drives will be monitored and btw i suggest you remove your floppy drive otherwise desk drive will search for inserted floppies constantly which will cause a constant and annoying sound, at least that is what happened to me. In my system desk drive used between 10MB to 20MB which is ok i guess for those rich people that have like a gig of ram and more (yes i am bitter because i only 256MB, oh wait i mean 224MB after you subtract the shared memory that the integrated video uses….i hate my PC).
So in conclusion use desk drive if you feel interested in having a shortcut for every media that you inserted. Available for Windows XP/Vista.

Get at it http://blueonionsoftware.com/DeskDrive.aspx