3 ms·

Ventoy – Bootable USB Solution

54 points by 8organicbits 2y ago

francislavoie 2y ago
Fantastic tool. Been using it for years, saves me the headache of loading my trusty USB drive with the latest Linux ISO when setting up a new machine. I also keep a few other ISOs like a recent Windows version just in case I need to perform a repair on a friend/family's machine, memtest86, dban, etc.
- incognito124 2y ago
  +1 to everything you said. Before I had an elaborate USB setup with several partitions for my multiboot stick, mostly for installation and rescuing. Now I just need to copy the ISOs and I'm done. So easy to use and update.
Retr0id 2y ago
So, how does it actually work?
- dijit 2y ago
  In the common case: Boot Ventoy application via GRUB/EFI Ventoy EFI application scans the same drive it booted from with a vfat driver for disk images. Ventoy then creates chainload grub commands for every image it finds. You are presented a list of boot options, just like a normal grub boot. Selecting an option chainloads a boot from that disk image. There's devil in the details of course, but largely that's how it's working.
- prettyStandard 2y ago
  There is a "How Ventoy works" section. First part is listing there open source dependencies https://www.ventoy.net/en/doc_disk_layout.html https://www.ventoy.net/en/doc_disk_layout.html https://www.ventoy.net/en/doc_disk_layout_gpt.html https://www.ventoy.net/en/doc_disk_layout_gpt.html https://www.ventoy.net/en/doc_mbr_vs_gpt.html https://www.ventoy.net/en/doc_mbr_vs_gpt.html ...
- boredpudding 2y ago
  If you mean, technically, I can't help you. But for users: You install Ventoy on your USB drive, and then you can drop ISO files in a folder. On startup, Ventoy opens and you can choose the ISO to boot. This means you just have one bootable USB, and no more using tools to create bootable usb drives.
- francislavoie 2y ago
  See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ventoy#How_does_Ventoy_work https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ventoy#How_does_Ventoy_work, TLDR when you pick an ISO, it sets up a virtual device which emulates a regular bootable device, pointing to the contents in the ISO.
  - Retr0id 2y ago
    This section of the wikipedia article is entirely uncited, and reads vaguely like LLM output. Ventoy is not a hypervisor (afaik), so how does it present an emulated device to a chainloaded OS? This is the edit that introduced that section, originally titled "How does Ventroy works" https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Ventoy&diff=1224769425&oldid=1224767737 https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Ventoy&diff=12247...
haunter 2y ago
Anyone managed to install Ventoy on a SSD/HDD (so not a flash drive) partition with preferably working with GRUB? Like a persistent install on the disk with its own partition alongside my regular stuff. Apperently it is supported but it never worked for me for some reason. https://www.ventoy.net/en/faq.html https://www.ventoy.net/en/faq.html https://www.ventoy.net/en/doc_disk_layout.html https://www.ventoy.net/en/doc_disk_layout.html
- airbreather 2y ago
  Have you tried doing the install on an ssd with a usb adaptor? I haven't done this with Ventoy, but it has worked for me in the past on a couple of distros. There is something that is seen differently when it is thru USB, I believe but not sure.
thrownawaysz 2y ago
Only found out a couple of months ago but you can also boot virtual disk images! I had an old vhd file that I wanted to boot on real hardware and actually worked!
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
amelius 2y ago
What I need is a way to reboot into a ramdisk version of my OS. This would allow me to do things like repartition the disk on which my root folder is stored (among other things).
- Y_Y 2y ago
  You can do this without rebooting. Just copy the filesystem into ram and switch_root.
  - amelius 2y ago
    Filesystem is too big for the ram.
westurner 2y ago
> No need to update Ventoy when a new distro is released > Most types of OS supported, 1200+ iso files tested ... 90%+ distros in distrowatch.com supported
ChrisArchitect 2y ago
Some discussion from December: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38672112 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38672112
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
exceptione 2y ago
Be careful! The source contains lots of blobs, not much is known about the author ( I only know he is from China *). This project would be a very fat target for anyone liking to get the most unfettered root access imaginable, because many system administrators will happily plug this in while installing OSes. --- * I hate to make this remark, as this could indeed be someone happily doing his hobby. Otoh, after xz we should be more vigilant than we were already.
- canada_dry 2y ago
  Are there more transparent (blob-less) equivalents to use??
  - exceptione 2y ago
    For Linux, yes, the Arch wiki mentions some. But if you want to add Windows as an option, I don't know one.

54 points by 8organicbits 2y ago

Fantastic tool. Been using it for years, saves me the headache of loading my trusty USB drive with the latest Linux ISO when setting up a new machine. I also keep a few other ISOs like a recent Windows version just in case I need to perform a repair on a friend/family's machine, memtest86, dban, etc.

incognito124 2y ago
+1 to everything you said. Before I had an elaborate USB setup with several partitions for my multiboot stick, mostly for installation and rescuing. Now I just need to copy the ISOs and I'm done. So easy to use and update.

Retr0id 2y ago

So, how does it actually work?

dijit 2y ago
In the common case: Boot Ventoy application via GRUB/EFI Ventoy EFI application scans the same drive it booted from with a vfat driver for disk images. Ventoy then creates chainload grub commands for every image it finds. You are presented a list of boot options, just like a normal grub boot. Selecting an option chainloads a boot from that disk image. There's devil in the details of course, but largely that's how it's working.
prettyStandard 2y ago
There is a "How Ventoy works" section. First part is listing there open source dependencies https://www.ventoy.net/en/doc_disk_layout.html https://www.ventoy.net/en/doc_disk_layout.html https://www.ventoy.net/en/doc_disk_layout_gpt.html https://www.ventoy.net/en/doc_disk_layout_gpt.html https://www.ventoy.net/en/doc_mbr_vs_gpt.html https://www.ventoy.net/en/doc_mbr_vs_gpt.html ...
boredpudding 2y ago
If you mean, technically, I can't help you. But for users: You install Ventoy on your USB drive, and then you can drop ISO files in a folder. On startup, Ventoy opens and you can choose the ISO to boot. This means you just have one bootable USB, and no more using tools to create bootable usb drives.
francislavoie 2y ago
See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ventoy#How_does_Ventoy_work https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ventoy#How_does_Ventoy_work, TLDR when you pick an ISO, it sets up a virtual device which emulates a regular bootable device, pointing to the contents in the ISO.
- Retr0id 2y ago
  This section of the wikipedia article is entirely uncited, and reads vaguely like LLM output. Ventoy is not a hypervisor (afaik), so how does it present an emulated device to a chainloaded OS? This is the edit that introduced that section, originally titled "How does Ventroy works" https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Ventoy&diff=1224769425&oldid=1224767737 https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Ventoy&diff=12247...

haunter 2y ago

Anyone managed to install Ventoy on a SSD/HDD (so not a flash drive) partition with preferably working with GRUB? Like a persistent install on the disk with its own partition alongside my regular stuff. Apperently it is supported but it never worked for me for some reason. https://www.ventoy.net/en/faq.html https://www.ventoy.net/en/faq.html https://www.ventoy.net/en/doc_disk_layout.html https://www.ventoy.net/en/doc_disk_layout.html

airbreather 2y ago
Have you tried doing the install on an ssd with a usb adaptor? I haven't done this with Ventoy, but it has worked for me in the past on a couple of distros. There is something that is seen differently when it is thru USB, I believe but not sure.

thrownawaysz 2y ago

Only found out a couple of months ago but you can also boot virtual disk images! I had an old vhd file that I wanted to boot on real hardware and actually worked!

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

amelius 2y ago

What I need is a way to reboot into a ramdisk version of my OS. This would allow me to do things like repartition the disk on which my root folder is stored (among other things).

Y_Y 2y ago
You can do this without rebooting. Just copy the filesystem into ram and switch_root.
- amelius 2y ago
  Filesystem is too big for the ram.

westurner 2y ago

> No need to update Ventoy when a new distro is released > Most types of OS supported, 1200+ iso files tested ... 90%+ distros in distrowatch.com supported

ChrisArchitect 2y ago

Some discussion from December: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38672112 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38672112

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

exceptione 2y ago

Be careful! The source contains lots of blobs, not much is known about the author ( I only know he is from China *). This project would be a very fat target for anyone liking to get the most unfettered root access imaginable, because many system administrators will happily plug this in while installing OSes. --- * I hate to make this remark, as this could indeed be someone happily doing his hobby. Otoh, after xz we should be more vigilant than we were already.

canada_dry 2y ago
Are there more transparent (blob-less) equivalents to use??
- exceptione 2y ago
  For Linux, yes, the Arch wiki mentions some. But if you want to add Windows as an option, I don't know one.