From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Fri May 1 23:46:05 2015 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [8.8.178.115]) (using TLSv1.2 with cipher AECDH-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id D7D7291A for ; Fri, 1 May 2015 23:46:05 +0000 (UTC) Received: from outbound-queue-2.mail.thdo.gradwell.net (outbound-queue-2.mail.thdo.gradwell.net [212.11.70.35]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 9C5171D1E for ; Fri, 1 May 2015 23:46:05 +0000 (UTC) Received: from outbound-edge-2.mail.thdo.gradwell.net (bonnie.gradwell.net [212.11.70.2]) by outbound-queue-2.mail.thdo.gradwell.net (Postfix) with ESMTP id CC93C55308 for ; Sat, 2 May 2015 00:44:55 +0100 (BST) Received: from cpc7-jarr12-2-0-cust882.16-2.cable.virginm.net (HELO amd.asgard.uk) (92.238.71.115) (smtp-auth username fbsd%pop3.dgmm.net, mechanism plain) by outbound-edge-2.mail.thdo.gradwell.net (qpsmtpd/0.83) with ESMTPA; Sat, 02 May 2015 00:44:55 +0100 From: Dave To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: How to restore a USB drive converted to bootable Date: Sat, 02 May 2015 00:44:54 +0100 Message-ID: <2282619.EBxGjBUkQK@amd.asgard.uk> User-Agent: KMail/4.14.3 (FreeBSD/9.3-RELEASE-p13; KDE/4.14.3; amd64; ; ) In-Reply-To: <5543FAA3.7050907@hiwaay.net> References: <5543FAA3.7050907@hiwaay.net> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7Bit Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" X-Gradwell-MongoId: 55440ff7.ca1a-7cf7-2 X-Gradwell-Auth-Method: mailbox X-Gradwell-Auth-Credentials: fbsd@pop3.dgmm.net X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.20 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Fri, 01 May 2015 23:46:05 -0000 On Friday 01 May 2015 17:20:10 William A. Mahaffey III wrote: > I am about to do some OS installs (NetBSD & OpenBSD, as it happens) on > boxen under construction. I would also like to use UBCD on a flash drive > to memcheck those boxen prior to installation. If I prep a USB thumb > drive as either a bootable UBCD drive or an over-the-WWW installer, I > wipe out the drive for its original use. Is there a way to restore the > drive back to its original functionality if I wanted to ? I will > probably use this box, AMD64 FreeBSD 9.3R-p13, for the prepping, BTW, > just to bring it sorta on-topic .... one potentially heretical answer is to use yumi, available from pendrivelinux.com It's a Windows program which puts syslinux on a FAT32 pendrive and allows you to boot multiple images/ISOs from a menu while retaining the "normal" usage of the pendrive. The possible downside is you need a Windows computer to build and/or maintain it. There is a Linux version in development too but I've not looked at that for a while. Disclaimer. I have no connection to Yumi or pendrivelinux.com. Just a happy user for a number of years.