Distros : Puppy - Old Boot
Now for the FUN PART, to configure your PC/Laptop to boot from a CD/DVD or a USB Key, maybe you will get lucky and this is already setup, so simply pop in the CD or stick in the USB key and choose to Shut Down the PC.
Restart and watch out for any messages such as Delete to Enter Setup Menu or F12 for Boot up menu, if it booted up with the USB Key Happy Days you are ready to play, if not you have to configure the BIOS see below..
BIOS
BIOS stands for Basic In Out System and is found on a small Chip on the Motherboard (Main Circuit Board) of a PC/Laptop. When you turn on your PC/Laptop the BIOS checks the system - memory, keyboard, hard drive -Power On Self Test and then looks where to boot from going through configured list ie CD-ROM first, then USB Key, it is this list of options that you need to edit in order to boot from that Puppy USB key.
Getting to the BIOS on an older PC is easier than a modern Windows 10 PC simply because its slower to Boot up and you should get a chance to see those boot up messages with prompts stating which key to press to get to Setup or Boot Menu. To be really methodical, do an Internet Search for you PC and read up on the BIOS/Startup section.
I have an old IBM/Lenovo Thinkpad T60 that originally ran Windows XP, it has a Big Blue ThinkVantage button that I can press during boot up to enter the BIOS, with newer Thinkpads you press any key to get to the BIOS.
This bring me to a small grey screen...
Esc to Cancel F12 Boot List
A BIOS screen has a similar layout to the graphics below: you will see a List of Options to configure the BIOS, a summary of the PC Hardware and a bottom section on how to navigate the BIOS.
Config was pre-selected, I want the Laptop to boot from my USB key so I used the Down Arrow key to select Startup then I Pressed Enter.
In the Startup Section, the Boot Device List F12 option is enabled, when this Laptop is booting up and you press the F12 you can choose which device you want to boot from.
Boot was already selected so I pressed Enter.
Now I see an ordered list of all possible things that the laptop can boot from, if they exists, starting with..
- An external USB Compact Disc Drive ,if you can find one.
- This Laptop's DVD drive
- An external USB Floppy Disk ,now you are talking history.
- The ATA HDD0 the first and only Hard Drive on this Laptop.
- The USB HDD the USB Stick that I have burnt the Puppy Image on.
- You can even boot off an image on the Network - PCI LAN.
- If you had a second Hard Drive you could boot from that.
If nothing is changed even though I stick in the USB Key and Reboot the PC, it will simply boot back off the Hard Drive, so taking note of the Item Specific Help I used the Arrow Keys to select the USB Drive and used the F6 key to push it up past HDD0 to the top of the list so the BIOS will try to boot from a USB Disk first.
I then hit the F10 key to Save and Exit this brought me to an Setup Configuration Box which Prompted me to Save Configuration changes and Exit now??
. Change your mind then hit the Tab Key to select No and press Enter. I know what I am doing (I hope) Yes is selected so I pressed Enter to Save. Some BIOS thinks that you may be making a big mistake and has NO selected so you have to choose YES before the changes are saved.
The PC will now reboot and hopefully will choose to boot from the USB first before the internal Hard Drive.
You should see a lot of text on screen showing how the boot up process is going, where its loading files from and hopefully a lot of [OK] 's and then before long hopefully you will hear your first Woof Woof as the Puppy Linux Desktop appears.