Porteus – Another Excellent Choice for the Thumb Drive Toolbox
Posted: 12 December 2012 Filed under: Linux, Other Distributions | Tags: flash drive, portable Linux, Porteus, Slackware, SLAX, thumb drive 5 CommentsA few years ago, I wrote a little article called My Thumb Drive Toolbox for Linux.com.
In that article, I explain how to install Slax on a thumb drive. I also mention Puppy Linux as being usable for that purpose also. It’s very useful to have a full-featured Linux OS on a thumb drive, particularly when repairing corrupted MS Windows systems, as I did earlier this evening for a client.
Over at Scot’s Newsletter Forums – Bruno’s All Things Linux, a topic came up regarding the porteus.org website possibly being down. Hamza from porteus.org dropped in to respond to the issue. After we resolved the issue, I went to the porteus.org website to snoop around a bit. I was, of course, already familiar with Porteus, but I had not visited the new site nor had I used the distribution recently.
My old (ancient, really) version of Slax on my thumb drive toolbox was still functioning, but I had been wanting to update to the newest version of Slax for a while. I’d been waiting for v7.0 for a while. I decided to kill two birds and all that…
I downloaded and installed both Slax and Porteus earlier this afternoon. I’ve had the chance to evaluate them both this evening. Slax is very nice, even with KDE 4. 😉 However, this article is about Porteus, which I installed with my favorite desktop environment –> Xfce. I first burned the .iso to a CD (directions on Porteus’ download page) and then booted that CD to use the Porteus Installer app to install it to my thumb drive. It worked wonderfully.
I specifically chose to use the 32 bit version because many of the systems that I would need to boot it from are older 32 bit machines. It’s best to have a diagnostic Linux distribution on a thumb drive that is functional with older machines if you’re in the fix-windows-for-family-and-friends business. HA! 🙂
Visit the website, snoop around the forums, then give Porteus a try. You’ll be pleasantly surprised. This is a quality portable media distribution, with a good documentation and support network. You know I’m going to like Porteus. It’s only natural…
from the Porteus forums:
Porteus is a light-weight, highly configurable and flexible live distribution based on Slackware…
Oh, and don’t forget… if you have the resources available, run it from RAM. It’s GREASED LIGHTING FAST!
Have fun!
~Eric
Nocturnal Slacker v1.0 
I also use Porteus. It rocks! It beats out slax in weight, speed and resources. Plus it has better support for newer graphics and stuff.
Hiya, beaver!
I like ’em both (and Puppy). However, I may start leaning toward Porteus because I’m not a big fan of KDE (since 4.x) and Porteus has a version with my fulltime DE/WM – Xfce. What’s not to like? 🙂
Thanks for stopping by and commenting.
~Eric
[…] Porteus – Another Excellent Choice for the Thumb Drive Toolbox […]
Porteus is really interesting project sprung off the SLAX.
It’s interesting to see how they’ll compete now, when SLAX is back in the game.
My view on Porteus 1.0
http://linuxblog.darkduck.com/2011/07/porteus-10.html
An interview with Porteus team:
http://linuxblog.darkduck.com/2012/05/porteus-team-we-consider-ourselves.html
Indeed, Dmitry. Those same thoughts regarding Porteus in relation to the recently revived SLAX project occurred to me also. Hopefully, the friendly competition between the two will end up enhancing both over time. 🙂
Thanks for stopping by and commenting, my friend.
Regards,
~Eric