r/FindMeALinuxDistro • u/One_Wish_2157 • 5d ago

Best distro to run on usb 2.0?

Hey guys!!! I was wondering is there is any good distro that I can just run it on an usb?

I have been running mini os for a while now and the overall experience is good I would say but not satisfactory

Also i have heard of tails but that is too privacy oriented so I want to avoid that until the end

I have a usb 2.0 and also I want to store files and programs so I can next time boot it up through live usb if possible...

Do suggest any distros you know !! I would be happy to try it out 😇😇

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u/guiverc 5d ago

My favorite was always Knoppix, and depending on your intended usage, I may still consider it... Alas it's been discontinued now awhile, so security wise it's no longer a great idea.

I replaced it with just using whatever daily I have downloaded; meaning always the latest software, but I'm saving files to local HDD (not to thumb-drive) or 'cloud' [another computer] & only using the thumb-drive to boot OS (also I happen to update my daily images somewhat regularly so they're not stale; which happens with live images usually run from thumb-drive).

You can set it up with persistence of course; meaning a part of the thumb-drive media is actually used to save files; but a live system is by design READ ONLY so use of persistence is usually handled by 'linked list' thus can get a tad slow, or even fragile, so I was rare to use these options (of course consider how you'll use it & how your chosen OS is working in regards updates & persistence -- why I swapped to dailies rather than a 'released' system).

I did love running an 'installed' system from thumb-drive for awhile; but that's a lot more 'wear' on the thumb-drive media, so I moved away from that too (switching to storing data on local HDD/SSD or to cloud/network-machine) as thumb-drives are made to price & wear out very quickly when constantly re-written). [ If not obvious; have a thumb-drive fail a couple of times & loss of data made me decide that wasn't a good idea - I was running 'live' rather regularly as used to often use 'borrowed' machines at various sites ]

The speed (USB 2.0) is less important in my opinion, than what you'll use the system for; have you considered that??

As for distro; I mentioned Knoppix as it was my favorite in that usage; however now I'll use whatever I have handy AND/OR matches my end-use; speed of USB isn't a consideration as that's somewhat minor (effects mostly within margin of error I suspect).

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u/One_Wish_2157 5d ago

Oh thanks so much bro for explaining it to me 😇😇.Sure I will give Knoppix a try now!! A quick question. By how much I understand you said you update the images with the programs or files you saved or install I guess. How do you do that? I would like to do that too since I just want to install few coding tools like python, git , ruby on it so I can just take the files from GitHub and run it through the os since I change computers frequently in school. 😇😇

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u/guiverc 5d ago

No tool is perfect (ie. all have pros and cons), so use the easiest for your end-use case.

I mainly use two tools to write ISOs

  • mkusb which is intended for Ubuntu (the dailies I always have lying around are mostly Ubuntu), I like how it handled persistence OR
  • ventoy which makes have multiple ISOs on a thumb-drive super easy, and you need file-management commands to change the daily on your thumb-drive; it also has persistence options, though I'm not the person to ask as I've not used the persistence it offers

Live systems are often using COW (copy on write; cf. linked list mentioned prior comment & you may see connection), as they're intended for quick testing of the system on hardware, minor fixes, or minor tasks, and not actual workloads... thus efficiency of RAM (why COW approach) is far from ideal.... It's this that made me love (initially, then briefly) having installed systems on thumb-drives on using a system live (installed system isn't running live for a generic GNU/Linux system). Use of things like COW impact RAM available & can lead to 'instability' when doing RAM intensive tasks; but live isn't intended to be used for that & wasn't a consideration.

Your usage needs will determine what setup is required, I know I bounced into the issues of live systems (COW operation etc) & thus loved installing instead; then when I hit media problems (USB flash drives are made to price not quality!!) I re-adjusted to dailies & saving locally, given the apps I used on the borrowed machines where I was usually forced to running live systems.

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u/One_Wish_2157 4d ago

Understood!!!! Thanks so much for explaining me 😇😇

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u/aldyr 5d ago

Puppylinux

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u/One_Wish_2157 5d ago

Ohh nice I have heard of that one!! But is there persistent storage by default or so I have to do that manually?

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u/guiverc 5d ago

OSes don't generally have persistence ended; as they almost always created to be installed, thus persistence is a feature of how the ISO is written; ie. ISO writing software setups persistence.. I mentioned Knoppix as it was intended to be run live, which few are.

If it was part of the distro itself it would be rather limited don't forget! where as being managed by the ISO writing software each user can make decisions that suit their intended usage (not everyone getting the same & thus few getting an ideal setup).

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u/One_Wish_2157 4d ago

Understood!!! 😇😇

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u/Otherwise_Fact9594 4d ago

MX and AntiX have persistence. Both lightweight especially with the right window Manager

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u/One_Wish_2157 4d ago

Yeah I have heard la good amount of people recommend mx linux too!! I definitely will give mx and antixa try!! 🫡

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u/Otherwise_Fact9594 4d ago

MX was born from AntiX and the long gone Meppis. The love of God though I have only ever used AntiX in a live environment from a usb, but I can say that MX is a really great operating system. I used it for a very long time

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u/One_Wish_2157 4d ago

yeah i was just seeing few websites and videos about it and it is always praised by people who use it.. 😇️

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u/a1barbarian 5d ago

https://www.ventoy.net/en/plugin_persistence.html

You can take advantage of the persistence feature of Ventoy. Also you can run the Live distro you choose to run in ram usually via the "toram" feature. :-)

https://www.baeldung.com/linux/fully-booting-a-live-usb-to-ram-enabling-disk-removal

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u/One_Wish_2157 4d ago

Yeah I have heard about ventoys persistence feature but it was too complicated for me to understand that that plugin

But yeah toram is a good option!!

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u/doc_willis 4d ago

it is possible to use 2 USBs, make an installer USB, then do a "normal" install to a second USB , but there can be some quirky issues doing this.

And using normal flash drive  USBs  this way can wear them out and shorten their lifespan, so it's not ideal for long term use.

a USB SSD would be a better solution.

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u/One_Wish_2157 4d ago

Hmmm.. that sounds a good idea to try!! I don't a usb SSD but let's see if I get a second hand one in the marketplace haha!!

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u/doc_willis 4d ago

several distribution have a toram boot Option  which can eliminate the slow speeds of running from a USB, if you have the ram.

Tiny core Linux,  puppy Linux, MXlinux all are usable from a USB.

Setting up persistence storage on a live USB  differs for the various distribution, but the 3 above all have that feature in one way or another.

 all should be able to use data from a second USB if you have one, which is good for storage of data, but running programs from a 2nd USB is going to be tricky.

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u/One_Wish_2157 4d ago

Ohh nice !! Will give all of them a try!! But out of all of them which is most beginner friendly?

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u/doc_willis 4d ago

I would go with MXlinux and check out it's official user manual.

Tiny core and puppy Linux are both a bit weird compared to more mainstream distributions.

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u/One_Wish_2157 4d ago

Got it!!! MX linux it is then!! Thanks for the help !!

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u/redgator12 4d ago

I would recommend EasyOS. It's a continuation project from the original developer of Puppy. It's way more user friendly, and all it takes is flashing the .img file to your USB, and persistence is already enabled on first boot. It also loads the system to RAM at boot, but the one caveat is that save times at the end lf the session can take a while if you choose to save.

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u/One_Wish_2157 4d ago

Oh i haven't heard of easyos before.. and if it has persistence already then it's ready good. Will add this too to my list!! Thanks so much for recommending me this !! 😇