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i have made liveusb of 32bit ubuntu with persistence twice but can only load the os on the computer i made it with. i have tried multiple other pcs to no avail. (it will load to blank screen with cursor on other devices) i burnt the 32 bit copy to avoid compatability issues on public pc's or friends old laptops. recently i burned a copy of quebes with mkusb and when i went to boot up i chose to check this media and install but it never got passed the check telling me to use an other media. it is a brand new usb device and i have tried a sd card in a usb conversion tool and a separate usb stick all to no avail. am i doing something wrong? is mkusb broken? how do i check to see if i am up to date?

edited to add the fact that it (ubuntu 32bit live usb with persistence) will boot to a blank screen on other pcs.. i have been able to get tails to boot on every pc i am having trouble with ubuntu

Dougie Get er done Fuoco
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    You have some misconceptions and the worst is the notion that 32bit is "more compatible". It isn't because it doesn't support UEFI and most machines you'll be using it with (c. 2010 or newer) are UEFI enabled and set to boot in that mode. Also "public" PCs shouldn't allow booting from external media unless a supervisor password is provided and , of course, you' re not supposed to know it. Also there are several issues with many graphics cards, particularly newer high-end ones for which you may need to use `nomodeset` to have video. –  Mar 23 '17 at 23:29

2 Answers2

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Please tell me more details, and I will try to solve your problem, to help you use mkusb and if you have found a bug, to fix that bug.

First, check the points described in the answer by @ubfan1.

Second, please tell us more about your system:

  • Which version of Ubuntu did you try to install (only 16.10 or some other version)?

  • 'recently i burned a copy of quebes with mkusb': I guess you mean Qubes.

  • In what computers did you test (brand name and model)?

  • Do those computers boot in BIOS or UEFI mode?

  • What graphics and wifi chips/cards were there is those computers? (Some chips/cards need boot options and/or proprietary drivers.)

Ubuntu 16.10 32-bit: It works for me to create a persistent live drive from the iso file ubuntu-16.10-desktop-i386.iso.

enter image description here

In order to make a 32-bit system boot also in UEFI mode, you need usb-pack-efi, so please install it into the system, where you have mkusb,

sudo apt-get install usb-pack-efi

If you are running an installed system in UEFI mode, it will be possible but difficult to install grub-pc, which is necessary to make a USB pendrive bootable in BIOS mode. A work-around is to create a live help system, that you install into a separate USB drive, for example according to the following links,

mkusb/persistent#Compressed_image_file_with_a_persistent_live_system

mkusb/persistent#Small_9w_systems_with_guidus_alias_mkusb-dus_and_gparted_installed

Qubes: It works for me to clone from the iso file Qubes-R3.2-x86_64.iso to a USB pendrive and use that pendrive to install Qubes.

Notice that mkusb can clone most linux iso files to bootable live-only USB drives, but can only create persistent live drives from Ubuntu (all flavours and current versions) and Debian Jessie and a few linux distros derived from them (for example Linux Mint, LXLE and ToriOS). Furthermore, the Qubes iso file is [an image of] an installer, not a live system.

sudodus
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Since the media check failed, maybe the problem was the download?

  1. Did you md5sum check the downloaded iso? See https://help.ubuntu.com/community/HowToMD5SUM Check the number against the listing in the link for your release listed at http://releases.ubuntu.com under the MD5SUMS link. For other releases' hashes, like lubuntu, see: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/UbuntuHashes
  2. If using a CD/DVD, did you burn the disc as slowly as possible? See https://help.ubuntu.com/community/BurningIsoHowto
  3. Did you select the media check before trying to install? https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Installation/CDIntegrityCheck
  4. Did you ever do a "memory check" (perhaps another live-media menu choice) on your PC?

Doing the above can save you a lot of time struggling with a bad install media or hardware problems.

The other machines which don't boot may have different hardware, like Nvidia video, which may require options at boot time.

ubfan1
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