CentOS 6 CD/DVD/ISO to USB Installation

linuxexplore — Mon, 17 Mar 2014 18:01:41 +0000

I tried various Linux ISO to USB software like UNetbootin, liveusb-creator, Universal-USB-Installer etc to create CentOS 6 (take a look at new look of CentOS website) bootable USB/pendrive. But all have some problems or limitations which force me to use ISO2USB software, which help me to meet my need.

Requirement

Create a CentOS 6 bootable USB which will support customized installation (by using kickstart configuration file).

Limitations with other software

UNetbootin: Bootable USB of CentOS 6 created by UNetbootin is not even booting the system using USB and not support kickstart configuration file.

liveusb-creator: It support live Linux Fedora OS only like fedora-live and not support kickstart configuration file.

Universal-USB-Installer: It successfully boot the CentOS 6 from USB but failed to install by kickstart configuration file.

Prerequisites of ISO2USB software

This is the minimum requirement for all ISO to USB software. It need followings:

ISO file or CD/DVD of CentOS 6 (Custom Installation disk of CentOS 6).
A USB drive to boot the system.

Prepare CentOS 6 bootable from ISO file or CD/DVD

After downloading ISO2USB software for Windows, follow the steps given below:

Plug the USB drive to Windows XP/Vista/7 machine.
Execute the ISO2USB software.

ISO2USB Software

Browse CentOS 6 ISO (with custom installation) file by using the highlighted browse button.

Browse Custom CentOS-6 ISO file

Click on OK button but before clicking on OK button; just make sure that correct USB drive should be selected.

Select USB drive

Click Exit button, when finished.

Exit ISO2USB

Safely remove USB drive from Windows XP/Vista/7 system.

USB drive is now ready to install CentOS 6 (with custom configuration file) on your system.

Look what Stella brought to CentOS 6.3, Desktop OS based on Centos

linuxexplore — Wed, 08 Aug 2012 16:40:54 +0000

There is a new Linux distribution released almost every week, sometimes, even every day. The latest is one called Stella, and the first version is Stella 6.3. Stella is a desktop-focused remix of CentOS, and Stella 6.3 is based on CentOS 6.3.

If you are familiar with CentOS, you know that out of the box, it is not really designed as a desktop distribution. Stella changes all that, as it is primarily aimed at desktop users, while retaining the core enterprise features and capabilities of CentOS.

And you can see that just by looking at the package manager. The package categories tell you that everything you can find in CentOS is also available in Stella. Plus desktop applications that you will not find in any default installation of CentOS. For example, an application listed in the screen shot below, is ROSA Media Player (ROMP), the default media player in ROSA Desktop, a distribution based on Mandriva Linux.

Because it is loaded with desktop applications and media codecs not available in CentOS, you can play most audio and video file formats out of the box. Here it shows a favorite online video playing in Firefox.

The next few screen shots show what the desktop looks like and some of the applications accessible from the menu. This one shows installed Internet applications.

Installed Office applications.

Installed multimedia applications.

Updates manager.