[ltp] [x31] extremely slow booting when usb key inserted

[Maik Zumstrull]

JP Renaud wrote:
>>I suggest you leave the capability to boot from USB enabled, but
>>change the order of boot devices so that USB is after the internal
>>HDD. Then it shouldn't probe the stick in normal bootup. When you
>>actually want to boot from USB, you can bring up the list of boot
>>devices by pressing F12 on the first screen after switching on the
>>Thinkpad and choose USB manually. That selection will be valid for
>>that bootup only.
> 
> would it be possible to install grub on the USB device and have one 
> entry to boot from a hard drive partition ?

Probably. However, the BIOS will work some magic to make the USB stick
look like it's the first IDE HDD to make booting from it work -- after
all, boot code is good old real-mode BIOS calls and doesn't actually
know about USB. So, the real HDD will probably look like the second or
third drive to bootcode on the stick. You'll have to fiddle around with
it a bit. But it should work.