Openindiana install to USB flash drive fails

[soundscribe]

Does anyone know how to get Openindiana to install to a USB drive?

I boot from the live CD without issue and start the install process. The USB flash drive is visible as a device choice.

I accept the defaults and then get this error message dialog box:

Red stop sign appears
Cannot mount volume
Unable to mount the volume 'rpool'.

I've tried different USB slots without success. The drive is Patriot 32GB drive, as is from the store. Probably formatted as a FAT-32 device out of the gate.

I've read others have successfully installed OI to USB flash so I'm not sure what else I can change to get this to install properly.

Meanwhile, I've got OI just fine in a Virtualbox VM under Centos.

Kinda got bit hard by the OI/zfs/storage bug. I know I'm a sick puppy.

 

[gea]

Does anyone know how to get Openindiana to install to a USB drive?

Installing OpenIndiana to USB is not a supported or recommended option!
Use a Sata Disk or SSD instead.

Even when you may get it working, its unusable slow.
(Solaris is not build to run from RAM like for example ESXi)

This may change with USB3 and SSD like sticks in future

 

[Patrick]

Yea, OSes typically are modified slightly to ensure minimum writes for the low write cycle NAND found in flash drives, especially USB 2.0 versions since those had much lower performance requirements.

 

[soundscribe]

Thank you gea and Patrick. I've given up on the Solaris on USB "project" as not being a viable option.

I've got a bunch more questions on other storage topics, but I'll start new threads.

 

[gea]

Thank you gea and Patrick. I've given up on the Solaris on USB "project" as not being a viable option.

I've got a bunch more questions on other storage topics, but I'll start new threads.

minimal Solaris on USB?

thats the idea of project EON
http://sites.google.com/site/eonstorage/

but i would currently prefer a default Illumian, OpenIndiana or Solaris 11 installation on Sata (disk or SSD)

 

[Patrick]

I tried EON maybe 18 months back but I think if you are going with a ZFS solution OI/ Solaris Express 11 or something like FreeNAS provide better alternatives. I think FreeNAS works on USB installations.