OK, I changed the cmdline.txt to specify the USB UUID instead of
PARTUUID and it seems to have partially booted correctly in that the
right partitions end up mounted, but it STILL wont boot without the SD
card inserted, and the root filesystem will not expand?

There is something very flaky about all this USB boot.

--
"When a true genius appears in the world, you may know him by this sign,
that the dunces are all in confederacy against him."

Jonathan Swift.

On Wed, 18 Oct 2023 19:48:32 +0100, The Natural Philosopher
<tnp@invalid.invalid> wrote:

>OK, I changed the cmdline.txt to specify the USB UUID instead of
>PARTUUID and it seems to have partially booted correctly in that the
>right partitions end up mounted, but it STILL wont boot without the SD
>card inserted, and the root filesystem will not expand?
>
>There is something very flaky about all this USB boot.

Maybe you have one of the old Raspberry 4 models?
https://www.pragmaticlinux.com/2021/12/directly-boot-your-raspberry-pi-4-from-a-usb-drive/

"To configure your Raspberry PI 4 to boot from a USB drive, you just
need to enable this feature inside the boot code, stored in EEPROM.
And here’s the best part: Most Raspberry PI 4 boards enable this
feature by default! Only a small batch of early Raspberry PI 4 boards
shipped with this feature disabled."

"What about older Raspberry PI models?

This article primarily focuses on booting a Raspberry PI 4, 400 and
Compute Module 4 from a USB drive. However, with a little trick, you
can reap the same benefits if you own an older model such as a
Raspberry PI 1, 2, 3 or Zero. The trick involves moving the root file
system (/) to a USB drive and just leave the boot file system (\boot)
on the SD card.

With this approach, your Raspberry PI still boots from the SD card.
However, the actual operating system itself runs from the USB drive.
Since the boot operation only needs to reads from the SD card, you
won’t run into SD card corruption problems. Just keep in mind that you
get better disk I/O performance on a Raspberry PI 4, because it
supports USB 3 ports. For step-by-step instructions on using this
approach, refer to this tutorial:

Move the Raspberry PI root file system to a USB drive

What do you need

To complete the steps outlined in this tutorial, you need the
following:

A basic Raspberry PI 4 setup. This includes a power supply, SD
card, HDMI cable, monitor, mouse and keyboard.
The Raspberry PI Imager software installed on your PC.
A USB drive.

Theoretically you can use a simple 4 GB or more USB flash stick for
this tutorial. However, for the best performance I recommend a SATA or
NVMe SSD drive with a suitable USB 3 adapter. For this tutorial, I’ll
use a Samsung 860 EVO 250 GB SSD in combination with a Nedis USB 3.2
2.5" SATA USB adapter. Note that not all SATA to USB 3 adapters fully
work with the Raspberry PI 3. For more details and a potential fix,
refer to article:

Fix for getting your SSD working via USB 3 on your Raspberry
PI..."
--
Jesper Kaas - jesperk@neindanke.online.no

On 19/10/2023 06:29, Jesper Kaas wrote:
> On Wed, 18 Oct 2023 19:48:32 +0100, The Natural Philosopher
> <tnp@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>
>> OK, I changed the cmdline.txt to specify the USB UUID instead of
>> PARTUUID and it seems to have partially booted correctly in that the
>> right partitions end up mounted, but it STILL wont boot without the SD
>> card inserted, and the root filesystem will not expand?
>>
>> There is something very flaky about all this USB boot.
>
> Maybe you have one of the old Raspberry 4 models?
> https://www.pragmaticlinux.com/2021/12/directly-boot-your-raspberry-pi-4-from-a-usb-drive/
>
Nope. Brand new 4B.
I stumbled through the mirk, somewhat hampered by the fact that I
interpreted the flashing green light as being some kind of malfunction,
whereas I eventually discovered it was simply looking for an SD card
that wasn't there, but still eventually booted.

The key was to relabel the root FS and use that in fstab and in cmdline.txt
And tell the green light to shut the f up.
Then I finally got a clean boot and was able to expand the root FS to
the whole SSD.

The next issue is to find some 2TB SSDs that don't flatten the USB power
supply.

It looks like cheaper and slower is less power...

--
There is nothing a fleet of dispatchable nuclear power plants cannot do
that cannot be done worse and more expensively and with higher carbon
emissions and more adverse environmental impact by adding intermittent
renewable energy.

On 18/10/2023 7:48 pm, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
> OK, I changed the cmdline.txt to specify the USB UUID instead of
> PARTUUID and it seems to have partially booted correctly in that the
> right partitions end up mounted, but it STILL wont boot without the SD
> card inserted, and the root filesystem will not expand?
>
> There is something very flaky about all this USB boot.
>
Probably not relevant but I've just spent the best part of an afternoon
trying to get a 2Gb Pi4 to boot from an SSD via a USB3 (allegedly) to
SSD adaptor.

To save time I decided to use Raspberry Pi Imager (on a Mint desktop) to
burn the image. It didn't work (write failure). I moved the SSD adaptor
to a USB-2 port and it worked.

If I plug the resulting combination into a USB-3 slot on the Pi 4 it
boots perfectly.

I think the adaptor works on the Pi USB-3 because the Pi 4 doesn't have
true USB-3 data rates. I haven't got a Pi 5 but I suspect the same
approach will not work.

Another Dave
--
Change nospam to techie

On 21/10/2023 10:14, Another Dave wrote:
> On 18/10/2023 7:48 pm, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
>> OK, I changed the cmdline.txt to specify the USB UUID instead of
>> PARTUUID and it seems to have partially booted correctly in that the
>> right partitions end up mounted, but it STILL wont boot without the SD
>> card inserted, and the root filesystem will not expand?
>>
>> There is something very flaky about all this USB boot.
>>
> Probably not relevant but I've just spent the best part of an afternoon
> trying to get a 2Gb Pi4 to boot from an SSD via a USB3 (allegedly) to
> SSD adaptor.
>
> To save time I decided to use Raspberry Pi Imager (on a Mint desktop) to
> burn the image. It didn't work (write failure). I moved the SSD adaptor
> to a USB-2 port and it worked.
>
> If I plug the resulting combination into a USB-3 slot on the Pi 4 it
> boots perfectly.
>
> I think the adaptor works on the Pi USB-3 because the Pi 4 doesn't have
> true USB-3 data rates. I haven't got a Pi 5 but I suspect the same
> approach will not work.
>
> Another Dave
All SATA /SSD adapters are not created equal

Allegedly.

What does lsusb show about the adapter?

PS Id I had known that a Pi4B would boot USB *by default* (if no SD card
is installed) I wouldn't have faffed around with the SD card..

--
The New Left are the people they warned you about.

In message <uh04p7$1ln8m$1@dont-email.me>
Another Dave <dmarsden@nospam.com> wrote:

> On 18/10/2023 7:48 pm, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
> > OK, I changed the cmdline.txt to specify the USB UUID instead of
> > PARTUUID and it seems to have partially booted correctly in that the
> > right partitions end up mounted, but it STILL wont boot without the SD
> > card inserted, and the root filesystem will not expand?
> >
> > There is something very flaky about all this USB boot.
> >
> Probably not relevant but I've just spent the best part of an afternoon
> trying to get a 2Gb Pi4 to boot from an SSD via a USB3 (allegedly) to SSD
> adaptor.
>
> To save time I decided to use Raspberry Pi Imager (on a Mint desktop) to
> burn the image. It didn't work (write failure). I moved the SSD adaptor to
> a USB-2 port and it worked.
>
> If I plug the resulting combination into a USB-3 slot on the Pi 4 it boots
> perfectly.
>
> I think the adaptor works on the Pi USB-3 because the Pi 4 doesn't have
> true USB-3 data rates. I haven't got a Pi 5 but I suspect the same
> approach will not work.

The symptoms you describe would also fit perfectly with a power supply
issue. Because of power limiting at USB ports, voltages at the USB
devices can be marginal. This shows up most often with relatively
high consumers of power, like storage drives.

David

On 21/10/2023 11:30, David Higton wrote:
> In message <uh04p7$1ln8m$1@dont-email.me>
> Another Dave <dmarsden@nospam.com> wrote:
>
>> On 18/10/2023 7:48 pm, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
>>> OK, I changed the cmdline.txt to specify the USB UUID instead of
>>> PARTUUID and it seems to have partially booted correctly in that the
>>> right partitions end up mounted, but it STILL wont boot without the SD
>>> card inserted, and the root filesystem will not expand?
>>>
>>> There is something very flaky about all this USB boot.
>>>
>> Probably not relevant but I've just spent the best part of an afternoon
>> trying to get a 2Gb Pi4 to boot from an SSD via a USB3 (allegedly) to SSD
>> adaptor.
>>
>> To save time I decided to use Raspberry Pi Imager (on a Mint desktop) to
>> burn the image. It didn't work (write failure). I moved the SSD adaptor to
>> a USB-2 port and it worked.
>>
>> If I plug the resulting combination into a USB-3 slot on the Pi 4 it boots
>> perfectly.
>>
>> I think the adaptor works on the Pi USB-3 because the Pi 4 doesn't have
>> true USB-3 data rates. I haven't got a Pi 5 but I suspect the same
>> approach will not work.
>
> The symptoms you describe would also fit perfectly with a power supply
> issue. Because of power limiting at USB ports, voltages at the USB
> devices can be marginal. This shows up most often with relatively
> high consumers of power, like storage drives.
>
That depends on the PC driving it. As far as a PI is concerned they have
up to 6W of USB power available which is enough for the hungriest SSD,
two reasonably abstemious ones and possible a third if small enough.

We shall see.

> David

--
Truth welcomes investigation because truth knows investigation will lead
to converts. It is deception that uses all the other techniques.

On 21/10/2023 10:58 am, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
> On 21/10/2023 10:14, Another Dave wrote:
>> On 18/10/2023 7:48 pm, The Natural Philosopher wrote:
>>> OK, I changed the cmdline.txt to specify the USB UUID instead of
>>> PARTUUID and it seems to have partially booted correctly in that the
>>> right partitions end up mounted, but it STILL wont boot without the
>>> SD card inserted, and the root filesystem will not expand?
>>>
>
> What does lsusb show about the adapter?

VIA Labs, Inc, VL711 SATA 6 Gb/s bridge
>
> PS Id I had known that a Pi4B would boot USB *by default* (if no SD card
> is installed) I wouldn't have faffed around with the SD card..
>
I did know (but had forgotten) this as I had sorted it out when the Pi 4
first came out. It was only when I got into the mire of PARTUUID and the
rest that it dawned on me I was wasting my time and should bypass all
attempts to use the live OS to copy the system to the SSD.

Another Dave
--
Change nospam to techie