[school-discuss] To U3 or not to U3

[lee rodgers <sregdoreel@xxxxxxxxx>]

I use the excellent Pstart application menu on the thumbdrive, but am going to try the U3 CD-ROM custom ISO hack: http://cse.msstate.edu/%7Erwm8/hackingU3/
 
I'm trying to decide whether U3 is a good idea or not... on the downside it will crash or lock up on some machines (so I'm not sure I'll ever really implement this any time soon), it's not open (and the official U3 sites are a payware farce), not secure, readily hacked, not truly portable (the default U3 packager wants to installs software on the machine) and *refuses* to run non-U3 applications (the PStart u3p version takes care of that one...).

On the upside it pretends to be a CD-ROM & will autorun on insertion. If you like the autorun feature (u3...), it sets itself up so there's no more system tweaks required to get autorun to work, which can be helpful for users who don't
 know how to use "My Computer." I'm not sure that's much of a boon, really, since almost anyone is trainable to explore "My Computer" and click through to the menu launcher.
  
Then there's the non-U3 thumbdrive mfg'r who sells a thumb drive where you can freely develop your own R-O ISO-FS / CDFS ... Actually you set up the two partitions just like U3 (CD-RO & RW) but the first one you an individual  can freely "burn" to any size partition with their utility (programs, non-volatile folders, static config info...) & the other volume for RW data files.
  
 http://goodmemory.stores.yahoo.net/udmothjuusbf.html

Now if flash reliability could be improved.... 
 
/lee




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/lee
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