 
![Fatdog64 logo](img/fatdog64-header.png)


# Installation options

  
Click [here](uefi-harddrive.md) for UEFI (Windows 8 and above) hard drive installation instructions.

## Guided Installation

Fatdog64 comes with an installer capable of installing to hard drive and flash drive. It provides step-by-step guidance:

1.  To choose which device to install to:  
    - You can choose hard drive or flash drive.
    - You can choose to format the chosen partition (=*data loss*) or leave it as is.
    - You can also run gparted to modify the partition.
    - For flash drive, you can install to a partition (e.g. sdb1) or to the entire flash drive, in "superfloppy" mode (e.g. sdb). We recommend you install to a partition.
2.  To choose whether you want to install a boot loader:
    - Install boot loader to Master Boot Record (MBR)  
      (unsafe, it can cause an existing operating system to stop booting, but Fatdog64 will still boot)
    - Install boot loader to the partition where Fatdog64 is installed  
      (usually safe if Fatdog64 is the only operating system in the partition. If you do this on a partition that holds an existing operating system, that operating system may stop booting)
    - Use existing Operating System  
      Only works for Windows 2000/XP/Vista/7. For Linux, please see note below about manual installation.
    - Do not install boot loader  
      Note that Fatdog64 will not boot unless you install the boot loader. If you choose not to install a boot loader now, you will need to do it yourself manually.

    If you choose to install a boot loader (to MBR or partition), the partition that contains Fatdog64 will also be made the "active" partition, and that one will boot. If you have other operating systems installed in another partition *they may no longer boot*.
3.  To choose installation sources:
    - From Fatdog64 CD/DVD
    - From ISO file downloaded from the Fatdog64 distribution

The Fatdog64 installer supports installing to VFAT, FAT16, FAT32 (also known as MSDOS partition, usually used for flash drive), ext2/ext3/ext4 (Linux partitions, usually used on hard drive), and NTFS partition (Windows partition).  
Note: Fatdog64 Installer is experimental code. It may cause data loss, or other installed operating systems to stop booting. Backup your data before you use it. *Use at your own risk.*

## Manual Installation

Manual installation is good for upgrading an already installed system. All you need to do is to get two files from the Fatdog CD/DVD: *vmlinuz* and *initrd*, and copy them to your previous Fatdog64 installation folder, overwriting the previous files.

> **Note:** Grub Legacy and Grub4dos are **VERY** slow loading files from ext4, you may not have noticed this with a typical 10MB kernel/initrd, but with Fatdog64 that will be closer to 370MB. If you want to use one of these bootloaders, put Fatdog64's kernel/initrd on an ext3 partition.

### Manual boot loader configuration

If you already have a boot loader and don't want to bork it, you may choose to install Fatdog64 manually. Simply copy the two files above somewhere in your disk, adjust your boot loader configuration (grub.cfg / menu.lst / extlinux.conf / whatever) to load Fatdog64's vmlinuz kernel and initrd. Some examples below:  


#### Example for menu.lst (GRUB and GRUB4DOS)

``` 
title Fatdog64
rootnoverify (hd0,0)
kernel /vmlinuz
initrd /initrd
```



#### Example syslinux.cfg (for syslinux, extlinux, pxelinux)

``` 
label Fatdog64
kernel vmlinuz
initrd initrd
```


That (hd0,0) refers to GRUB-style naming of the device and partition. If you're not sure what it means, [Google](https://www.google.com) is your friend.

## Supported media / operating modes

Fatdog64 can be installed in several types of media and has a few operating modes.

### Live CD/DVD

You don't have to install Fatdog64 to use it. You can just use the Fatdog64 CD/DVD as is. When you shutdown, you will be asked where to save your "session" (i.e. your changes, configuration settings, browser bookmarks, etc). You can choose to save in a flash drive, or in your hard drive. The session is saved in a file referred to as the "savefile", its actual name can vary but it's usually called fd64save.ext4. Next time you want to start up the computer, just put the CD (also plug-in the flash drive if you put your savefile there) before you power-up your computer, and Fatdog will find and load up the savefile - your environment will be just the same as it was when you shut down previously.  
Note: Fatdog64 loads completely into RAM. It means that after Fatdog64 completes the boot process, you can take out CD/DVD and put something else there (e.g. to listen to music, watch movies). On the downside, this means you need to have enough RAM to load an entire copy of Fatdog64 into memory -- a minimum of 1GB is probably needed.

### Harddrive

You can install Fatdog64 to your hard drive. The installation method used by Fatdog64 is known as "frugal install", where instead of occupying a dedicated partition, Fatdog can use \*any existing\* partition, and share it with existing data and/or operating system files. All this type of installation does is to copy two files: *vmlinuz* and *initrd*, and configure the boot loader, if you ask it to.  
Operation in Harddrive mode is identical as in Live CD, except that you don't always have to carry the CD with you. The savefile can be in the harddrive or it can be on a flash drive. You can also modify the kernel command line parameters (please refer to [Boot Options](boot-options.md)) to specify exactly where your savefile is so that Fatdog64 does not consume time looking for your savefile.

### Flash drive

Also known as thumbdrive, usb stick.  
For booting a flash drive on UEFI (Windows 8 and above) hardware click [here.](uefi-flashdrive.md)  
A flash drive install operates exactly like a hard drive one. The flash drive needs to be formatted with VFAT/FAT16/FAT32 (MSDOS filesystem) or NTFS (Windows filesystem) or one of the Linux filesystems ext2/ext3/ext4, before it can be used to install/boot Fatdog64. Other formats are not supported.  
A flash drive can be formatted just like a hard disk (i.e. multiple partitions), or it can be operated like one big storage (called "superfloppy" mode in Puppy Linux terms). If you use the installer, you can see the difference as follows: a flash drive formatted like a hard disk will have partitions (e.g. if your flash drive is identified as *sdb*, then it will have partitions named *sdb1* (and possibly sdb2, sdb3 and so on), whereas a flash drive prepared in superfloppy mode does not have partitions.  
Fatdog64 supports both, but sometimes your BIOS (the firmware of your computer that controls it before any operating system is loaded) may not. You can try whichever formatting mode that works with your BIOS.  
You can use Fatdog64 installer to change your flash drive between hard disk mode or superfloppy mode (*warning: data loss*). If you want to use standard hard disk partitioning, use Gparted ("Modify Partitions" from the installer) to create a partition in your flash drive, if one does not exist, and then format that partition (usually Gparted will do that for you too). If you want to use superfloppy mode, choose the "disk" device of your flash drive (e.g. *sdb*, not *sdb1*) and then format it.  
A special concern with flash drives is that there is a limit on the number of writes that can be done on them, usually arount 10,000 for cheap drives. After this many writes, the flash drive will start to fail in unpredictable manners. While you think you may not do 10,000 writes, an operating system operation writes a lot of times behind your back (especially if you use journaling filesystems like ext3/ext4 or NTFS).

### Session saving control

Fatdog64 address this by using the RAM layer - writes are stored into memory, and only once every 30 minutes or so (configurable) the changes will actually be flushed and written to the flash drive. This helps to extend the life of flash drives considerably. It also makes operations faster, as a flash drive is a slow device when it comes to writing data to it. In this way, you will only notice the delay during the periodic saving. This is all good stuff but like everything in the world, it has a downside: if you lose power, you can lose up to 30 minutes (or whatever period you set) of your work. If this is not acceptable, don't use a flash drive, get a portable harddrive instead.  
Session saving control is available for all savefile operation - not only for flash drives but also for regular drives and network drives. The periodic saving can also be disabled, making you fully in charge of whether or when to save changes. (You can save by clicking the "Save RAM layer" icon on the desktop). You can choose not to save the session at all if you wish - whatever you did during your session will be thrown away and you will start fresh next time you will use your computer.  
Unlike Puppy Linux, Fatdog64 does not try to automatically enable RAM layer feature for flash drives. You need to specifically enable RAM layer (please refer to [Boot Options](boot-options.md)).

### Multisession DVD+RW / DVD+R / DVD-R

Running Fatdog from Multisession DVD+RW is just like running Fatdog from Live CD/DVD, except that the session can be saved directly to your DVD+RW --- not flash drive or hard drive. During shutdown, your changes will be compressed and written as SFS file to the disc. The SFS will be loaded again the next time you reboot. Note that all the session data is loaded into RAM - so you need to have quite a bit of RAM available. Once the system boots up, you can take out the DVD+RW - just like Live CD/DVD. You will be reminded to put it back in at shutdown time.  
When the disc is full, all you need to do is burn another copy of Fatdog64 on a new optical disc, then use this disc when prompted to insert the disc. Fatdog64 will save your old session as well as the new session on the new disc.  
Multisession is enabled by passing *`multi`* parameter on the kernel command line parameter.  
Note 1: The following optical disc types have been tested and known to work: DVD+RW, DVD+R, DVD-R. CDs are not supported.  
Note 2: Multisession DVD+RW is an oxymoron. DVD+RW in fact does not have nor supports "multisession" as it is defined for CD or DVD-R. But the result of running in this mode is similar to running traditional multisession, so we keep this term.  
Note 3: At this stage, support for multisession is still rough. There is no warning on whether the disc is full, and when the disc is full, you need to manually burn a new copy of Fatdog64 before saving the session.

## Advanced installation options

These will only be discussed briefly. Starting from Fatdog64 600, the following installation options are available:

### Copy ISO file directly flash drive

Fatdog64 ISO file is an [isohybrid](http://wiki.geteasypeasy.com/Hybrid_ISO/IMG_format) image. In addition to burning it to CD/DVD, it can be imaged directly to a flash drive. When done this way, the flash drive will work exactly like a Live CD.

### Savefile encryption

Savefile can be encrypted. This is asked during savefile creation during shutdown. During boot, the system will ask for the password. If the password is wrong the system will continue to boot without the savefile. The cipher used for encryption is AES, in the future it may be configurable.

### "Underdog" feature

Fatdog can mount and use another Linux operating system as part of its own filesystem. In this way, Fatdog can use some features of the other operating system as its own. In Puppy Linux terms, this is called using an "underdog" feature. Changed files can either be saved directly to the other system, or to a separate savefile so that the original operating system is unaffected.

### Remote savefiles

Savefiles can be stored not only in local devices. They can be stored in remote systems, using either CIFS (aka SAMBA / Windows shares), or NBD (network block device).

### Netboot

Fatdog can be booted by pxelinux directly from the ISO file, using memdisk. A simple configuration looks like this:


#### pxelinux.cfg/default

``` 
default fatdog
label fatdog
kernel memdisk
initrd fatdog64.iso
append iso raw
```


Or you can still use the standard netboot options by extracting *vmlinuz* and *initrd* and specifying them directly without using memdisk. Fatdog64 only requires these two files to boot, in Puppy Linux terms, Fatdog64's initrd is called "humongous initrd".  
Using memdisk is easy, but using the extracted files is more flexible because you can add configuration options to the kernel command line. With memdisk the kernel line is fixed.

### Multisession with harddrive

The multisession feature is available for DVD+RW and also for hard disk. It saves every session as a separate SFS session file (which can be opened and reviewed independently). Unwanted session files can simply be deleted.

## Unsupported installation options from previous Fatdog64 versions

### Multisession CD

Multisession with CD is not supported. Systems capable of running Fatdog64 usually come with a DVD writer anyway, so usually this is not a concern.

### Multisession DVD

Multisession with DVD-R/DVD+R/DVD-RW is not supported. It might work but it is untested.

### Full Install

The compressed files from the install CD are expanded and copied to a dedicated partition of the hard disk. This is the normal mode of installation for mainstream Linux system, such as Ubuntu or Fedora. Fatdog64 does not officially support this mode of installation, but see [here](full-install.md) if you are really inclined to.


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[Fatdog64](home.md)
| [FAQ index](faq.md)
| [FAQ files](faq_file_list.md)
| [Fatdog64 online](https://distro.ibiblio.org/fatdog/web)
| [FAQ online](https://distro.ibiblio.org/fatdog/web/faqs/faq.html)

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_This page was automatically converted from [harddrive.html](https://distro.ibiblio.org/fatdog/web/faqs/harddrive.html) on 2025-09-20._
