The object: testing downloaded Linux (Ubuntu 11.04-pre) install media,
avoiding burning more coasters.
From the documentation, I see that from the command line I can "mount"
an ISO file image as a device, e.g. loopback loop
(hda0,1)/iso/xubuntu-11.04-a3.iso
It would seem logical that I could then boot from that "device." Disks
burned from these images are bootable -- whatever that requires.
Annoyingly, they all then fail to mount the filesystem.squashfs that
contains the Linux content. IIRC, the image uses LOADLIN to boot,
perhaps indicating that this would require chain-loading; however, if I
examine the files contained in the image, I see that it also contains a
/boot/grub/grub.cfg file.
Installation would seem to be worlds quicker if I could leave the
relatively slow CD access out of the equation -- and even more
convenient if I could at least test that the image would not fail like
all its predecessors.
THANKS IN ADVANCE!