[syslinux] Creating a bootable partition on a USB disk with syslinux

[Andreas Jellinghaus]

Am Montag, 10. September 2007 schrieb H. Peter Anvin:
> Ian Brown wrote:
> > My question is: shouldn't syslinux /dev/sdb1 create a bootable partition
> > ? Should I use fdisk for it ? (like the "a" command of fdisk,
> > toggle a bootable flag)
>
> You need to install an MBR and mark the partition active.

btw: how to do that?
all I know is
 - use mbr file from lilo
 - use dd to write it to /dev/sda
 - use some fdisk to mark the partition active

using dd is somehow awksome since it looks like this will overwrite the 
partition table. but if the mbr small enough (220 bytes or something)

debian/ubuntu has also a package "mbr" with a programm install-mbr.
but: this program adds some hot keys so people can choose which partition
to boot during boot. this can be a security issue in some setups.
(or an annoyance as it adds a few seconds to the boot time.)

oops, checked ubuntu lilo package, no longer contains an mbr.
does anyone know a source of an open source mbr without fancy features?

Regards, Andreas