New Flash Drive Ground Station!

[alanbjohnston]

We have a new experimental Flash Drive Ground Station you can try out:

[Flash-Drive-Ground-Station](https://github.com/alanbjohnston/CubeSatSim/wiki/Flash-Drive-Ground-Station)

It turns your Windows laptop or computer (actually any x86/AMD machine including old Macs) into a full CubeSatSim Ground Station with the same software as the Raspberry Pi Ground Station FIABv4.

To try it out, you just need a 32 GB or larger USB flash drive (a 16 GB flash drive might work as well).

It doesn't install anything or change your laptop or computer - once you shutdown and unplug the flash drive, your computer will startup again into Windows.

For those of you technically inclined, it is an image of Ubuntu 24.04 LTS with grub2 boot loader.

If you try it out, let me know how it goes!

Alan

[W7DGP]

Hi Alan, I've tried the new Flash Drive Ground Station and the good news is that I got it to run a few times and FoxTelem picks up the cubesat signal and decodes payloads. The bad news is that it does not follow your instructions...completely. All is well up to the Ubuntu boot menu. After 5 seconds, however, I get multiple (about 15) "Invalid buffer alignment" errors followed by "You need to load the kernal first" then loads the boot menu again. It will sit there forever in the boot menu. What I've tried is CTRL-c, Enter and typing the command "exit". Sometimes ctrl-c gives me a command line prompt (GRUB shell?) and I can type "exit". This will either return me to the boot menu or brings up the Ground Station and all is happy.
While in the Ground Station, everything works like a champ. When I exit and after shutdown, I remove the USB mem and turn it on. I get the HP logo (its an HP Spectre laptop) and then the error message: "Your device ran into a problem and needs to restart". From here, it simply reboots and all is well when it comes up.
When Ground Station launches, I find my really clear and nice OLED screen displays FoxTelem in very tiny, tiny format. I'm using a head magnifier to read it now but I think I need to set my screen resolution before using Ground Station. That's my problem.
Another interesting thing: After the first use of the USB memory, the blue "...Option" and "...Device" screens do not appear. It simply pops up directly in the Ubuntu boot memory.
Unfortunately, I have very little experience with a dual-boot Win/Linux machines. I have built a Win 10 machine by booting up an image file on a USB stick before but this is not the same. I'm learning though - always a good thing.
So, what to do? I'm using a 32GB SanDisk Ultra USB 3.0 mem stick and downloaded the image file before installing it with Balena Etcher. Could this be FAT32 vs NTFS issue? GRUB not handling booting properly? GRUB can't find the boot files on the USB mem? If my laptop is the only computer having this problem, then something is likely wrong on the USB mem and it all needs reloading. Quite frankly, at this point this is the only thing I know how to do. :-) -Larry

[alanbjohnston]

Hi Larry,

Thanks for trying this out! I'm glad it worked for you, but it sounds like the process was not smooth. Also, we haven't seen any of these issue so far. I suspect we may end up seeing many device-specific issues such as yours that can be overcome, but take some time and effort.

Question: Do you only get the multiple "Invalid buffer alignment" errors the first time you did it, or do you get it every time you switch the boot to the flash drive ground station?

This is expected behavior that you saw: Another interesting thing: After the first use of the USB memory, the blue "...Option" and "...Device" screens do not appear. It simply pops up directly in the Ubuntu boot memory. If you were surprised by it, I should make sure it is mentioned in the instructions.

I don't know enough either about grub to figure out if there is a way to avoid the problems you had. Perhaps others will know.

Thanks again!
Alan

[W7DGP]

Unfortunately, the stack of "Invalid buffer alignment" errors happens every time. A little research on this error points to Grub fails and can occur whenever the Ubuntu kernel fails to load. The fact that there is a series of the same error is a hint. Its an opportunity to learn about dual booting. 73, Larry

…

________________________________ From: Alan Johnston ***@***.***> Sent: Monday, January 5, 2026 11:55 AM To: alanbjohnston/CubeSatSim ***@***.***> Cc: W7DGP ***@***.***>; Comment ***@***.***> Subject: Re: [alanbjohnston/CubeSatSim] New Flash Drive Ground Station! (Discussion #407) Hi Larry, Thanks for trying this out! I'm glad it worked for you, but it sounds like the process was not smooth. Also, we haven't seen any of these issue so far. I suspect we may end up seeing many device-specific issues such as yours that can be overcome, but take some time and effort. Question: Do you only get the multiple "Invalid buffer alignment" errors the first time you did it, or do you get it every time you switch the boot to the flash drive ground station? This is expected behavior that you saw: Another interesting thing: After the first use of the USB memory, the blue "...Option" and "...Device" screens do not appear. It simply pops up directly in the Ubuntu boot memory. If you were surprised by it, I should make sure it is mentioned in the instructions. I don't know enough either about grub to figure out if there is a way to avoid the problems you had. Perhaps others will know. Thanks again! Alan — Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub<#407 (comment)>, or unsubscribe<https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/A2GWINMHQUNNNWH3V4XBUHT4FK6RRAVCNFSM6AAAAACPGHHHXOVHI2DSMVQWIX3LMV43URDJONRXK43TNFXW4Q3PNVWWK3TUHMYTKNBRHAYDOOI>. You are receiving this because you commented.Message ID: ***@***.***>