Raspberry PI 4 Boot from USB Drive (External Hard Disk)

Introduction:
Today, we’re going to explain an important feature of the Raspberry Pi 4: booting from a USB hard drive.
Why It's Important:
As you can see, this Raspberry Pi doesn't have a microSD card inserted. The slot is empty. Instead, I boot this machine from this USB drive, and this drive serves as a backup.
Essential Equipment:
The first important thing is to buy a new powered USB hub. This ensures that the Raspberry Pi doesn't need to supply power to the USB drives, which can help prevent power supply issues.
Setup Process:
1. Prepare the microSD Card:
- Create a bootable microSD card with the standard Raspberry Pi operating system.
2. Copy the OS to the USB Drive:
- Use special software to copy the operating system from the microSD card to the USB drive.
3. Configure USB Boot:
- Create another bootable microSD card with a specific software provided by the Raspberry Pi community. This card will instruct the Raspberry Pi to boot from a USB device instead of the microSD slot.
Booting Process:
When you power up the system, it will boot from the USB drive, eliminating the need for a microSD card.
Demonstration:
Now, let's look at the Raspberry Pi booting from the USB drive. Here we are, as you can see, there are two drives connected. The first one, SDA, is the boot drive, and SDB is the backup.
Cloning the Drive:
To clone the microSD card to the hard drive, I used a program called RPI Clone. This software copies the entire microSD card to the hard drive. I then used the same software to clone the first hard drive (SDA) to the second one (SDB).
Benefits:
The software makes an exact copy, allowing you to boot from the clone. Cloning the drive (SDA to SDB) took about an hour and a half, which is quite fast. The drives are not very large, but they provide enough space for our needs.
Conclusion:
That’s all for today! If you have any questions, I'll be happy to answer them. Stay tuned for the next episode about the Raspberry Pi. See you next time!
Chapters
0:00 Intro
0:23 Hello Mighty Pirates!
1:00 USB Hub for the drives
2:37 Checking two drives
3:02 Using RPI-Clone
3:58 Backup time