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So I recently got my Raspberry Pi 2 Model B, and decided I wanted to use it to practice hacking and other internet security things.

Anyway, my teacher recommended that I first started by playing around with something called 'BackTrack' which has now been renamed to 'Kali Linux'. https://www.kali.org/downloads/ (I'm guessing I'll be taking the 'mini' downloads)

I want to install this program onto my Pi by use of a USB stick. I have little experience with Linux and Raspbian (which is the OS I have installed; came with the 'NOOB' package). I have an idea of how to do it: I burn the ISO onto my USB using my Windows PC, and then boot the Pi from the ISO using the BIOS (however I have no idea how to do this).

I also don't know if this will install onto the Pi, or just make the program runnable from the USB (which is also okay). Any help and advice is appreciated!

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2 Answers 2

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boot the Pi from the ISO using the BIOS

Nope. There's not really anything that would be considered a BIOS. You have exactly one choice for the boot device: the SD card.

You do not need to use the SD card for the root filesystem, but you'd still have to put some stuff on it (minimally a bootloader and an OS kernel). However, I recommend you first go the normal route and then think about that later.

The pi requires a special boot partition which dedicated pi distros include in their image file. This appears to be the case for Kali as well, and they have a documented process for using it. That refers to dd, which I do not think is available on windows. But since you are a student interested in hacking, security, and the pi, you should really set yourself up a linux box or VM anyway ;) You could also do this using a live CD. Mac OSX systems have dd too.

Make sure you get the correct image. Kali also has generic ARM images but those will not work on the pi, and pi A/B/+ only images won't work on the 2 (although the difference is just the kernel, so they can be made to work). Fortunately I notice on this Kali downloads page at the top of the "ARM IMAGES" section one specifically for the Raspberry Pi 2.

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  • That's not strictly correct - the pi obviously does have a bootloader which fulfills much the same function as a modern PC bios (it sure is not hardware interpreting that FAT filesystem!). However, it is not in the pi's configuration set to boot from USB, but rather only from SD.
    – Chris Stratton
    Commented May 16, 2015 at 3:25
  • Tevo D's answer (the accepted one) to the question linked in the first paragraph has a pretty decent explanation of that. While the pi obviously has to have something that fulfills some of the function of a traditional BIOS, it 1) Technically does not have one, 2) In the more colloquial (less "strictly correct") sense implied in the question here (of "user configurable firmware boot manager"), it still does not have one either.
    – goldilocks ♦
    Commented May 16, 2015 at 10:35
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The pi does not have a BIOS. I reccomend if putting it on SD card to backup everything important onto the USB and using the SD card for the Kali Linux.

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