I have found 2 easy hardware ways to boot from a specific USB drive:
1. Connect all of your alternative USB 3 drives with individual power switches like a SABRENT 4 Port USB 3.0 Hub with Individual LED Lit Power Switches. Power only the drive you want to boot.
(Right after posting this, I found it oly works most of the time, but not allways. Sorry, I'm new at this.) 1. Connect the drive you want to boot from directly to the RPi5. Connect the backup drive to a USB 3 dongle. Make sure you set "Control Centre>Performance>Disable USB Current Limit" to on. The RPi5 will find the directly connected USB drive first and boot it.
Even though I'm an American, I did not want all of my USB drives to be created equal.
1. Connect all of your alternative USB 3 drives with individual power switches like a SABRENT 4 Port USB 3.0 Hub with Individual LED Lit Power Switches. Power only the drive you want to boot.
(Right after posting this, I found it oly works most of the time, but not allways. Sorry, I'm new at this.) 1. Connect the drive you want to boot from directly to the RPi5. Connect the backup drive to a USB 3 dongle. Make sure you set "Control Centre>Performance>Disable USB Current Limit" to on. The RPi5 will find the directly connected USB drive first and boot it.
Even though I'm an American, I did not want all of my USB drives to be created equal.
Statistics: Posted by B52apl — Thu Feb 05, 2026 4:39 pm