Booting Linux from an SD card

[Dustmasterd]

Hey guys so I own a x41t which had it's onboard ram die a couple of months ago. I purchased a barebones x41t for $30 and figures I could swap the hdd for college.

Issue is that ubuntu is loading extremely slow now, as in taking 2 minutes to load chromium. The hdd is starting to make wierd noises and when I tried to clean install xubuntu, it said the hdd was not able to take the install. I don't want to spend money on an old hdd, and I really don't want to spent a lot on an ssd.

It got me thinking, is there a way that I can just boot and run the OS off of a SD card? I can get a 64 gig one for $30, so it would be extremely cheap.

In addition my battery life is extremely low, should I get this? Has anyone had experence with docking batteries on the x41 tablet? http://www.ebay.com/itm/Genuine-IBM-Thi ... 1189019552

I'm not sure if this is legit.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/New-4cell-Origi ... 0947015408

Thanks for any advice!

[Oglon3r]

Does the x41t support Sdhc cards? Im not sure I used the method on the link below on a x61 tablet but I know for a fact these do support sdhc cards
http://<promotion of site not allowed>/UVHzN.
Good luck.

[RealBlackStuff]

X41 machines have 1.8" HDs of max. 60GB, running at 4200rpm.
Hard to get, slow to run.
You can modify the mobo to run SATA hard disks, plenty of posts about that.
And other mods have been applied too.
SDHC works, see http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?p=374065

[Dos3.1]

Is there a particular reason to use an SD card, as you can also boot and run from a CD and USB stick? Are you wanting to use the SD as a sort of hard drive and can you install the Linux OS to that (and have the benefits of a hard drive), rather than just running it like a live CD? (I'm guessing so.)

[RealBlackStuff]

@Dos3.1:
These X2x/X3x/X4x/X6x laptops do not have a CD/DVD drive, you'd need a matching docking base with such a drive.

[axur-delmeria]

is there a way that I can just boot and run the OS off of a SD card?

Short answer: No.

Long answer: there is a complicated procedure that works only for Linux and requires the hard drive (or any other boot device) to boot the Linux initrd image with the kernel modules for the internal SD reader included.

Don't bother with it though. The internal card reader is slow; a USB card reader is faster.

RealBlackStuff has already mentioned the SATA mod, using mSATA SSDs with it is not far off.

[Dos3.1]

I see. I was speaking more in general about Linux .iso images used to boot from. I have one of my TP's with no hard drive and I run it from the USB stick just fine.

@Dos3.1:
These X2x/X3x/X4x/X6x laptops do not have a CD/DVD drive, you'd need a matching docking base with such a drive.

[Dustmasterd]

Thanks for the suggestions, I was just thinking an sd card might work well because it would sit flush with the device. Thanks for the advice on the mods too, but I really don't have the time or money to do a project like that considering I'm starting school in a week and at the cost it would make sense to just get a netbook which would be faster and have a decent battery.

I think I might just get a low profile usb drive and do that, will I be able to store programs and photos? How do I go about doing this because in xubuntu the installer says that I can run off the usb to "demo" it.

[twistero]

The absolute cheapest way to get your computer going is indeed a low-profile USB drive.
And yes, you can do a full install of *buntu on a USB drive. It works just like installing to the hard disk. In your case, you can put the installer on one USB drive and use it to install to a different USB drive.

[Dos3.1]

I think you"ll need a second usb drive for storage.

[farmall]

You can store files on a USB drive with Linux installed if you have enough space.

I like CF card installs too. I don't have an x41t but I've installed various Linux distros and FalconFour 4.5 to CF. I have them in CD/IDE and CF/SATA adapters in my test gear bag.

This looks like the way to go for an x41t:

http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=78852

[Dos3.1]

Didn't work for me, and I had space. I had to pop in a 2nd USB stick.

You can store files on a USB drive with Linux installed if you have enough space.