XP pro on CF or Microdrive

[the1pcdoc]

Has anyone sucessfully installed and run XP on a Compact Flash or Microdrive and booted from it?

[pgriffet]

Never heard of such an installation. Is it possible ?

[the1pcdoc]

I haven't tried it yet, but I am looking for an alternative way to run an OS besides Disk on Chip. CF or microdrive would be shock and vibration proof, for my line of in dash car computers. I strive to make my products cutting edge, high tech, extremely flexible. Some environments such as field mapping on a 4 wheeler are tuff on laptop drives. This is just one use for my car computer. I think it is possible as long as your bios can boot from an external device and mine does allow for such a thing, Now how much room do I need for the OS? Mabey I'll try embedded XP...I think people have booted linux this way. Anybody know?

[elroy]

Check out Knoppix, it is a Linux distro that runs from a cd. They currently seem to be having some problems with new copyright laws in Europe but it is still available on other servers here in the US.

[Nighthawk]

I think it'll work but the problem is that CompactFlash can only be written to a specific number of times before it dies so something like a swap file would kill that portion of the card quickly. Otherwise, I understand CF to work just like an IDE drive so as long as you get a connector to let you plug it in it'll work as a hard drive.

Another thing is that even the fastest CF cards can only read at around 10Mb/sec.. You could try putting a laptop hard drive into a shock mounting.