Portable Linux Device

[Dupontrocks11]

Hey guys, recently I have developed a great hatred for Windows and its stupid stupidness, so I decided to switch to the obviously superior and elitist Linux .

Right now, I have Linux Mint 14 on my 4GB Sandisk Cruzer 2.0, but the Cruzer wasn't exactly made for speed. The read/writes are awful, so much so that I have decided to buy a new portable device. I just ordered a highspeed 32GB 3.0 stick, but I am also considering an SSD. What do you guys think?

Portability is of utmost importance, as I like to keep my current distro in my pocket at all times, because in addition to my distro, I also keep school files and various white-hat programs with me in case I need them. So, a USB is extremely useful in this use, but I would be willing to switch to a slim SSD as long as it fits in my pocket. SSD's obviously have almost 4 times the speeds of USB's, but they aren't exactly portable, nor are they as unnoticeable as USB's (for my furtive tasks), and not many of them have easy hookups. Really I need a mix of extreme speed and portability.

So, if anyone has any opinions or suggestions shoot them my way. Basically, have any of you ever been in the same situation, and what did you do? Thanks!

 

[skittle]

So, if anyone has any opinions or suggestions shoot them my way. Basically, have any of you ever been in the same situation, and what did you do? Thanks!

Many people, my self included, run distrobutions that are designed to run off flash drives. I use ArchPup (derivitive of puppy linux).
puppy loads completely in RAM, and writes changes to disk on exit.

 

[Dupontrocks11]

So, if anyone has any opinions or suggestions shoot them my way. Basically, have any of you ever been in the same situation, and what did you do? Thanks!

Many people, my self included, run distrobutions that are designed to run off flash drives. I use ArchPup (derivitive of puppy linux).
puppy loads completely in RAM, and writes changes to disk on exit.

Is that a specific design of ArchPup, or can you use the RAM to load any distro? Also, how much RAM does Linux use while running? I'd be surprised if it was anything less than 2GB.

 

[skittle]

http://puppylinux.org/

You don't have to save data to hard drive to work with Puppy. You can save data to USB flash or even to Internet storage (like www.drop.io ). When installed to USB flash, Puppy consumes only a little over 100 MB, or about 256 MB with OpenOffice. You can use the same USB flash (where Puppy is installed) for saving data.

You can use the base puppy linux comfortably with as little as 128mb of ram.
my fully loaded archpup installation consumes 400mb (openoffice + octave/maxima..)

here is a list of distros that are designed to run from ram.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Linux_distributions_that_run_from_RAM

 

[Dupontrocks11]

http://puppylinux.org/

You don't have to save data to hard drive to work with Puppy. You can save data to USB flash or even to Internet storage (like www.drop.io ). When installed to USB flash, Puppy consumes only a little over 100 MB, or about 256 MB with OpenOffice. You can use the same USB flash (where Puppy is installed) for saving data.

You can use the base puppy linux comfortably with as little as 128mb of ram.
my fully loaded archpup installation consumes 400mb (openoffice + octave/maxima..)

here is a list of distros that are designed to run from ram.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Linux_distributions_that_run_from_RAM

Fantastic, thanks for the link! I think I am going to grab LPS and keep that on a flashdrive, as that seems dedicated to security. Thanks for your help!

 

[skittle]

If you want an easy way to install to your USB drive, recommend 'LiLi':
http://www.linuxliveusb.com/

If your feeling ambitious, you can edit the bootloader to support multiple linux OS's on your flash drive as well.

 

[Dupontrocks11]

Alright, I'll definitely try that, and while I'm at it, I might as well fiddle with the bootloader. Apparently, this new upgrade took away my ability to select a best answer, but if a mod swoops in here give skittle some credit!

 

[skittle]

... might as well fiddle with the bootloader...

A hint: look in the file 'syslinux.cfg' after lili is done installing.
http://www.syslinux.org/wiki/index.php/SYSLINUX