Alan McKinnon wrote: > On Friday 11 January 2008, Anthony E. Caudel wrote: > >> 2nd question: I must be dense on this one so someone help me out. >> Since a USB stick is seen as a hard drive, why can't I do a standard >> install to it? Is it because until lately they haven't been large >> enough? I'm thinking of using an 8GB one. >> > > There's a few reasons: > > 1. The memory used on those devices has a limited life - about 100,000 > writes for the good ones and maybe 10,000 for the bad ones. With a > standard install, frequent writes are the norm (think cache and other > similar things). This usually ends up at the same spot on the disk, > meaning your new install will last about a month if you are lucky. > There are ways around this, for instance how a LiveCD does things. > > 2. Booting off it is a pain. You need drivers for the entire USB stack > at boot time, which usually means a ginormous initrd. > > 3. Size, which you mentioned > > OK. Then maybe a better solution for a compact portable system would be an external HD. In the laptop size (2.5") the enclosure can just about fit in a shirt pocket. And some of them run off the USB interface. Not as small as a thumbdrive but close.
Tony -- Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety. -- Benjamin Franklin -- gentoo-user@lists.gentoo.org mailing list
