Booting Windows XP from SDHC?

Hey guys,

I have pretty much singled out the laptop I want (ASUS M70) and much of it consists of the latest notebook hardware and technology.


Anyway, one of the features included in the laptop is the 8 in 1 card reader.
I am not a photographer and will probably access family pictures and such through USB instead of fidgeting with the cards themselves.

Instead of letting the card reader just sit there and gather dust, I've been pondering about using it to boot Windows XP (setting "Removable Devices" to the first boot slot in the BIOS). The SDHC cards have dropped a lot in price recently. A good 4GB SDHC class 6 card can be found for only $10~$15!

I have only seen one article covering this topic, and it's here at NotebookReview, but they are using it as a harddrive replacement (I just want to boot Windows XP and applications from it) " SDHC vs Hard Drive vs SSD."

Also, I found an interesting reply from the EEEUser website (for the above article), though the wording may have given me the wrong impression:

I am thinking of buying myself an Adata 8GB Class 6 Turbo SDHC, but I want to hear your inputs over this method.
Am I right in believing that Photoshop will boot up much faster considering the low (none?) seek time for files compared to HD?

** I am keeping my HD to store files, I just want to boot Windows XP and other large programs from the SDHC card.

Thanks for reading,
- psygn

 

Firstly you have to modify the xp install files, to get xp on boot up to load the usb drivers quick enough. It is no easy task, and many experience users have failed at this. Some even report , tha it is only possible to boot from an sdhc card with xp sp1 (not sp2 or sp3 ) installed.
Secondly your programs wont start faster, because even tho the sdhc has low access times, the read times are 3x slower than that of hard drives nowadays, and the write speeds even lower. Also bandwidth also depends on your sd reader. Forget booting off an sdhc.

 

I second what Jisaac said. There is no benefit to booting from a sdhc. Just downsides. I think if you don't want to see the port wasted just buy a card and use it to store backups of important files in case your hard drive ever dies.

 

Surely the basic question is whether the notebook BIOS supports booting from the media card reader? I haven't seen one which does. "Removable Devices" usually applies to devices connected via USB. See the attached for a typical selection of boot devices.

John

 

Thanks for the replies!

Scratch the SDHC idea.

I'm now wondering about 300x Compact Flash cards. Here is a video of the bootup (19 seconds!): http://youtube.com/watch?v=Iog7nxZXsfs&feature=related

I wish to have one Compact Flash Card (300x) with Windows XP and Photoshop on it, and a harddrive to store my data in.

Any one have the same setup?