| Roffen | computer-stuff: CF-to-IDE booting |
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| | Veteran |  |
| | Group: Regulars
| | Location: Copenhagen | | Joined: 12.11.06 | | Posted on 19-05-2008 08:07 |
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I found this remarkable device:
It makes a memory-card, if this case a CompactFlash card act as a harddrive, from which you can boot from.
I find this as a very good idea, since you can do your OS-installation on this drive, and keep the rest of your installations on a real harddrive. Make a copy of the CF and once your computer runs slow and irregular (for windows-installtions!), just coopy your OS-files back on the CF-card, and you are set up for a fresh installation.
It is completely silent as there are no moving parts at all.
I haven't tried this myself yet, but will be doing after the summer-holidays, when I will be buying a new computer.
It can be found on Ebay for buying, I haven't found it in shop anywhere yet.
Also, I have no idea how it performs. It's stability, speed or reliability in general.
But I think it's a very good alternative to a clean windows-install every other month.
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| Roffen | RE: computer-stuff: CF-to-IDE booting |
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| | Veteran | |
| | Group: Regulars
| | Location: Copenhagen | | Joined: 12.11.06 | | Posted on 19-05-2008 08:07 |
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a link to more information, of course 
http://www.addonics.com/products/flash_memory_reader/adidecf.asp
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| Vuzman | RE: computer-stuff: CF-to-IDE booting |
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| | Admiral |  |
| | Group: Klikan,
Outsiders,
Administrator,
Regulars
| | Location: Copenhagen, DK | | Joined: 10.06.06 | | Posted on 19-05-2008 10:44 |
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Do you want to run it continually off the CF-card? I'm pretty sure you can get CF-cards that match (or maybe exceed) regular HDD performance, but I'm not sure about the buses, i.e. if the performance will be comparable other than in theory.
If you think about overwriting the windows folder every 2 months, I would advise against it. Sounds like a good idea, but in reality a LOT of programs have their fingers deep in the windows folders and store their settings there, a lot of them store their installers there (and won't re-install/uninstall/upgrade if removed), and in addition you will lose all your windows settings and updates that have been performed between overwrites.
If I were to do this, I would try to see if I could get better performance out of putting windows and/or the page file on the card, and when that turns out not to be, then create a script (r just use a simple backup-prog) to use the card as a daily/hourly incremental backup of settings, documents and other user-created stuff.
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When I kill her, I'll have her
Die white girls, die white girls |
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| Vuzman | RE: computer-stuff: CF-to-IDE booting |
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| | Admiral | |
| | Group: Klikan,
Outsiders,
Administrator,
Regulars
| | Location: Copenhagen, DK | | Joined: 10.06.06 | | Posted on 19-05-2008 10:54 |
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Another idea (not CF-card related), is to create an image of your current running installation (with all your crap-load of apps) for a virtual-pc environment.
Then, install windows anew, along with all updates and your must-have installs. Create a disk-image of this with Norton Ghost or similar.
Then, whenever you need one of your less used applications, fire up the virtual-pc image (with your crap-load) and use the app. If you at one point decide that you use this app pretty often you can install it to your non-virtual environment (and maybe make a new disk-image).
This way you can have a fresh environment with the latest (or at least pretty recent) updates and all your favorite, most-used apps, and whenever you want to use one of your less used programs, you can fire up the virtual-pc and use it. You can even use the virtual-pc as a test-bed for installing suspicious apps, or apps you want to check out without burdening your main environment (you want to keep a backup of your virtual-pc, just-in-case).
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When I kill her, I'll have her
Die white girls, die white girls |
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| Roffen | RE: computer-stuff: CF-to-IDE booting |
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| | Veteran | |
| | Group: Regulars
| | Location: Copenhagen | | Joined: 12.11.06 | | Posted on 19-05-2008 14:10 |
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This way you can have a fresh environment with the latest (or at least pretty recent) updates and all your favorite, most-used apps...
This is one brilliant way to do it. This possibility for people to have their own CF-card, like a family PC, where the teen-kids can install all their stupid games without interfering with their parents setup.
I do see several downsides, but also a very big plus-side for this. Of course, with a standard ISO-file for the CF, it will be quick to the clean install will be quick (clean = with standard programs).
The remark, I made with the clean install just referred to the frequent clean installs windows makes me do 
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| Norlander | RE: computer-stuff: CF-to-IDE booting |
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| | Field Marshal | |
| | Group: Administrator,
Klikan,
Regulars,
Outsiders
| | Location: Copenhagen | | Joined: 09.06.06 | | Posted on 20-05-2008 14:39 |
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Somebody set up us the bomb...
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The conventional view serves to protect us from the painful job of thinking.
- John Kenneth Galbraith |
Edited by Norlander on 20-05-2008 14:40 |
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