How to install Linux on SD card?

Currently im trying to install backtrack 3 on a 4gb sdhc card for the acer one but im getting different ideas from everywhere. i downloaded the backtrack 3 usb version i know i need that but i just copied it over and it wont boot so i know it needs to be formated fat32 but idk how to make it bootable. im pretty sure it can be done because ive seen it on the eee asus pc but i want it for my acer.

If possible can it be done in windows?!?! lol hate booting live cds to do stuff like this

 

You have to format it as FAT32 probably because it uses syslinux as its bootloader.
Syslinux only works on FAT32 file systems. H. Peter Anvin (the creator of syslinux) also created isolinux (used in virtually ALL liveCDs) and extlinux (an ext2 version of syslinux) but, for some reason, people still use syslinux (probably because it's tried and tested).
To make a liveUSB you typically have to copy ('dd') an image to the USB stick. This is different from just copying the files across.
You can do the latter (which it sounds like you did) but then you'll need to make sure the SD card was formatted as FAT32 before you copy the files across. You can do that in windoze.
Once they're copied (or even before, if you like) then you'll need to run syslinux on your SC card so that it can install its code on the SD card's MBR. You can run syslinux from any linux distro as long as the syslinux package is in that distro's repos, ie. install it to your PC from the repos and run it. Just make sure that when you run it, you tell it to install on the MBR of your SD card and not the MBR of your PC's hard drive I believe there is also a windoze version of sysconfig that you can install and run from XP (probably Vista as well) but you'll need to google 'syslinux.exe' to find it.
You'll then need to check/edit the syslinux.cfg file on the SD card to make sure it's looking for the kernel in the right place, loading it with the right kernel options, loading the ramdisk, etc.
You'll also need to check the BIOS of your PC recognises the SD card's drive at boot so that you can boot from a card in the first place.

 

What model is your Aspire One? If it's an A110 or A150 then you CANT boot from the SD slots, cheers.

 

But you can put place the card in a USB card reader and boot from that

 

booring are you sure about it ?

 

AOA150-1570 definitely will not boot from an SD slot.

Now you can install Linux on your SD card, but place /boot on your SSD/HDD with a custom vmlinuz/initrd that contains the needed modules to recognize and read the SD card. There was some discussion about this in the forum back in January. I thought about doing it, but never got around to it; figured if I had to put the kernel on the HDD, I might as well keep the whole distro there.

 

By the way, just so people will know, you CAN install AND boot Ubuntu from an SD card on the Acer AOD150 10 inch. I have a "cheap" triple boot setup this way with WinXP and Mac OSX on the internal 160gb HD (two partitions) and Ubuntu on an 8gb SD card in the SD card slot. When I want to use Ubuntu I simply reboot, hit the F12 boot key and choose the SD card and the GRUB menu comes right up and allows me to boot Ubuntu. I have the OSX hackintosh Chameleon bootloader on the 160gb HD which shows and allows booting of OSX or WinXP. (FYI, I installed Ubuntu on the SD card with a bootable USB flashdrive that I had copied Ubuntu Netbook Remix to).

I probably could edit the menu.lst file on the SD card to also allow selection of all OS's from the GRUB menu but I am not really a Linux systems person and don't quite understand the physical to logical drive mappings of GRUB.

At any rate, the AOD150 (BIOS 1.05, there are newer versions) works great as a triple OS machine with this setup!

 

I use an 8gb SDHC card for experimental installs of different versions of Linux. Because I'm paranoid (having screwed up so many things in the past 25 years), I remove the HDD before doing so. Once installed, as kentest writes, you can triple boot: Hold down the F12 key during boot to choose between HDD or SDHC (or USB flash drive); or, wait until the grub menu appears, and choose from whatever is installed on the HDD.