Knowledgeable and devious minds lurk here.

I've a 64GB sdcard which I want to split between a windows live usb and a liveslak one. The majority of the space can go to windows.

Windows will probably need uefi. Can such a thing be done, and how?

Probably a tool like Ventoy or similar

By "windows live usb" you mean Windows 10 or Windows 11 installed in the mode Windows To Go?

Well, I for one I have and use USB storage devices with Windows To Go, BUT I do NOT recommend you to install it in a SD-card. Unless this SD-card is of very high quality (and this mean also very costly) , it will wear very fast. And by this I mean something on range of minutes or max. several hours. Yeah, I have broken several SD-cards trying this.

However, you will get much much better results by using an USB hard drive, either bought as is or made from an old laptop hard drive and a cheap USB 2.0 or USB 3.0 enclosure. IF the size constraints are really high, there exists also USB 3.0 enclosures for M.2 model 2242 hard drives, which enclosures are only a bit bigger than an USB flash drive or an USB adapter for SD-cards.

Now, to install Windows To Go in an USB storage device is really simple with Rufus and it knows also even tricks to use Windows 11 (To Go) on old computers, BUT from my own experience, it needs at least a 64GB device for properly working. The good news is that Rufus can install it in a mode which permit Windows To Go working in both legacy BIOS MBR and UEFI modes.

AND, please be aware that Rufus does full formatting of USB drive, also that Windows To Go can't upgrade to superior Service Packs (or Feature Updates) so you have to reinstall Windows (To Go) to upgrade from Windows 10 21H1 to Windows 10 22H2 , for example.

These are also the reasons for WHY I do not recommend you to try to install also LiveSlak on the same USB storage device, even it's theoretically possible to manually resize/move the Windows partitions and make some room for LiveSlak and install it manually.

In other hand, it's quite possible to install LiveSlak in a 64GB SD-card, and its installer also do a full formatting of USB storage device. Additionally, seems like it's possible to install the "real" Slackware in a 64GB SD-card with some tuning, as ZhaoLin1457 did. From what he said, he uses a full installation of Slackware in a SD-card like this, using F2FS and some TMPFS for particular directories - I remember that from what he said, he have /tmp in a ZRAM device, probably other directories too.

So, as bottom line, I for one I recommend you to install LiveSlak (or the stock Slackware) alone in that SD-card and to install Windows To Go in a separate USB hard drive - made as you like, but having at least 64GB.

PS. Yes, I have "live Slackware" too, in the form of 2 USB hard drives, each one having a stock Slackware installation, one for -stable 15.0 and one for -current. I know, I know, I could have put both in the same USB drive, BUT because I use them mainly in my laboratory garage where I play with over dozen (old) computers, I prefer them to be fully independent.

2 members found this post helpful.

Thanks for the replies, guys.

@marav: Yes, I've heard of Ventoy but I gather there's a learning curve as it seems to be 'Swiss Army Knife' software.

@LuckyCyborg: I hear you on the short life expectancy of sdcards, and will obey, which actually kills the project for now. So I have accordingly marked this solved. Windows must write endlessly. I hadn't heard of "windows to go" and was thinking of using some EOL'ed version, as it seems to go up by about 10G per version.

In my tmpfs I make a directory in rc.local for my browser cache and that saves a lot of disk writes. That's fine in slackware, but it's a whole lot of work trying to civilize windows.

This whole project was a want, born out of a large sdcard with no use for it. All I need is the liveslak, multilib & wine. I have those.

Well, you CAN'T install Windows in the standard mode on a removable storage device. The installer will just refuse and even IF you some Windows-Fu and deploy manually the OS imagine, it will be stuck to the current computer setup. On any other computers this will NOT work.

However, there is Windows To Go mode, which in fact is a feature of Professional series, since Windows 7. In this mode, you can install Windows to a removable storage device, it survive well to major hardware changes, BUT you can't upgrade to a superior Service Pack, hence a fresh install is required.

BUT, please note that Window To Go is a real installation of Windows in a removable device, will all of its bests and worsts.

I would say that my USB hard drives with (stock) Slackware installations could qualify as Slackware To Go, because they are stock/real installations in EXT4FS partitions, with the storage devices configured via UUID into /etc/fstab and bootloader..

As others have said, Ventoy. Unless you are doing booting on a Mac, Ventoy don't work on Macs (any of them). But if you do find a solution and feel like getting frisky with your liveslak's, you could always try out my GNOME 43 "spin" https://slackware.lngn.net/gnome-43-1-liveslak/ It needs love too!

EDIT: Just gave ventoy another whirl since it seems to permanently ruin usb sticks once initialized, but it appears to work on Macs now and even seems to support persistence out-of-the-box for many recent distros with no configuration (unless it's going to wipe me upon next boot). This is much nicer than it was previously.

1 members found this post helpful.

You just install ventoy on a flash drive (it will wipe it) then all you have to do is dump any .iso file in there and it will appear on the boot menu.
The learning curve is so small it can be mistaken for a straight line...

1 members found this post helpful.

Okay, everybody says Ventoy...

BUT, how you start a Windows desktop from Ventoy when there is no "live" Windows shipped by Microsoft and no "simple way" to get one with a thirdly party tool?

The OP wants a "live" Windows desktop running from a SD-card. BUT, there is no official (or semi-official) way to run Windows in "live" mode, aka from an ISO or a read-only storage device.

There is only an alternate way to have a "portable" Windows installation, which is literally a true Windows installation in a removable storage device, in a read-write NTFS partition from this device.

I have explained already that this Windows To Go is similar with installing the stock Slackware in a removable storage device, and using UUIDs everywhere, as to survive well to devices names change.

I think you people confuse the "live" installations of operating systems, like is LiveSlak which can run from a read-only CD or DVS, and the "portable" installations of operating systems, which are standard installations with tuning for consistent devices naming - usually using UUIDs and an appropriate initrd.

The end results may be kinda similar - an operating system running from a removable device, BUT they work completely different.

And, again, there is NO official (or semi-official) variant of a "live" Windows capable to run its desktop from a read-only CD or DVD. Only a "portable" one, which is an entirely different thing.

We all heard you the first time.

Permit me to doubt this.

Because otherwise people here would have been already figured out that Ventoy is not exactly a solution for the OP's project of dual booting a "live" Windows and LiveSlak from a SD-card.

Ventoy has a VHD plugin, so you just have to do a basic installation in VirtualBox
copy the .vhd into your ntfs partition on your Ventoy key (in addition of the ventoy vhd plugin)
And that's it

BUT, a Windows installation in a VHD image is not a "live" Windows installation running from a read-only ISO file.

It's in fact a "portable" Windows installation using a more complicated design, and it's just like Windows To Go more or less - a real Windows installation, hence the SD-card will be strong hammered and it will wear very quickly. Unless it's a very high quality SD-card, which is very costly too.

Not the way to boot is the problem, but the endurance of the result. Which will be lamentable, speaking from my own experience. Yes, I tried to install Windows in SD-cards.

Anyway, this evening I looked at a computer-shop and seems like I can buy a M2 SSD format 2242 hard drive of 120GB with 18 EUR (aprox) and a decent SD-card of 128GB with aprox. 20 EUR. However, I'm not sure if that SD-card will resist at a "portable" Windows installation.

While with another aprox 22 EUR I can buy an enclosure (like the one from the attached image) for the M2 hard drive, resulting a very small external hard drive, where I can install well the Windows To Go and having enough space to install also my custom tailored Slackware installation in a To Go mode (aka UUIDs everywhere).

And that external hard drive would have several thousands times more endurance for this purpose.

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So, Virtualbox itself is running in linux, or where? Then, of course, linux gets to handle the driver headaches. Reminds me of this:

He talks about installing Windows in a virtual machine (run by VirtualBox) and after finishing the installation, to grab the virtual hard drive of this virtual machine, which is a file named whatever.VHD and to put it in your SD-card.

In theory, it's like installing the Slackware in a loop file formatted EXT4FS, then using it with a proper tuned initrd. Yeah, in the past I did this and this way, installing Slackware in a NTFS partition hosting along also a functional Windows 7.

Not true...
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/wi...iew=windows-11