External Virtual Machine

[TheMastr13]

(all the products I will need are linked at the bottom)

 

So today I had a good idea. I think.

 

Ever since I got my macbook, there have been certain programs that I wish i could run, but couldn't due to the OS barrier. I kept thinking about dual-booting/installing a virtual machine, but my SSD is already cramped.

 

So, I thought about installing "virtual hard drive" on an external USB 3.0 Hard Drive. But then I would have to carry that with me everywhere. I needed some way of having all the files on my machine. But not on my SSD.

 

Enter the nifty mini drive. I first saw this device a few months ago. It accepts a micro-SD card, and adapts it into a very small SD card that goes into the reader on your macbook, and sits flush against the edge of the notebook.

 

SO. What I want to do is use a mini drive, and a 120gb MicroSD card to store my windows files, so I can use a virtual machine any time I want. 

 

Here are my questions:  It seems possible, but has anybody done it? Does anybody have any tutorial on how to do this? I want to use Oracle Virtualbox, as I have had a lot of experience with it. I know you can select different places to set up your machine, but will it allow me to select an external drive?

 

Thanks!

 

Nifty Minidrive: http://www.amazon.com/Nifty-MiniDrive-MacBook-Retina-Display/dp/B00IWDKEN0

MicroSD: http://www.amazon.com/SanDisk-Memory-Adapter-SDSDQUAN-128G-G4A-Version/dp/B00M562LF4/ref=pd_bxgy_147_text_y

[samcool55]

it doesn't matter where the virtual machine is located, as long as the VM program itself can read and write as it wants, it works.

So yes it's possible and it will work.

[TheMastr13]

it doesn't matter where the virtual machine is located, as long as the VM program itself can read and write as it wants, it works.

So yes it's possible and it will work.

sweet! Now I just need some moneys...

[Tycho]

running windows off an sd card just seems like a bad idea, what are the read and write speeds on the card?

[TheMastr13]

running windows off an sd card just seems like a bad idea, what are the read and write speeds on the card?

30 megabytes read, 20 megabytes write

 

those are from actual benchmarks, not sandisk's "theoretical" speeds

 

EDIT: oops, wrong SD card.

45 read, 35 write

[Tycho]

30 megabytes read, 20 megabytes write

 

those are from actual benchmarks, not sandisk's "theoretical" speeds

 

EDIT: oops, wrong SD card.

45 read, 35 write

Well with those speeds you might just be able to do some basic stuff without suffering from too long boot and loading times. but there's no way to find out until you do it.

[TheMastr13]

Well with those speeds you might just be able to do some basic stuff without suffering from too long boot and loading times. but there's no way to find out until you do it.

It's gonna happen. It will cost me $200 USD, but maybe I'll publish a guide on how to do it. Seems like a cool project.