So I got a ZOTAC ZBOX HD-ID11 last week and it's my first time back on XBMC since I used to run it on top of Jaunty (for a while I was using ps3mediaserver to stream to my ps3, but I got fed up with instability). I must say, it has come a LONG way since then. AWESOME. 
OK so the ZBOX runs pretty hot, especially if you want it to be relatively quiet. I drilled additional ventilation holes in the case and it still idles around 60 deg c. I was tossing around the idea of getting an SSD, but then I realized that I could just not use any HD or SSD and install and boot XBMC from SDHC since all of my media sits on a file server elsewhere. I figure doing this and removing the HD altogether will save on heat production. Right now-while running xbmc live and watching some relatively high bitrate 1080p x264 media-my box is reading about 61 deg c under what will be a typical load (so only a little warmer than my idle temperatures with the HD installed).
After doing a little reading, I guess there are really 3 easy ways to achieve a more-or-less permanently installed, bootable SDHC card: 1) make it with unetbootin from the XBMC Live iso image; 2) install to the SDHC from the installer on the XBMC Live iso image boot menu; 3) install to the SDHC via the bootable disk wizard (BDW) addon in the XBMC Live iso image.
My question is: which of these 3 methods will result in the most optimized install for SDHC (less writes to SDHC, no journaling file system, no swap space, etc.)?
TL;DR Which install method will give a bootable SDHC optimized for SDHC?
OK so the ZBOX runs pretty hot, especially if you want it to be relatively quiet. I drilled additional ventilation holes in the case and it still idles around 60 deg c. I was tossing around the idea of getting an SSD, but then I realized that I could just not use any HD or SSD and install and boot XBMC from SDHC since all of my media sits on a file server elsewhere. I figure doing this and removing the HD altogether will save on heat production. Right now-while running xbmc live and watching some relatively high bitrate 1080p x264 media-my box is reading about 61 deg c under what will be a typical load (so only a little warmer than my idle temperatures with the HD installed).
After doing a little reading, I guess there are really 3 easy ways to achieve a more-or-less permanently installed, bootable SDHC card: 1) make it with unetbootin from the XBMC Live iso image; 2) install to the SDHC from the installer on the XBMC Live iso image boot menu; 3) install to the SDHC via the bootable disk wizard (BDW) addon in the XBMC Live iso image.
My question is: which of these 3 methods will result in the most optimized install for SDHC (less writes to SDHC, no journaling file system, no swap space, etc.)?
TL;DR Which install method will give a bootable SDHC optimized for SDHC?
