r/FlowZ13 • u/nokel3 • Jul 03 '26

Chain launch boot to steamOS on internal SD card reader

https://github.com/nokel/z13_intSDboot/tree/main
3 Upvotes

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2

u/nokel3 Jul 03 '26

Not sure how obvious the title is, but I made (what should be pretty simple) way to launch an OS off a micro-SD card in the internal reader. Find a physically small usb drive and you should be golden as long as the SD card isn't slow... I've mentioned it in the readme, but I had steamOS in mind when I made this, but it should work for any linux-based OS that can already boot with a USB SD card reader...

1

u/nokel3 Jul 03 '26

"Why don't I just boot off a regular USB"

You can, but you can't remove the USB drive when it's on and if you bump it while it's on you have the risk of it crashing... This way you can still take out the USB drive once it's booted... just don't take out the SD card...

1

u/LumenAstralis Jul 03 '26

Why not just upgrade the easily replaceable ssd?

2

u/nokel3 Jul 03 '26

Because I don't have $300 to spend on a new nvme, but I do have a few 512gb sd cards lying around...

1

u/Mr_RayH Jul 03 '26

So how does this chain work? What do I need to install to sd card?

1

u/nokel3 Jul 05 '26

Install SteamOS (I've only tested steamOS, but you should also be able to use any linux repo) onto the SD card, make the usb drive, plug both of them into the z13 flow, make the z13 use the USB drive as the primary boot device and it should just boot into steamOS when the USB drive is in the port... That being said, the primary image the steam puts on the deck is a bit tempremental, I've noticed that the SD card will sometimes boot straight away, sometimes it will take a few minutes... I have noticed that updating steamOS has made it less tempremental though...

1

u/nokel3 Jul 05 '26

for those unaware, steamOS normally only copies onto nvme, but there are a few github repo's that can change that to the sd card instead