Hi I have windows xp and opensuse installed as duel boot on my laptop internal hard drive and would like install other distros on my 8 GB usb pen flash drive but dont want the install of the usb drive to write to the laptop hard drive witch always stops the start menu on the hard drive from working.How would I stop the install of other distros from writing to the boot sector of my internal hard drive!Witch can not be turned off wile doing the install.
yes that will make a live start usb flash drive but how about full install.Witch I have dun but the install writes a menu redirect to the menu on the flash drive on the mbr witch screws up my hard drive booting windows and opensuse witch are on the hard drive.as my laptop dos not have enough boot mem. to run both menus :’( and boy is that allot of work to fix 
!!!
To be honest, personally I wouldn’t bother. But if you insist I would consider a different distro to suse on a flash drive. The latest Knoppix KNOPPIX Linux Live CD
Has a Install to USB option. Boot the live cd and you can run the install to USB.
I have it as a live USB and it totally flies
opensuse is on my hard drive as my favorite linux the usb flash drive is for playing with other distros opensuse will always be the default linux on my laptop mini its cool!Witch is whey I dont want the other distros screwing up my mbr as the repair on the opensuse disk wont start the opensuse on the hard drive it comes back you have no linux on your system then I restart and menu comes and I start opensuse 11.1 on my hard witch I tested to see if it would so I could just start from the repair on the install disk and reinstall the mbr from the boot loader once it was running from admin but would not start it from the disk.O well I will keep looking for it would be nice to have a play drive to 
any of these KNOPPIX in english I will try any distro
Just click the UK/US flag on the front page
then downloads and pick a mirror
eg:
http://ftp.knoppix.nl/os/Linux/distr/knoppix/KNOPPIX_V6.0.1CD-2009-02-08-EN.iso
Thanks am downloading now ha new toy to play with
I just tried out KNOPPIX that is harsh very cool I will defiantly add to my collection thanks for the lead looks like lots of fun lol! rotfl!
I think what caf4926 is saying, is to try another, smaller, Linux Distrobution, perhaps DSLinux, that’s an acronym for “**** Small Linux.” You might have more luck using a smaller LINUX distro.
Good luck!