I've managed to partition and install a CF card using OSX and the
(rather dodgy and experimental!
) ext2 filesystem driver. However it's tricker than doing it with linux, as pdisk is almost as evil as vi, and there's no fsck, so if you balls the installation somehow you have to make the filesystem again
It's a good excuse to try desktop linux out, and as RTFM points out you can use a live CD. You WILL need a CF writer supported by linux
(any old cheap USB multi card reader will do
).
You cannot install linux "on device" like a CE program, all the memory will be flushed and used as RAM by linux when the kernel starts so BACK UP if you want to keep your CE setup
(HP Backup is probably the best HPC backup util i've used
).
I've used 4GB Transcend and Dane-Elec cards
(and a 512mb Kingston
) for this with no problems, YMMV.
Personally, i'm waiting for sound and suspend support, till then i limp on with Netfront/ftx, PocketPuTTY and TCPMP under CE.