Optimum Installation

I have a Dell Core 2 duo with 4 Meg RAM and a 120 Gig hard drive that has windows and is almost full. I have been trying out CAE Linux 2011 on a 16 Gigabyte USB drive. I also have an extra hard drive I can install in place of the CD drive.

When I try the piston demo. I run into a memory allocation error while computing the mesh. When I look at the system monitor is says there is 0 bytes of swap space. I expect that is because the 16 Gigabyte USB drive is too small.

I am wondering what my best option is. Some previous experience indicates that if I install on the second hard drive, the loader will be on the second hard drive and I can no longer boot from any drive unless the second hard drive is installed, so I would prefer not to do that. I could get a larger USB drive, or if there is a way to install CAELinux on the hard drive and select a one time boot menu from the BIOS that would work well.

Please confirm that the lack of swap space is causing the memory allocation error and what the optimum solution from the list of options is.

Jake