I play around with Linux on and off. But would running from a USB stick work? I guess I'm thinking in terms of Windows here, but it seems you need to have enough virtual memory space or HD space to accommodate the DAG. Not a problem within one of these like HiveOS? Just put on USB, boot and load lolminer?
Seems like dark magic you speak of.
HiveOS & Simplemining are both intended to run from USB sticks but can also be run from hard drives if you wish, I run HiveOS from an SSHD.
https://hiveos.farm/https://simplemining.net/