[Windows 8 General] bads3ctor:
I have managed to boot to rEFInd on my Toshiba Encore in preparation for booting Ubuntu from a microSD card natively. I have not written up a guide yet from my notes because I don't think there will be much demand for this here on XDA. If enough people want to do this, I will turn this post into a guide. This boots directly from the UEFI partition with no USB stick needed. You DO need a USB stick to do the actual install.

Toshiba Encore booting to rEFInd: http://postimg.org/image/4lx3mnxzr/

Toshiba Encore booting to Grub2: http://postimg.org/image/p3rgtpqkp/

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Installing Ubuntu 14.10 to a microSD card on the Toshiba Encore:

Note: There are many problems right now with Ubuntu on the Encore. Touchscreen driver is broken as of kernel version 3.16. It's some kind of regression bug in the atmel-maxtouch driver(here is a program to debug our touchscreen: https://github.com/atmel-maxtouch/obp-utils).

You will need to prepare with:

A USB stick to do the install

Ubuntu 14.10 64 bit ISO(Daily build) http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/daily-live/current/

A microUSB OTG cable(if you use the StarTech cable mentioned below then you don't need this)

A high speed microSD card(Partitioned: 200MB FAT32 EFI partition, a large EXT4 partition, and a swap partition). I used this(was $21 on sale) http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00IVPU894/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o04_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

A Linux box to compile the latest versions of a few programs used to boot into Grub2 and Ubuntu. I will post the compiled versions but you should compile them yourself for security reasons.

Read this to get an idea what's needed to get rEFInd installed: http://www.rodsbooks.com/refind/installing.html#windows (there are extra steps not listed there)

The install will go from the usb stick booted from rEFIind to the microSD card. The Samsung PRO I am using only does ~20MBps so I'm guessing that is a hardware limit. I did the install without a swap partition and Ubuntu was unusable after opening up 4 or more programs so I added a swap partition to the end of my microSD card.

Getting rEFInd booting:

Turn off Secure Boot in the Encore bios. It should be possible to boot Ubuntu from a USB stick without turning off Secure Boot but I doubt it will ever be possible to do from a microSD card because the Toshiba Encore has no option to boot from a microSD card in the bios boot options.

Get rEFInd here: http://www.rodsbooks.com/refind/getting.html

Run these commands in an elevated permissions Windows command shell:

powercfg /h off

manage-bde -status c: (checks bitlocker status)

powershell

PS C:\> Disable-BitLocker -MountPoint "C:"

manage-bde -status c: (after above command finishes, makes sure your disk is really decrypted.)

Then follow this: http://www.rodsbooks.com/refind/installing.html#windows

All the commands are explained on rodsbooks website except disabling Bitlocker. This is optional but if something goes wrong along the way, you might find Windows 8 encrypted and unbootable.

Note: The command: "bcdedit /set {bootmgr} path \EFI\refind\refind_x64.efi" to get rEFInd set as the default EFI boot program did not take the first time I did it. You might have to run that commend a few times rebooting each time until your tablet boots into rEFInd. Once it does, you will see a graphic to boot Windows 8. I suggest changing rEFInd to text mode so that you can use the VOL UP, VOL DOWN, and Windows button(as enter) to scroll through the boot options. Use "textonly" option in the rEFInd config file to set this: http://www.rodsbooks.com/refind/configfile.html#adjusting

Installing Ubuntu(bleeding edge) 14.10:

Touchscreen does not work yet so I will update this section when I get it working.

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If you want to have power to your tablet and USB OTG access at the same time, here is what you need(both Amazon prime eligible):

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0047AALS0/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o03_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00KQES55M/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o03_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1 (Any usb gender bender like this will do...there are cheaper ones)

Attach the USB gender changer to the black end of the StarTech cable and the attach a USB hub to the other end of the gender changer. Plug the red end into a 2.1 amp USB power source and the microUSB end into the Encore. Now the tablet will say "plugged in, not charging". You can now attach any USB device to the hub and Windows or Linux with see them. The tablet will have power but the battery will not charge.