[all variants] Best method for installing ubuntu on flash drive?

Hey guys, its my first post here, i hope its in the right place.

I've recently built a pc out of my spare parts, quickly realized that i didn't have a spare hdd lying round. I'm building this pc as a media pc for streaming etc, and i'm aiming to install ubuntu on a 8gb flash drive (not a live cd) that boots the whole system into ram, has a few gb of persistent storage and be able to permanently mount shares on a smb network

My system:

Amd Phenom ii x6
8gb ram
on board graphics (nforce)
no optical drive
no hdd

i tried installing directly on to a flash drive but the performance was awful (many freezes) because i couldn't get boot to ram to work (necessary packages would install, maybe no compatible with 13.04?), i tried a live usb with "toram" parameter but persistent storage would not work, plus im really looking for a full install so i can change window managers etc.

Ive used other distros like knoppix(really good performance but lacking the necessary software) but im really wanting an ubuntu based distro.

I feel like there should be an easy way to go about this but ive yet to find it.

Any help is much appreciated!