Install Windows 7 using a bootable USB flash drive

Hi all,

I understand that many of you here have already installed Windows 7 onto their netbooks using external DVD drives. That's the easiest way to go about it. I have an external DVD drive myself and I'm planning on installing Windows 7 to my AAO with it once I get home.

However, right now I'm not at home and I wanted to install Windows 7 on my AAO. The only way I could do it was through a bootable USB flash drive. So I went ahead and did it, only to find that the 8GB model can't cut it - meaning Windows 7 won't install completely on it. I'll have to vLite my Windows 7 ISO and try again tomorrow, but for now I just wanted to share what I learned with anyone who might be interested.

Here's how I was able to created a bootable USB flash drive to install Windows 7:

http://www.electronicpulp.net/2009/01/1 ... ash-drive/

 

I installed Windows 7 onto my 8GB SSD too, using a flash drive. When I made my ISO with vLite, I also slipstreamed many of the drivers (Card Reader, Wireless...) and they all work perfectly... except the wireless light on the front. I'm still working on that...

 

an easier method that i found was:

Take a spare 4GB (or bigger) USB 2.0 thumbdrive, reformat it as FAT32, and simply copy the contents of the Windows 7 Beta ISO image to the memory stick using xcopy e:\ f:\ /e /f (where e: was the DVD drive and f: was the removable drive location). Not only was it easy to boot and install from the thumbdrive, it was also blindingly fast: quicker than the corresponding DVD install on my desktop machine.

 

Just a little note: This method probably will not work if you remove "Manual Install & Upgrade" from the installation. XP can't install from USB if that's removed either, so...But I'm not 100% sure if it still has it.

 

I try this with the Windows 7 DVD in F: and the flash stick in H: and I have an error message which tells me that the command cannot create the directory H:

I execute : xcopy F:\ H:\ /e /f

Any idea?

 

will this work for other cd's that i wish to install'?

*can someone explain how to to this in further detail, i am a total noob

 

Basically, I think, you're making the USB drive bootable. Then you're just copying ISO files over, and as long as your computer can boot from USB, it'll boot from the installer.

 

did you format flash drive to fat32 first?

 

absolutely

 

Try using this command:

xcopy f:\*.* /s/e/f h:\

This is what I used to make my USB drive.

Good luck.

 

I'm getting "no bootable partition in table" when trying to boot from usb. I downloaded the iso, and then mounted it with daemon tools, and then ran the xcopy command in the previous post. I've tried two seperate usb drives, both relatively new, with no luck. Any ideas?

 

I am by no means any expert in this matter, but have you made your USB drive bootable yet? If not, Google it. I don't know command prompt very well, lol, so I just installed GParted on a drive. Makes it much simpler.

 

I used the directions from:

http://www.electronicpulp.net/2009/01/1 ... ash-drive/

with a couple of changes.

Follow the directions down to step 3: in step 3 you do not have to do #3 since it is only going to give you the Help file for BootSect.exe

So run - BootSect.exe /nt60 d: (where d: is your flash drive) - This will make the drive bootable. The /nt60 command is for Vista/Win 7 - the command /nt52 is used for Win XP.

I then ran: xcopy f:\*.* /s/e/f d:\ - where f: was my DVD drive since I had a burnt copy and d: was my flash drive.

I then close my command window and unmounted my flash drive and then put it in my AA1 and ran the install from the flash drive.

I hope that this helps.

Note: I used a 4g PNY Attache Flash Drive.

 

I run xp on my A150.

To install windows 7 as a dual boot I...:

1.Partitioned my hardrive using partition magic giving the new partition 20GB and the standard format that it defaults to NTFS I think. The computer needs to restart twice during this.
2.Downloaded Windows 7 32 bit
3.Extract the .iso using winzip, the free trial version, to the partition that I had created
4.Got an error message and had to delete any items in the .iso that were of size 0
5.In my xp I ran setup.exe that was on my partition
6.Installed beautifully
7.When I start up it says run old windows or windows 7 and you can pick and they both work

I saw a better guide here and I just wanted to add my issue about extracting the .iso but I couldn't find it.

 

I tried it so many times, and it just doesn't work for me!!!
Tried 2 USB sticks, one can is definitely able to boot (used fedora live on it).

When i do the xcopy, one usb doesnt do anything and the other one just get stuck!

The dvd I am using can boot fine into the windows 7 setup....any ideas?

i did modify the xcopy to xcopy f:\*.* otherwise i get an error.

thanks,

Bar1

 

That could have been written by me, I have EXACTLY the same problems!

I've tried an 8GB and a 16GB stick neither of which work giving a message that no OS can be found, although both show up as being bootable in the partition manager

 

I give up.
gonna borrow an external dvd writer tomorrow....

Will it duel boot with Fedora 10?

 

I just did it using a 4 gb sandisk cruzer micro.
1- download .iso file for WIn7
2-download 7-zip
3- copy contents of .iso onto ntfs formatted usb drive
4- boot from it

And that was it. Now I had already created a new partition using gparted.

 

This always works for me on a 4GB USB drive.
1. Run CMD.EXE and type the following. Note: This set of commands assumes that the USB flash drive is addressed as "disk 1". you should double check that by doing a list of the disks (type "list disk") before cleaning it. If you have multiple hard drives, like an SDFlash drive or a Multibay drive, you could end up wiping your second drive using this command.

1. diskpart
2. select disk 1
3. clean
4. create partition primary
5. select partition 1
6. active
7. format fs=fat32
8. assign
9. exit
2. Copy Windows Vista's DVD ROM content to the Flash Drive
Simply issue the following command to start copying all the content from the Windows Vista DVD to your newly formatted high speed flash drive.
o xcopy d:\*.* /s/e/f e:\

 

There is a much simpler way to get Win7 to boot from a 4GB (or greater) USB drive without the use of the terminal (scary prospect for some).

1) Plug in your USB drive.
2) Right-click the drive in My Computer
3) Format the drive as FAT32 with "default allocation size". Check "Quick Format" if you don't feel like waiting for the low-level format method.
4) Mount the Windows 7 ISO using DaemonTools (or some other virtual drive emulator)
5) Open the CD/DVD, copy all of the files and folders to your formatted USB drive.
6) Leave it plugged in and restart your computer.
7) Press "F12" before or during POST.

From here you should be brought to the "Boot Devices Selection Menu". Highlight your USB drive and press Enter.

If you get any errors during install, reformat the drive and copy the files again. If it still errors during install, download a new ISO as your current one is most likely corrupt.

If you do not see your USB drive, then it is likely that your motherboard and/or BIOS does not support booting from a USB device.