Preparing a Bootable USB (Windows 7)

Most of us have USB Flash drives. Making a USB Flash drive bootable and using it to install your OS is a very viable way of going about things. We can say good bye to CD/DVD scratch issue and making us helpless at times.

In this blog, I shall show you how to install Windows XP, Windows Vista and Windows 7 using a USB Flash drive.

The hardware required for this is: a USB Flash drive (at least 4 GB as many of the Versions span around 2.0 - 4.0 GB), and a Netbook/Desktop.

Formatting the USB drive

If you are running Windows Vista or Windows 7, open command prompt by running the command "cmd". “Right click” on “cmd” icon and click “Run as Administrator”

  

Type following commands one by on
"diskpart"   -- will open the native Win application for Disk Partition 

"list disk”   -- will list all the disks 

“select disk 3”   -- here 3 is the number corresponding to the USB disk, so you
                               can replace it with what is shown in your system

“clean"

“create partition primary"

“active"

“format fs=fat32 quick"

“assign" 

     Making the drive ready to boot and install Windows Vista/ Windows 7

          Have Win 7 DVD : 
                Insert in the DVD Drive .
     
     Have a Win 7 ISO Image:
                You might need a Disk Cloning Software to mount the ISO image. 

                     There are a lot of utilities available on internet.I used Virtual CloneDrive
                 from "Slysoft" availabe @ http://www.slysoft.com/en/download.html.

               Mounting an ISO Image
                ·      Right click on WIN 7 ISO Image and click “Mount”

                     ·        Mounted ISO image will be seen as Disk Drive in “My  Computer”

Type the following commands
"K:"         -- Assuming the DVD/Mounted drive is K

“Cd boot"

“Bootsect /nt60 I:"    --  “I” is the driver letter of your USB Disk

       

     

     Now your USB Flash Driver is ready to boot. Just simply copy all the files from the Mounted CD/DVD to the USB Flash drive and you are ready to install WIN7 from USB.

For Installallation :

To install Windows Vista/ Windows 7 on your Netbook, you must set the Netbook to boot through the USB Flash drive. To achieve this, go to the BIOS and make USB HDD (or USB ZIP) as primary boot device. Start the Netbook, press a key to boot through the USB drive, and install Windows as usual. Remember to reset the boot sequence to boot from the internal hard drive when the system restarts the first time during the installation.