This is a task that can come in quite handy in numerous situations, especially as more and more client & server machines go virtual and the OS itself needs to be installed on hardware that doesn’t have a DVD drive. Hopefully this will prevent some of you from having to spend hours trying to figure out why it’s ‘so hard to make a bootable USB drive’ when burning an ISO image to DVD is so easy. Two kinds of Bootable USBsBootable USB without OS so you can put any files on it - whether those files boot or not is entirely up to what you’re doing…you’re on your own here. An example of using this method is with custom Windows Deployments where custom ISO images or boot folders are created. These must be deployed via USB using this option, NOT the second one mentioned below
Bootable USB with an OS so you can just install the OS image from boot. This option requires a Windows Installation source, so you can’t use this for custom OS images, non-Windows or other bootable purposes
Bootable USB without OS Insert your USB (4GB+ preferable) stick to the system and backup all the data from the USB as we are going to format the USB to make it as bootable.
Open elevated Command Prompt. To do this, type in CMD in Start menu search field and hit Ctrl + Shift + Enter. Alternatively, navigate to Start > All programs >Accessories > right click on Command Prompt and select run as administrator.
When the Command Prompt opens, enter the following command:
DISKPART and hit enter.
LIST DISK and hit enter.Once you enter the LIST DISK command, it will show the disk number of your USB drive. In the below image my USB drive disk no is Disk 1. In this step you need to enter all the below commands one by one and hit enter. As these commands are self explanatory, you can easily guess what these commands do.
SELECT DISK 1 (Replace DISK 1 with your disk number)
CLEAN
CREATE PARTITION PRIMARY
SELECT PARTITION 1
ACTIVE
FORMAT FS=NTFS (Format process may take few seconds)
ASSIGN
EXITRead more: shadowbox | 2010 wave for developers
Bootable USB with an OS so you can just install the OS image from boot. This option requires a Windows Installation source, so you can’t use this for custom OS images, non-Windows or other bootable purposes
Bootable USB without OS Insert your USB (4GB+ preferable) stick to the system and backup all the data from the USB as we are going to format the USB to make it as bootable.
Open elevated Command Prompt. To do this, type in CMD in Start menu search field and hit Ctrl + Shift + Enter. Alternatively, navigate to Start > All programs >Accessories > right click on Command Prompt and select run as administrator.
When the Command Prompt opens, enter the following command:
DISKPART and hit enter.
LIST DISK and hit enter.Once you enter the LIST DISK command, it will show the disk number of your USB drive. In the below image my USB drive disk no is Disk 1. In this step you need to enter all the below commands one by one and hit enter. As these commands are self explanatory, you can easily guess what these commands do.
SELECT DISK 1 (Replace DISK 1 with your disk number)
CLEAN
CREATE PARTITION PRIMARY
SELECT PARTITION 1
ACTIVE
FORMAT FS=NTFS (Format process may take few seconds)
ASSIGN
EXITRead more: shadowbox | 2010 wave for developers