Can I Use A USB Drive For Installing A OS ?
Jul 8, 2009
I'd like to get something that I can use without needing to burn DVD's anymore for installing operating systems..
I'm wondering if this will work for doing a clean install of Windows 7 during boot?
Newegg.com - Patriot Xporter XT Boost 4GB Flash Drive (USB2.0 Portable) Model PEF4GUSB - USB Flash Drives
I know you can boot from a CD, but not sure if you can boot using this?
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May 1, 2012
I've just finished building my new computer and I'm getting BSOD errors when first formatting a hard drive and secondly (after a successful format) installing a game on it.My boot up SSD drive seems to be fine, it's just my other hard drive.64bit Windows 7 Home premium. Full version I bought a a few days ago. The whole computer is new. If you need any further information, let me no.8GB RAM. Intel Core i5 2500k CPU. Radeon 7850 graphics. 120ish SSD. 1Tb hard drive. Asus P8Z68-V Pro gen3 motherboard.Edit:having just seen a notice, I've updated the post to contain two attachments. Or atleast I think I have
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Sep 2, 2011
I just have a couple questions, I have a new computer i picked up and the drive is broken. I can pick one up but not till payday, my question is. Is it possible to create a large partition of space on HD and use an iso image on the main OS side mount it and install a clean copy on clean space and then delete the main OS? Also another way, if i was to put the iso on an 8G sdcard, could i use the built in card readers to read the image and install from there?
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Jul 2, 2012
I deleted the post because i realized thaT I had an older post here that came close to the same subject and no one replied - so i have no reason to believe anyone would reply to this one.
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Dec 9, 2011
Any good guide or book I can read for SSD's. I wanna learn which one to choose, how to install. Wanna use it as a primary drive for the OS, and have a secondary drive. How to setup my OS and computer to do that.
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Sep 21, 2009
Alright, so after a few days of hardware checking I've determined that the cause of my computer being as messed up as it is is the hard drive.
Seagate's own SeaTools says it failed the drive tests, and I'm gonna have to call them later and get an RMA on it.
Well, how would I go about installing Windows 7 on my replacement hard drive? I've installed and activated it a few times on this same drive, but I think that's because the activation system detects the exact same hardware, therefore it lets me keep activating it.
If I put in a different hard drive, though, won't it see it as a different computer and deny me the chance to activate it? (Same goes with my OEM Student version of Office 2007)
So what would you guys suggest? Can I de-activate it from one computer then activate it on another? or what?
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Mar 1, 2011
I have installed a few drives in my time. But something I do not understand has happened in drive manager in Win 7.Obviously I have to initialise a new drive before I can format and partition it, but when I go to initialise another box comes up and identifies the new drive and asks to I want to partition it with MFT tables?? Not seen that before I obviously dont want to move any boot partitions from my C drive.I have drive C with hidden boot partition, main active system partition and a data partition (logical).The new drive will be E, is 1TB and I want to partition into 4 logical drives. I know how to do it, query is what is the box that comes up and asks whether I want MFT or another version?? Is it safe to say OK.
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Feb 8, 2011
I have a laptop with a broken LCD. I can hook it up to a monitor to use, but the monitor doesn't work until Windows starts. I am trying to install XP onto the hard drive from my Windows 7 computer but am getting the "blocked due to compatibility issues" message. Is it possible to do it?
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Jun 17, 2011
I have a netbook. It came with Windows 7 starter I have a seperate copy of Windows 7 home premium (on dvd) that i purchased. There's no dvd/cd drive on netbook and I will not be purchasing one for it. (defeats the portability of netbook!). So, is there anyway (and if so how) to install or create a boot usb_key or external hard drive from the Windows 7 home premium dvd so that I can then install win7home premium onto the netbook from the usb_key and/or external hard drive?
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Aug 10, 2009
I have pre-purchased a Windows 7 professional upgrade and am trying to determine my install options when it is available.
I am currently running Windows Xp pro and have a computer with 2 identical hard drives. I know I will have to do a clean install from Xp. I would like to install Windows 7 on the second hard drive and be able to use both Windows 7 and Xp until I am familiar enough with Windows 7 to confidently abandon Xp.
I have a hard drive switch that I will use to boot to the OS that I want to use. I elected to do this instead of using dual boot. Currently that switch is not installed.
I would like to install Windows 7 on the second hard drive, but am concerned that I will need to verify that I have an authentic copy of Xp for that to work.
Will there be options during the install so that I can select the second drive as the place to install Windows 7 (and make it a bootable drive)? I would not like to get into a situation where I would be overwriting Windows Xp on the drive I currently boot from.
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Sep 22, 2009
I want to have a Windows 7 installation that can be booted from a hard disk in a USB caddy or a USB flash drive / SHDC card. So I am installing to a USB connected drive.
I have created a bootable USB flash drive with the Windows 7 install DVD contents on it, so I am in a position to install to the Netbook hosting the USB hard disk. I have also (for reference) created a VHD on a different Windows 7 machine and set it up to boot from that, on the internal HDD.
The Windows 7 installer will not install directly to a partition on my external HDD, because it is connected by USB or Firewire (err message "Windows cannot be installed to this disk"). I can't "just ignore" the warning, as suggested by some, as the Next button is inoperative.
If I create a virtual hard disk (VHD) on a partition on the external HDD I am again warned by the Installer that it can't be installed to the VHD as the "computer's hardware may not support booting to this disk". If I ignore the warning and press Next (only works for the VHD option) I am told "Setup was unable to create a new system partition....See the setup log files for more information"
I can at that stage use the Installer tools to Format the VHD etc.
So I'm stuck - where do I find the installer log files and how can I move forward to get a bootable installation on a USB connected drive ?
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Sep 27, 2009
Can I do that? I have windows XP right now and i was thinking about buying another hard drive, making it a slave, and installing windows 7 on the slave drive so that i can keep XP on the master drive and have a dual boot setup. Is there any problems i would encounter or does it sound ok?
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Oct 26, 2009
im having problems installing from my flash drive, everything seems to work fine up untill the point where windows gathers the information. It tells me "A required CD/DVD drive device driver is missing. If you have a driver floppy disk, CD, DVD or USB flash drive, please insert now."
and i have no idea how to get past this.
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Dec 21, 2009
So I been trying to follow this guide, but it hasn't been working. I set the computer to boot from usb and then it will just sit there. I tried with an empty flash drive and it would say no bootable table or something similar, so it does detect my hard drive having something bootable and fails.
So far, despite following the directions, when I try to boot from the external hard drive it just hangs there and the screen never opens (unless I need to really wait a really long time).
It seems the missing detail is likely that I have to make the hard drive bootable.
However, so far, all the guides that talks about making them bootable requires to clean the drive (well flash, but I guess hard drives requires that too). That defeats one of the biggest selling points in this guide, no need to delete any files (also to note, I seperated the hard drive into two partitions as directed, the cmd only see them as one). So how does one make it bootable without clearing all the files.
Update: How to make your external HD bootable It seems that it should work for that person, I don't understand what is my problem. When I try to boot from USB, it just hangs there and the Windows7 setup never appears.
Another thing to note that this laptop is a dell 1520 which is powerful enough for the 64-bit, though currently I think it is on 32-bit vista.
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Nov 17, 2011
i want to format by laptop (Acer Aspire One )which doesn't contain dvd rom so, i want to format with pendrive but i dont know how to make my pendrive bootable?
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Jan 6, 2010
after i install windows seven my CD drive doesn't appear,what should i do?
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Jul 23, 2012
installing windows 7 to a usb drive?
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Dec 8, 2012
(I also posted this in the New Build section, not knowing exactly where I should do it)Finished a new build about a week ago and all was well.
ASRock z77 Extreme4
Chronos SSD
Today when I power up I get a message something like No Boot Drive.After several tries and getting the same message I reseat the connectors to the drive. Same error.I remove the HD from the old system and connect it to the same cables as the SSD was connected to.System boots ok.I remove the old HD.Install a new HD, same cables thinking I'm going to install Win 7.Boot with the Win 7 CD.Can not find the new HD just two others that are attached for data and backup.Now put both the old and new HD on the new system and boot with the old HD. Fiddle with Disk Management, it recognizes the New HD. Set up a partition on it, showing as Primary.Back to the Win 7 CD, select the New HD partition but get the following error message Setup was unable to create a new system partition or locate an existing syetem partition. See the Setup log files for more information.Have no clue about how to see the log info since I'm running Win install.I've been back and forth between the Old HD fiddling with Disk Management on the New HD then back to the Win install. I wouldn't even want to guess how many times I've been through this, also reading MS notes on installing new HDs on Windows.
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Jun 23, 2009
I'm trying to install from a sata dvd drive onto an ide hard disc. I have the raid drivers for my board, x64 vista drivers to be exact.
During the install sequence I obviously get to the bit that asks me to insert a driver disc for the dvd drive. Currently the drivers are on a floppy, so insert the floppy disc and browse to the drivers. windows 7 then starts to load the drivers them fails with a message stating it can't find find drivers for this drive.
Has anyone else tried installing from a sata drive, and if so how did you get on?
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Jan 3, 2013
I have an extra TB of disk space that is unused and would like to install Windows 7 on my computer without deleting the XP system I use. I want to do this as a test of how many programs will I have to re-install and do drivers exist for printers etc. Two questions: 1) how do I establish the new partition that I will need and 2) How will I boot the computer to either operating system?
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Sep 10, 2011
I have a Lenovo Thinkpad T410. Win7 came pre-installed on hard drive without DVD copies. I want to put in a new solid state hard drive. Is there a way to create a Windows installation disc so I can format and install Win7 on the new hard drive? I know there's a copy of Win7 on a partition on the hard drive but I don't know what to do to make a DVD.
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Mar 28, 2012
I recently built myself a new system from scratch, and plan to install Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit onto it using an OEM copy I purchased from retail. I had planned to save money on my new machine by not installing an optical drive, since I have no need for one. My original intent was to take the optical drive out of my old machine and use it just to install Windows, but in short-sightedness didn't realize my old optical drive is not compatible with my new motherboard. After a bit of research, I have found a number of websites detailing methods of installing Windows 7 using a USB Flashdrive. I have an 8GB Flashdrive so I had hoped to work-around my problem through this method, but ran into a new problem. All of the guides require that the data be copied from the disk to the flashdrive using Windows 7/Vista, and on my old machine I am using Windows XP (which from my limited understanding, doesn't play friendly with USB drives). I found a couple of other articles detailing a more complicated method that works with XP, BUT doesn't work for me, because my copy of XP is 32-bit and the copy of Windows 7 I want to use is 64-bit.
I don't know anyone with a copy of Vista/7 64-bit already to use or with a compatible optical drive to borrow, and I really hope to avoid buying an optical drive just to install Windows.
Does anyone know of a method that I can get the information I need to install Windows 7 64-bit onto a USB Flashdrive using Windows XP 32-bit? Or any other way to get my DVD of Windows 7 installed onto my DVD drive-less computer?
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Apr 28, 2011
i know i know... there's tons of threads about making flash drive bootable, put windows 7 onto flash drive and even has a post said ... installing windows 7 onto drive ... but no answer...i have bootable windows cd a laptop with bootable usb port capability... i am NOT trying to make a bootable windows 7 flash drive...i am trying to install windows 7 onto this removeable drive so if my hdd really dies, i can just use this flash drive as a hdd to continue do what i am doing light weight computer tasks
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Jul 2, 2011
I have Windows 7 originally installed on an old HDD and recently purchased an SSD.How do I go about installing windows 7 into the SSD and deleting it from the old HDD?Is a reformat of the HDD the only way?
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Dec 3, 2011
In my 8 years of serious computing, I have never had to replace a HDD but I am going to have to do it for the first time sometime earlier next week when the new one along with the recovery media from Acer gets here.I have managed to locate a service manual for my Acer Notebook model series here.The new HDD is a WD500BPKT @ 7200RPM The old HDD is a WD3200BEVT-22ZCT0 @ 5400RPM Will I need to install new drivers (SCSI etc.) or anything else, or is it a simple plug-and-play operation once the recovery media is booted off of the disks and installed?I suspect I will need to change the BIOS Boot Order so that the opticle drive is first rather than IDE 0 to get the disks to come up, so that's a non-issue.
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Feb 26, 2012
So I am building my first computer so i bought my new motherboard, processor,etc.. and windows 7, but i am using an old hard drive from my broken computer that has windows xp on it. Before it all gets to my house i was curious on how to wipe the hard drive and install windows 7.
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Apr 20, 2012
Would it be possible to install Windows 7 x64 Ultimate onto my 32GB USB Flash Drive as a portable OS on the go? I'm not talking about creating a Windows 7 Installation USB Flash Drive as an alternative to a DVD Installation, I'm talking about being able to have Windows 7 x64 Ultimate OS on a USB drive.
I'm asking because I need to be able to have another Windows OS on a separate drive in order for me to be able to Secure Erase my OCZ RevoDrive PCI-E SSD using OCZ Toolbox.
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Oct 27, 2012
i had used windows xp, i updated to windows 7, 2 days ago. i cant find my d: drive now. i searched in diskmgmt. it's not showing my drive. my 48 gb drive is missing....
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May 7, 2009
I have a quad core i720 intel processor and the asus p6t deluxe V2 motherboard and a basic 512 video card. I installed Vista 64 bit first - took about 50 minutes. Then installed Windows 7 RC1 on a second hard drive (dual boot) and it installed in 20 minutes.
It couldnt find the divers for chipset but shortly after it said I didnt have them installed (they werent available on the mb setup disk nor on Asus website) and it asked if I wanted them installed and windows installed the drivers. Much more intuitive.
Also I looked at the processes running on initial startup - I had perhaps 8 on windows 7 and perhaps 25-30 on vista. That alone made me a believer.
Now it wont run all of the software i would like to run (some antivirus and antispyware - spydoctor - zonealarm etc) but that was the same thing initially for vista. Oh superatispyware ran from the get go on vista and does on windows 7. I cant figure out why other antispyware and antivirus companies hem themselves and make a product that is so OS version specific.
Overall I am impressed with windows 7 - far less processes running in the background.
The beta of win 7 crashed when I tried to join my domain. Had to reinstall then I left well enough alone. The RC1 joined domain without a hitch. Less trouble than either XP or Vista.
Runs my business programs just fine. been testing those for a month.
Also pleased with the try before you buy concept. I can use the win 7 setup thhrough may 31 2010.
Would like to see the price of the OS come down a bit. Close to $300 is a little steep to convert more of my machines to win 7. I am running a laptop with vista, 2 desktops with vista. and three desktops with XP.
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Sep 23, 2012
Instead of installing programs on the main OS Drive and installing on a secondary drive or partition, I should still be able to run the programs if I decide to format the OS drive and reinstall Windows. If so, the problem I'm seeing is that Windows won't know those programs are installed (like using the search bar to find programs or the program list) since whatever registry entries the program installer made will be wiped. Is there an easy way to back it up?Or is it advisable to just reinstall everything when I reformat?
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Jul 30, 2010
I have a laptop with Vista and I bought a dvd of Windows 7 Full version that I want to install on this laptop. I want to remove Vista. Do I have to format the c drive before installing Windows 7 or will this be done during the installation process?
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