Windows 7 bootable USB flash drive from installation disk. Instructions for creating a bootable USB flash drive on Windows
Today, more and more laptop and PC manufacturers refuse to integrate an optical drive into their devices. This can be explained by the fact that CD and DVD media have lost their relevance. They have been replaced by smaller media such as memory cards and USB flash drives. Moreover, in slim body It is simply impossible to integrate a drive into an ultrabook. This trend has led to some inconveniences, for example, when installing an operating system. Creation bootable flash drive Windows 7 becomes simply necessary.
How to create a bootable USB flash drive
What is needed:
- Flash drive
- UltraISO program
- DVD image with Operating System
The storage capacity must be at least 4 gigabytes. This is how much a standard one weighs copy of Windows 7. Larger storage capacity can be used.
If you have everything you need, we proceed to the actual creation.
First, insert the flash drive into any free USB port. Make sure there is nothing on it that you need, as all information will be erased from it.
If you are recording an image from a laptop, check the battery charge and, if necessary, connect to a charger.
If the computer turns off during recording, there is a high probability that the flash drive will turn into a useless piece of plastic.
Step by step instructions:
1. Launch the UltraISO program. This must be done as a computer administrator, otherwise the program will not be able to start the recording process. Click the right button. mouse on the program shortcut and select “run as administrator”.
2. After the program starts, open your ISO image file in it. In the left top corner program, click on the file->open button or press the CTRL+O button combination.
3. Select the file with the Windows 7 image in the window that opens and click “open”.
4. The selected disk image will open in the program and you will be able to see all the files that it consists of.
5. Then, go to top menu programs to the “Boot” item. In the drop-down list of actions, click “Burn Hard Disk Image”.
6. Another window will pop up where you will need to select recording options. First you need to specify which device the image will be written to. Opposite the “Disc Drive” option in the drop-down menu, select the flash drive that you prepared.
7. Opposite the “Recording method” parameter, select the “USB-HDD+” mode. Next to “Hide boot partition” put “no”. After this, you can safely press the “Record” button. The remaining parameters do not need to be touched.
8. After this, the process of writing the selected image to removable media. This usually takes 10 to 15 minutes.
You can check the status of the process by looking at the event log at the top of the window and at the progress bar. Above it will be indicated the percentage of the recording completed, as well as how much time has passed and remains.
Do not close the program or turn off the computer during this time. If this happens, you risk ruining the flash drive.
9. Once the recording is complete, you will see a message in the event log stating that everything is ready and the recording was successful.
From a USB drive, installing Windows 7 is faster than from regular disk. This is because USB 2.0 speeds are much faster than an optical drive.
10. The creation of a bootable USB flash drive has come to an end. All that remains is to check its functionality.
To do this, insert it into the USB port of the computer or laptop on which the installation will take place. Turn it on and go to BIOS. To do this, hold down the DEL or F2 key. After the transition, check your download priorities. In loading priority (First Boot Device) should be your flash drive. Save the settings by pressing the F10 key and restart the computer. If the installation process starts, it means you did everything correctly.
When purchasing licensed software, the buyer receives it on a DVD. Therefore, to install it on a PC that does not have an optical drive, you need to create a bootable flash drive. Our step by step instructions will help you with this.
This installation method is suitable if you own a netbook or your CD/DVD drive has failed and you need to install Windows 7. This method is also good because the process Windows installations 7 from a flash card is several times faster than from a CD or DVD disc A.
Before you start Windows entries 7 to a flash drive, copy all important data from the flash drive to other storage media ( hard drive where Windows will not be installed, another flash card, disk, etc.), since during the process of formatting and writing the Windows 7 image to a flash drive, all data on it will be destroyed.
First way
If you are creating a bootable USB flash drive while in the Windows 7 operating system, then you will need a program Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool, which can be downloaded from Of. Microsoft website following the link.
If you are creating a bootable USB flash drive under the Windows XP operating system, you will need to install Microsoft.NET Framework 2.0 And Microsoft Image Mastering API 2.0. Of course, if you already have them installed (usually the first program), then you do not need to install them again.
1) Insert the USB flash drive into the laptop.
2) Launch the program. Click the button Browse.
3) Select ISO Windows image 7 and press the button Open.
4) After you have specified the Windows 7 ISO image, click the button Next.
5) Click the button USB device .
6) Your flash drive should appear in this window. Click the button Begin copying
7) Click on the button Erase USB Device
8) Click Yes.
9) The process of writing the Windows 7 image to the USB flash drive will begin
10) When recording is complete, the status will change to Backup completed. Close the program
Second way
For the second method you will need a program Ultra ISO.
1) Insert the USB flash drive into the laptop.
2) Launch the program. In Windows 7 and Windows Vista It is recommended to run the program as an administrator.
The UltraISO program is paid, but you can use a trial period, we will consider this option. Click the "Trial period..." button
3) Select a menu item File ->Open...
4) Select the Windows 7 ISO image and click the button Open.
6) In the field Recording method: select USB-HDD. Click the button Format.
7) The formatting utility will launch. Click the button Begin.
8) Click OK.
9) After formatting, a success window will appear. Click OK.
10) Close the program.
11) Press the button Write down.
12) Click Yes.
13) The process of writing the Windows 7 image to the USB flash drive will begin.
14) Upon completion of recording in the column Event The message “Recording complete!” will appear. Close the program.
Third way
For the third method, we need the WinSetupFromUSB 1.0 Beta 7 - program.
Note: the link has a newer version, but the principle remains the same.
1) Insert the USB flash drive into the laptop.
2) Launch the program. On Windows 7 and Windows Vista program must be run as administrator.
In the field USB disk selection and format your flash drive should be listed.
Note: If the flash drive is not detected, then format it using the PeToUSB or HPUSBFW utility.
Also, the flash drive may not be detected if it is inserted into the laptop after the Winsetupfromusb 1.0 Beta7 program has been launched and for it to be detected, just press the button Refresh.
3) Click the button RMPrepUSB.
4) Mark the following lines: WinPEv2/WinPEv3/Vista/Win7 bootable (CC4), NTFS. Place a check mark next to it Boot as HDD (C: 2PTNS). Click the button 6 Prepare Drive.
5) Click the button OK.
6) Click the button OK.
7) After this, something like this will appear Dos window.
Warning: Do not close this window. It should close automatically.
8) After Dos the window will close click the button Exit.
9) Check the box next to it Vista/7/Server 2008 - Setup/PE/RecoveryISO. Click on the square on the right.
10) A window will appear Browse folders in which you need to choose virtual drive in which the ISO image of Windows 7 is mounted.
After you have done this, press the button OK.
11) Press the button GO. The process of writing Windows 7 to the USB flash drive will begin.
12) At the end of recording, a small window will appear. Click OK.
13) Close the program.
Fourth method
The installation method is quite simple, so anyone can do it! For this we need:
1) Windows 7 image
2) Flash drive with a capacity of at least 4GB
3) A program for creating and editing ISO images, ultraISO from the above method or free MagicDisk
You can take any media from a regular flash drive to an SD card, but not less than 4GB!
4) Launch the command line (in Windows XP this is standard->command line. In Windows Vista/Windows 7, open start, at the very bottom there is a search, enter cmd and open with administrator rights).
5) Next in command line enter diskpart, the disk management utility will open.
6) Next, in the diskpart utility itself, enter: list disk, this will display all physical disks PC, namely disks and not partitions.
Among them we are looking for our flash drive.
7) Then we execute the command select disk #, Where # This is the number of our flash drive.
IN in this case The flash drive on the screen is number 1, therefore s elect disk 1. All further manipulations will be carried out only with this disk.
8) Execute the command clean, clean the drive, then the command create partition primary- create a new partition on the disk.
9) After creating a new section, write select partition 1, select this section for manipulation, enter active, thereby making the section active.
10) Now for the flash drive to be visible in bios, you need to format it in NTFS format, which we do with the command format fs=NTFS.
11) Next, you need to activate the process of connecting the device and assigning letters to it, we do this with the command assign.
That's it, the preparation process is complete.
Installing Windows 7
You can record the distribution using any file manager or a free one.
In this case, you need to somehow open the image installation disk with the OS, you can do this with any disk emulator, Alcohol or MagicDisk, create an image and copy everything from it with a file manager to our prepared flash drive.
Everything, the creation process installation flash drive completed, now we try to install the OS by first setting it in bios.
Well, that’s all, which of the four methods of creating a bootable flash drive to use is up to you.
Inclusion in BIOS boot from a flash drive
Before you start installing Windows 7 from a flash drive, you need to go into the BIOS and enable booting from the flash drive.
To enter the BIOS you need to press a certain key when the computer boots. On desktop computers This is the Del key. On laptops, the F2 key is most often used.
Usually, when you turn on the laptop, a screen appears on which at the very bottom there is a line that says which key you need to press in order to enter the BIOS.
If you do not have such a line, then you need to look at the information on how to enter the BIOS User Manual walking with a laptop.
1) Insert the flash drive into the laptop if it is not inserted.
2) Turn on the laptop, if it is on, then reboot.
3) Go to BIOS.
Using an example, the whole process will look as shown below; if your BIOS is different, then the principle will remain the same. If you have questions, write in the comments.
4) Go to the tab Boot. In it, in boot order, you need to put our flash drive in first place, using the arrow keys and keys F5 And F6. That is, we use the arrow keys to select our flash drive, and use the key F6 we take her to the very top.
To find out which keys you need to use to set the boot order, see the tips on the right.
The name of the flash drive should appear in the line USB HDD.
Also, the flash drive may appear in the line USB KEY.
To save changes and exit the BIOS, press the key F10. (Depending on manufacturer BIOS key may be different. See tips on the right or below).
5) A window will appear asking in English whether to Save changes and Exit? Choose Yes.
6) After this, a reboot will occur and the Windows 7 installation process will begin.
Installing Windows 7 from a USB flash drive
If a bootable USB flash drive with Windows 7 was created using programs WinSetupFromUSB 1.0 Beta 7, it will appear first green screen. Select Start Vista/Win7/Server 2008 Setup or PE/Recovery ISO from partition 0.
Next, the Windows 7 setup program will launch.
Write in the comments what is not clear and what questions you have.
How to create a bootable USB flash drive with Windows to install the operating system from a flash drive? Create bootable USB flash drive with the Windows operating system you can use various programs specifically designed for this purpose.
Now you will learn how to create a bootable USB flash drive to install the Windows operating system using the free Windows programs 7 USB/DVD Download Tools.
As the name of the program suggests, it is intended for recording on external USB drive or DVD disk of the Windows 7 operating system. This program also allows you to create a bootable USB flash drive with the Windows 8 operating system.
Why might you need such a bootable flash drive? Most netbooks and some laptops do not have an optical DVD drive. If there is no DVD drive, these devices have a pre-installed operating system Windows system.
In case you need to reinstall operating system, or install a different edition of the operating system, netbook users will have to buy a rather expensive external DVD drive. Using a Windows disc, you can do this if the operating system for some reason does not boot on the computer.
The way out of this situation is to install the operating system from an external USB drive.
In this way you can install the operating system on regular computer. You can create a bootable USB flash drive with Windows 7, or a bootable USB flash drive with Windows 8.
Installing an operating system from a flash drive is no different from normal installation Windows operating system from an optical DVD disc.
Storage advantage boot image operating system is that the external USB drive takes up little space, is it more mobile? and is also resistant to mechanical damage.
If you simply copy files with the Windows operating system to an external drive, you will not be able to create a bootable USB flash drive this way. To create a bootable USB flash drive, you must use a special program.
To create boot disk with the Windows 7 operating system will be used without paid program Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tools, manufactured by Microsoft Corporation.
Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tools works on English, but it is easy to use and will be understandable to every user.
Owners of netbooks that do not have an optical DVD drive will need to copy the ISO image with the operating system to the hard drive of their netbook in order to be able to write this image to a flash drive.
To avoid any problems in the future, it is better to use the original image of the Windows 7 operating system or the image of the Windows 8 operating system to install it on your computer. You can activate the operating system after installation on your computer.
download windows 7 usb dvd download tools
After downloading the program to your computer, run its installation. The program installation wizard works in English, but this will not cause any difficulties during the installation of Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tools.
Bootable USB flash drive in Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tools
After installing the Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tools program on your computer, you will need to launch the program from the program shortcut on the Desktop or from the Start menu. Before starting the program, you need to insert the USB flash drive into the USB connector of your computer.
The flash drive will be formatted using Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tools. Before formatting, in order not to lose the files on the USB drive, they will need to be moved to another location, otherwise they will be lost after the formatting process is completed.
The entire process of recording an operating system image occurs in several stages and takes four steps.
In the first step, you need to click on the “Browse” button. In the Explorer window that opens, you must specify the path to the ISO image with the Windows 7 or Windows 8 operating system.
In this example, I have selected a disk with an image of the Windows 7 SP1 Maximum 32-bit operating system, which is located on the external hard drive “K:”. After selecting the operating system image, you must click on the “Next” button.
In the second step, you need to select an external USB drive. The program can transfer installation files operating system and DVD. In this case, when choosing an optical DVD drive, the program will write the operating system image to a DVD disc.
After selecting the USB drive, click on the “USB device” button.
In the third step, the program detects the connected external USB drive. If several are connected external drives, then select from them the one on which you will record the operating system image. After this, you will need to click on the “Begin copying” button.
Now the fourth step of the program begins. Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tools formats the USB drive and then writes an image of the Windows 7 operating system.
The operating system image recording time depends on the power of your computer.
The Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tools window appears with a message indicating that the process of recording the operating system image has completed. A bootable USB flash drive with an image of the Windows operating system has been created.
In this case, recording an image of the Windows 7 SP1 Maximum 32-bit operating system took me 12 minutes with the antivirus turned on.
Now you need to exit the program and then open the USB drive. After opening the flash drive, you will see the recorded files of the Windows 7 operating system on your removable drive.
To install the Windows 7 operating system, or the Windows 8 operating system, you need to insert a flash drive into the USB connector of your computer.
After this, you should turn on the computer. At the very beginning of the boot, you will need to enter the “BIOS” (by pressing the “Delete” key on the keyboard or another one, which is indicated at the bottom of the monitor screen when you start the logo of your computer’s motherboard). In the BIOS settings you will need to set the boot priority from a USB drive.
After this, the process of installing the Windows operating system on the computer begins. The process of installing the operating system is exactly the same as from an optical DVD.
Conclusions of the article
Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tools allows you to quickly and easily create a bootable USB flash drive for the Windows operating system.
Creating a bootable USB flash drive in Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tools (video)
I will show you 4 ways to help you make a bootable USB flash drive. This is usually needed to install Windows or for a program if it runs before the system boots.
There are many programs to solve this problem, but sometimes you can get by using the system. I will provide instructions that will help you make a bootable USB flash drive from any Windows version or program. 4 methods, 2 universal and 2 for specific OS.
But before that you need to prepare. You will need:
- Flash drive with a capacity of 4 GB or more.
- Image ( iso) operating system or program for which a bootable USB flash drive will be created.
Before creating a bootable USB flash drive, be sure to format it to avoid errors.
Bootable USB flash drive in Windows OS
You can do without third party programs and do everything in Windows. To do this you will have to use a number of commands. I will demonstrate only the most necessary ones.
First clear your device of all files. To do this, go to the execution line ( Win+R) from the Start menu >> Run, and then enter the command diskpart as in the image below.
In the window that appears, enter list disk to see all devices for further work with them.
In my example, there were 2 devices:
- 0 - hard drive.
- 1 - flash drive.
Distinguish a flash drive from hard drives very simple in size. Select it with the command select disk 1.
Be careful, there may be another number instead of 1.
After this, you need to create a primary partition. To do this, enter create partition primary.
Select a section by entering select partition 1 and activate it with the command active.
Then set the letter to the carrier ( automatically) by entering assign and finish the job Exit.
Now be sure to download the files to the USB flash drive unpacked. If you just copy the iso file, nothing will work.
If you don’t understand something, you can watch a video on how to do it using a real example.
Bootable USB flash drive for Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool
Download and install the USB/DVD Download Tool. It is made specifically to work with Windows files 7 and absolutely free. Most likely it won't work with others. Total 4 simple steps to create.
Please note that if you use an image not from the official Microsoft website, problems or errors may occur.
Specify the path to iso file y and go to the next step.
Then select “USB device” for a flash drive or “DVD” for a disk.
Select a flash drive and start copying. It must have at least 4 GB of free space.
Then wait until it is written to the device and you will receive a ready-made bootable USB flash drive.
The instructions are also available in video format.
Bootable USB flash drive for all images in UltraIso
This is a paid program with a free one. trial period. Download it from the official website and install. It is multifunctional and in Russian. Suitable for Windows XP, Vista, 7, 8 and 10.
You can watch an example of installing Windows XP in the video. With other versions of systems, everything is done similarly.
Once launched, select a trial period.
Then open the image in the program.
Now in the “Bootboot” tab, select the image entry as shown in the example below.
Settings are made here.
- Disk drive- flash drive.
- Image file— here check whether the path is specified correctly.
- Recording method- be sure to use USB-HDD+. Otherwise, in some cases it will not work.
After checking all the settings, start recording.
Wait for it to finish. Time to finish is shown on the right.
Under no circumstances remove the flash drive until the process is completed.
If completed successfully, you will see a completion message. After this, the bootable USB flash drive will be ready. Just close the window and enjoy.
Additional method for Windows XP
Download free utility DirectGrub and unpack the archive. No installation required. Select the iso file, flash drive and click “Start” as in the image below.
Wait while the files are copied. After successful completion, a window will appear.
I hope you don’t have any questions and everything turned out well.
What did you use to create a bootable USB flash drive?
A bootable Windows USB flash drive is very easy to make. This article will describe three simple quick ways creating a bootable USB flash drive from a ready-made ISO image. All methods are free and popular, although among them there are simpler and more complex options, using different software. Also, all utilities work fully in Windows XP.
If you have a new laptop or computer with BIOS UEFI, and whose hard drive uses the GPT table layout style, then you can also install on such a computer Windows 7 using a different algorithm. Also, if the device, computer, laptop, netbook, etc. has a USB 2.0 port and USB 3, and you decide to install from a bootable USB flash drive to such Windows device 7, then undoubtedly you should connect the flash drive to USB 2.0 port because Windows 7 itself does not support the USB 3 port type, which are usually marked in blue.
If the bootable USB flash drive is connected via USB port 3, then the attempt to install Windows 7 will end with the following error:
"Not found required driver floppy drive optical disks. If you have a flash drive, floppy disk, DVD or CD with such a driver, please insert this media."
Creating a bootable USB flash drive
Now the first thing you definitely need is ISO image operating system. Secondly, this is the need to take care of the flash drive itself. Since this media will be formatted, the data from the flash drive must be moved to a safe, secure place. It is also important to note that the size of the flash drive must be strictly at least 4 gigabytes.It is imperative to check and make sure that a specific motherboard definitely supports loading such a plan (from a flash device).
- Creating a bootable USB flash drive using means (recommended last, since it is not a very effective method);
- Created by ;
- Utility;
Creating a bootable USB flash drive using UNetBootin
You need to download the program and run it (the program is portable and works without installation).
You need to check the box called ISO image, and then select the letter of the USB drive.
The location of a specific image must be specified manually.
Next, click open.
Now just click OK.
There is a short process of copying system files to the flash drive.
After a short extraction necessary files our bootable flash drive is completely ready.
Creating a bootable USB flash drive using UltraISO
A little difficult decision in contrast to the above is the use of the program Ultra ISO. However, you can quickly understand the program by following the instructions. The functionality of the program is written in understandable Russian, and the trial period under the license is completely functional and suitable for our purposes.
Next, you need to select the Russian language and download the program, which is very simple. Run as administrator, then select a trial period of use.
In front of us is a regular program window.
The next step is to find our ISO image on your hard drive, which contains the operating system. It is worth recalling that such an image can be created by any other program, and then specified here. In the main UltraISO window, you need to right-click on the file, and in the menu that opens, select the open option.
Next, we indicate our image with the system, in our case it is a Windows 8.1 image, which is located in the installation folder. Find the image in your place and click open.
You can also now place a flash drive in the slot of a netbook or laptop. You must select the Boot menu in the main window of our program and click on record image hard drive. The inserted flash drive should be present in this window.
Next, click record.
A prompt will appear indicating that your flash drive will be erased, we agree.
Next, we wait for the recording process to finish.
Now you can carry our operating system in your pocket.