How to Create a Bootable USB Flash drive in Windows,Linux using CMD.docx
- 1. How to Create a Bootable USB Flash drive in Windows/Linux using CMD? Steps to Create a Bootable Windows/Linux USB Using CMD There are a total of 12 steps to Create a Bootable USB Flash drive, follow these steps:- Step 1: Run the Command Prompt in Administrator mode. There are two ways to do the same: Search for CMD in the Start menu, right-click on the command prompt, and click on Run as Administrator.
- 2. Or Open Task Manager, go to File -> Run new task, search for CMD and press enter.
- 3. Step 2: Connect the USB Device to the computer that is to be made bootable. Step 3: Type the command diskpart and then press Enter.
- 4. Step 4: Type the command list disk to display a list of all the available storage devices on your system. Press Enter to continue.
- 5. Step 5: Select the disk that is your pen drive. To choose the disk, type the command select disk X in this case, select disk 1 and press Enter. Note: Generally, it is marked as Disk 1, it might vary from system to system. Make sure not to select any other available disk as it will get formatted.
- 6. Step 6: To make a pendrive bootable, there is a need to format it to clean the existing data. This can be done by the use of clean commands.
- 7. Step 7: Type the command create partition primary and press Enter. This will make the disk primary and ready to be made bootable.
- 8. Step 8: To choose the partition created as primary, type the command select partition 1, and press Enter.
- 9. Step 9: Before making the disk bootable, you need to format it as NTFS if you are using legacy BIOS. This can be done with the use of a command format fs=ntfs quick and press Enter. Note: If you are using Unified Extensible Firmware Interface or in simple words UEFI BIOS then you must type in the following command instead. Most modern systems are UEFI systems, you can check your system manufacturer’s website to know whether your system is legacy BIOS or UEFI BIOS. format fs=fat32 quick Or format fs=ntfs quick
- 10. Step 10: Type the command active and press Enter. This will mark the primary bootable partition as Active.
- 11. Step 11: Type the command exit to exit DISKPART and press Enter. Now close the command prompt window. Step 12: Creating Boot Sector Let us assume that the flash / USB drive is the D: drive and the Windows installer folder located on drive F :. The first step, we will navigate Command Prompt to set installation Windows installer folder as its active directory. 1. By default, Command Prompt's active directory for Administrator permission is on C: WindowsSystem32>. We will navigate Command Prompt to set on Windows installer folder (F:) as its active directory. Just type 'f:' then hit Enter, and the active directory changed to F:. 2. Type 'cd Windows installer folder/boot' and hit Enter. Active directory changed to F: Windows installer folder/boot>. 3. Type 'bootsect /nt60 d:' and hit Enter. Creating boot sector on D: drive (USB flash drive). 4. Type 'exit' and hit Enter to close the Command Prompt. Until this step we have made a bootable USB drive sucessfully, and the flash drive is ready to be used as a boot media.
- 12. Step 13: Copying Installation Files To install Windows from a bootable USB drive, we just need to copy the whole installation files contained on the Windows installer folder to flash drive. To do this, open the Command Prompt as in previous steps. Once it opens, type 'xcopy f: *. * d: / E / H / F' and then press Enter. Wait until all the files in the Windows installer folder copied to the flash drive. Now bootable USB drive is ready to be used for installing Windows from flash drive and you're done ! Or Open Windows installer folder select all files in this folder and copy and paste in yours pen drive. Now bootable USB drive is ready to be used for installing Windows from flash drive and you're done ! Step 14: Now copy all the data from the OS(Windows/Linux/etc.) installation disk to your USB drive that is just been made bootable.