Discussion on:

Illustrated walk-through: Creating a bootable USB flash drive for Windows XP

How many people actually have a Windows CD? New computers have not come with a Windows CD since the late 1990's. I'm waiting for a utility that will take the necessary files from an existing installation of Windows and put them on a USB device.

I too, would like to see this.

Download the HP mass formatter tool. It can make a boot partition on any USB drive using FAT 32 or NTFS.

I Googled "HP Mass Formatter" and found zilch. Where can I find the tool?

Not sure which tool he's talking about, but I found this one which seems to do the same thing:
http://h18000.www1.hp.com/support/files/serveroptions/us/download/20306.html

Thanks, will give it a try!

Sorry, it is more properly call the HP USB disk storage tool. Here is a link to a German web site that post it.
http://www.pctipp.ch/downloads/dl/32594.asp
I believe that I got my download off Tech Republic.

WinFuture XP-Iso-Builder is a tool for creating bootable CD that are updated and configured the way you want. It has a feature of creating a standard CD from the custom CD that ship with the systems or from the directory on the drive. It might be limited to the hardware it came with, I'm not sure.

http://winfuture.de/xpisobuilder3_en

This site typicaly teases you with links. You select the download you are looking for only to be directed to another page with a zillion more links then you have to find the link you originally wanted then you click it and then you go to another page with the same sh_t over again..I was disquisted with the whole process and left the site...waste of time.

If the Windows CD didn't come with the system but a recovery CD did, then the install files are already on the HD (somewhere).

PEBuilder can find them for you if use the Source-->Search Menu. But it may take awhile. (it may also be that you have to assign a drive letter to the partition where those files are)

Also, if it's an old machine (pre-SP1) they won't help you much. The source has to be SP1 or newer to build BartPE.

delete this comment, its a lag comment

The people who are willing to use their hours and that can actually understand this article will most likely have their own Windows CD. If you work with computers alot, it becomes a valueble tool.

And if you make/manage your own pc, you'll HAVE to have a copy. Like going into war without a weapon. Once a serious problem pops up.

Also MSNDC alliance offers XP for $15 a copy to students at most colleges, so if you have a kid in IT courses, ask him/her to talk to their IT instructor about it.

Hi every one: I think this article is very useful and will allow me to have a more managable recovery unit.

Thank you Greg for taking the time to share it with us.

This is the best article on booting XP from a flash drive I've seen, but what about booting Vista from a flash drive.

I haven't yet attempted to figure out how to get Vista to boot from a USB flash drive. When I do, I'll write an article on how it is done.

I'm paying attention to making a PE bootable for Vista when I have time, and hope to have it done within a month.

An important thing to download and then master is the WAIK ISO. Some of the 'advice' sites out there give directions in this regard that do not match the drive contents, so beware.

The best way to "boot" Vista is out the door!

...that so many of you have gotten this technique to work!

If you had success, can you post the brand name and size of UFD you used and the type and version of the BIOS on your computer?

I used to use a Win98 boot on my UFD, but since I couldn't see our NTFS drives, I jumpped on this. I use a Simpletech 1GB UFD and we have all Dell Optiplex and Latitude laptops. It's a slow boot process, but it does work. I've used PEbuilder fo a couple of years for bootable diag disks, but this can be a time saver.

I just created a drive using a generic Microcenter 2gb drive

http://www.freewebs.com/chinhan2k5/SRSP1.rar

and any one talk me why just simple create a dir with name srsp1, are there any logic relative here.

When I am done I have 4 files -- BartPE.iso, ntdetect.com, ntldr, and winnt.sif on the USB device. It then will not boot. I have tried this 3 times following the instructions exactly as the article says and I am getting the same results. SO -- what am I missing here?

I am having the same issue. I have read that the USB drives are a hit or miss. Some brands will work and some won't. Let me know if you hear otherwise.

Hi
I have exactly the same problem that BartPE creates an .iso file, and 3 other WinXP loader files. But I could not boot from it.
Were you able to fix this problem?
Thanks in advance.

Samir Desai
aerify7351@mypacks.net

I have tried a Transcend 2GB, a PNY 512 GB and a whatever 256MB. Upon trying to boot, I get a message that Boot Disk not found.

hi,
i have attempted 3 times by following the said instructions but get the same error message every time by booting from the UFD.

the error message is:
"File \i386\system32\ntoskrnl.exe could not be loaded. The error code is 4
Setup cannot continue. Press any key to exit"

btw i m using dell system. Kingston 512M UFD.

what can i do now?

It's not necessary to expand all of SP1. Simply open it with WinZip or WinRAR, select the two files, extract them to your SRSP1 (or wherever) and expand ramdisk.sys. Of course, if you have a server already running 2K3SP1, just copy the files from there...

Where is fancy bread in the heart or in the head?

I have trouble installing the Mcaffee virus scanner. It kept telling me that it can't find scan.exe when I tried enabling it on the plugins screen. I followed the instruction and it didn't tell me anything about this. Any extra info I should know?

seems like alot to go thru when you can get knoppix on to a CD and boots from the CD. I have used it several times to recover windows Pc and or user files if windows was to corrupted. http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=de&u=http://www.knoppix.org/&sa=X&oi=translate&resnum=1&ct=result&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dknoppix%26hl%3Den%26rlz%3D1T4GGLR_enUS241US242

So is there any way by which I can format my windows XP using flash drive???
I'm in desperate need plz tell me as soo as possible at rsa_y2j@yahoo.co.in
Thanx

In my case, I want a bootable Windows Server 2003 flash drive. I'm going to follow your steps and see if I can make it work. Has anyone tried this? Thanks

After creating a boot image on UFD and trying to boot the laptop using the UFD; system tries to create a ramdrive.
After creating a virtual drive, when attempting to load BartPE I am getting error; File \I386\system32\ntoskrnl.exe could not be loaded. Error code 14, setup cannot continue? Any guesses what could be wrong?

I just cannot get this thing to work. I've tried 3 or so UFD two system which both support UFD booting. The only thing is I am running windows Vista, but I don't think that should make a difference, or should it? I have 4 files on the UFD: bartpe.iso, ntdetect.com, nldr and winnt.sif. Any suggestions?

Elmidwill,

When I tried to boot from my Kingston 1GB DataTraveler, I would get the following error: "No Bootable Partition in Table". I had seen a reference to making your memstick bootable by using a utility at HP but that's no longer available. I found another thread that mentioned using a Dell utility. This is the way I got the problem fixed.

1 --- Google CW1310A0.EXE site:dell.com
(Current URL is ftp://ftp.dell.com://diags/CW1310A0.EXE )
2 --- Expand and run DDDP.EXE. Click on "Install to USB Flash Drive" button.
3 --- Remove flash drive and reboot.
4 --- Plug in flash drive. Run pe2usb -f {drive letter for flash drive}

Here's the URL that led me to the solution:
http://blogs.oreilly.com/digitalmedia/2004/10/utility-to-make-usb-flash-driv.html

Since the Jack said that the Dell utility doesn't work for everything. He also states that it works for Vista.

Cheers,
ED

Great article....
Well done!!

BillD, This article is all about creating an XP bootable. Would you explain why you are referencing files on Windows Server 2003?
Also, is this XP bootable good for only Professional, or will other versions work as well, given the caveats you've already mentioned.

I keep getting these errors when trying to re-install XP: Missing lass.exe, stop:0X00000007, FS_rec.sys-address, F978451 DAT 3b7d8361 dates stamp
Any suggestions? funtym2008@yahoo.com

Have a prebuilder 313 on a CD. Can I create the PE2USB folder from 313? I need it to make the USB drive.

INF-file txtsetup.sif is incorrect or missing. status: 18
help me

Expand the ramdisk.sy_ file to the SRSP1 folder with the command:

expand -r ramdisk.sy_ c:\pebuilder3110a\srsp1

iT GIVES ME THIS ERROR
WHY???

Can`t open input file: ramdisk.sy_

the command prompt confused me, possibly because i'm on vista. is their any chance you could link me to/make a guide for how to do this while on vista? i wanna get rid of vista soo bad.