Windows 10 on a USB stick

[whs]

Thanks, I'll have a look at it.

 

[JRockZ]

WHS, I finally got around to this, I used your ImageX.exe as I couldn't find or figure out how to remove the Imagex.exe file from the iso for waik and I didn't have a cd or usb drive to actually install it. I seem to be having some luck,,, iam able to boot from the USB and see the windows ten splash and spinning (loading) dots but it just hangs there I waited almost an hour and no boot. I came back to w7 and scanned the thumbdrive and couldn't find the boot folder so I re-did bcdboot L:\windows /s L: and now I see the boot folder again,,,,, then tried again, same thing and again when back in win7 boot folder is missing unless I tick unhide system files in folder options then I see it.
Your tutorial says "

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The first thing you will have to do is the Windows 10 normal installation." So does this mean start the install from within my win7 install?? that seems my only option so far but I don't want to accidentally install ten over my win7 os that I currently use.
Any ideas what I maybe doing wrong? I also noticed after your tutorial there are a few files such as "set up.exe,bootmgr.efi,Autorun.inif" not included on my thumb drive.
Thanks again for your help and great tutorial everything went as you said, took 5+hrs to create the usb drive but that's probably because my drive is slow but is the fastest I have.
J

 

[cmmtch]

WHS, I finally got around to this, I seem to be having some luck,,, iam able to boot from the USB and see the windows ten splash and spinning (loading) dots but it just hangs there.

The first thing you will have to do is the Windows 10 normal installation." So does this mean start the install from within my win7 install?? that seems my only option so far but I don't want to accidentally install ten over my win7 os that I currently use.
Any ideas what I maybe doing wrong?

Thanks again for your help and great tutorial everything went as you said, took 5+hrs to create the usb drive but that's probably because my drive is slow but is the fastest I have.
J

JRockZ, I am having the exact same issue when booting my laptop from the USB. Since the USB already has Windows 10 on it from the BD ROM drive I wasn't sure about installing it. I thought maybe after boot up from the USB then you would install it on the USB even though you've put everything on it already from the Windows 10 iso that was downloaded.

So far a pretty cool project, thanks whs Like JRock I'm concerned about installing it over my existing Win7 install. I have backups so no problems there but it'd be a PIA to have to reimage either the desktop or laptop. From my experience my problems are caused by something I'm doing or failed to do

 

[JRockZ]

JRockZ, I am having the exact same issue when booting my laptop from the USB. Since the USB already has Windows 10 on it from the BD ROM drive I wasn't sure about installing it. I thought maybe after boot up from the USB then you would install it on the USB even though you've put everything on it already from the Windows 10 iso that was downloaded.

So far a pretty cool project, thanks whs Like JRock I'm concerned about installing it over my existing Win7 install. I have backups so no problems there but it'd be a PIA to have to reimage either the desktop or laptop. From my experience my problems are caused by something I'm doing or failed to do

Im also thinking maybe it is something I did or didn't do,,, when I mount the iso in the BDrom I can get it to start the install in my win7 environment but im not sure if that's what whs means to do or not,,,, Maybe because im using WindowsTechnicalPreview-x64-EN-US.iso and not the enterprise version? and also it could be my USB drive,,, though brand new 32gb patriot slate I bought it on a whim (12bucks)then read reviews on it and that even though usb3.0 its still only giving usb2 speeds or slower, horrible reviews. Also could have something to do with my bios being set to fast boot, UEFi setting/s maybe or something else.
After reading WHS post on win ten forums he is getting a 8 or 10 sec boot from the usb in 3.0 I think he said, so I guess I screwed up. Will await the almighty whs's replies and see what he says.

 

[whs]

So does this mean start the install from within my win7 install?? that seems my only option so far but I don't want to accidentally install ten over my win7 os that I currently use.

Of course you have to install it but from the stick and on the stick. How else will it run.

 

[JRockZ]

So does this mean start the install from within my win7 install?? that seems my only option so far but I don't want to accidentally install ten over my win7 os that I currently use.

Of course you have to install it but from the stick and on the stick. How else will it run.

Ok well like Steve said I was just afraid it may overwrite/dual boot my system which I don't want, I just want to be able to run 10 from the usb standalone... but like steve, I created an image yesterday I can always revert back to if I have to just would be a pita that's all.

 

[cmmtch]

I can't find the "setup" installer to start the installation from the stick on the stick, it is there in the BD ROM but I can't seem to locate the installer to start the process on my USB stick. Snip of BD ROM below:



The USB stick doesn't show the setup, pardon my ignorance but please tell me how to start the install from the stick. Snip of USB stick below:

 

[JRockZ]

I can't find the "setup" installer to start the installation from the stick on the stick, it is there in the BD ROM but I can't seem to locate the installer to start the process on my USB stick. Snip of BD ROM below:

View attachment 345279

The USB stick doesn't show the setup, pardon my ignorance but please tell me how to start the install from the stick. Snip of USB stick below:

View attachment 345280

You have to boot from the USB drive is my guess but like I said with mine it just sits there on the windows splash screen with spinning dots and nothing ever happens,,, I let it go about 60 mins and got nothing, no change and no way out had to just hard power down and restart my PC.
Obviously it can be done IF WHS got it working and possibly others,, it maybe the imagex.exe possibly but im pretty sure that was just for creating the image that is on the USB drive, I didn't have any issues with that. Im just going to split up a portable drive I have and install right to it and use that I guess,,, again I just didn't want to dual boot or mix win ten with 7 at all I wanted it completely stand alone,, no big deal though.

 

[whs]

JRock is right. You have to boot with (from) the stick.

 

[AddRAM]

I think he`s still trying to create the stick.

 

[JRockZ]

AddRam as far as I know I completed the tutorial and finished the stick,, I followed all steps and the last thing I did to the usb stick was

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bcdboot F:\windows /s F:

 

[AddRAM]

I`m talking about cmmtch

 

[cmmtch]

I've created a second USB flash drive stick following the tutorial exactly, used the amd64 imagex.exe from the WAIK tools. This stick is a 64G USB3 PNY brand, the image.exe transfer took 61 minutes, the other stick I used yesterday took 207 minutes. Also HD Tune shows 0.8 seconds access time so this stick should be good to go for this project.

The computer booted from the USB/Removable Device and gave the same results as before, Windows 10 logo splash screen and the small spinning dots below that. Waited and waited with nothing more happening (20+ minutes) This doesn't appear to be an install screen, it looks like a boot screen to me. What exactly is happening when that first "boot" screen appears, is it actually installing on the USB stick and I should leave it alone?

Looks like there is something still missing or not being called on the stick that will start the install, it appears to be trying to boot but there's nothing beyond that. I'm trying something else and will post results if any to report.

 

[cmmtch]

What I tried was putting one of the files from the WAIK tools folder where the imagex.exe was. There are several other things in the folder besides the imagex.exe. I tried copying a "WimMountInstall" and putting it in the Windows folder on the USB stick, no luck.

Heck maybe the entire amd64 folder should have been included in the image transfer to the USB stick to start the install. Seems like there is something missing between the boot file and the OS image, looks like the boot is starting from the USB but nothing happens. Maybe I need to wait longer, when I click on "Safely Remove Hardware and Eject Media" I get the message that it's in use, close all files then try again. There isn't anything on the stick I can see that is in use. This is after I've hit reset to get out of the endless boot screen and reboot back into Win7.

Should the boot screen move along into an install screen, and how long would that take? This is an image of an OS, in the past when I've reimaged my desktop there wasn't an "install" screen, it just installed the image without much user input once the back up image was chosen.

Can somebody point me in the right direction, the tutorial was great, step by step that worked until the point of installing Windows 10 TP on the stick. That's where I'm stuck.

 

[whs]

It looks like you have no boot files. Did you run this command.

bcdboot F:\windows /s F:

If yes, is your partition on the stick an active primary NTFS partition.

I made 2 sticks and one SSD and they all work perfectly. Once you have the imagex.exe on your desktop and the .iso in the virtual CD or a real DVD, then you really need to run only the 2 commands.

 

[JRockZ]

It looks like you have no boot files. Did you run this command.

bcdboot F:\windows /s F:

If yes, is your partition on the stick an active primary NTFS partition.

I made 2 sticks and one SSD and they all work perfectly. Once you have the imagex.exe on your desktop and the .iso in the virtual CD or a real DVD, then you really need to run only the 2 commands.

For Mine I verified yes and yes! Seems after command prompt runs

bcdboot F:\windows /s F:

The boot folder is there but is a hidden folder I went to my folder views and ticked do not show hidden files and folders,, when I did that and then ticked it back to show them the boot folder was gone completely so its not staying for some reason.

EDIT but if I uncheck hide protected operating system files it is still there,, im guessing maybe because I need to "take ownership" maybe? would that even matter??

 

[whs]

Playing around with the files is not going to solve the problem. Can you post a picture of your disk management with the stick plugged in. I want to check something.

 

[JRockZ]

Playing around with the files is not going to solve the problem. Can you post a picture of your disk management with the stick plugged in. I want to check something.

Almost scared to do that,,, lol its messy!
But here ya go.
Volume N: is my usb 32gb

 

[cmmtch]

Disk management screen shot. I did do the boot file command again, this time when booting from the USB in my laptop (Dell Latitude E6400, refurbished) I got a Windows 10 screen saying previous installs had failed, it was titled "Recovery Tools" and gave me startup options like safe mode, boot logging, etc... That was something I hadn't seen before. I wanted to post the disk management before trying again in my desktop. Could be the boot file is/was corrupt causing my problem. This is the first time I've gotten anything but the logo with spinning dots below it.

 

[whs]

Both sticks look OK as far as Disk Management goes.