USB Windows 7 Installation Key Drive - Create

PundaSmith · Apr 26, 2009

Nope, I used method 2 (manual) and still got the same error. I changed formatted the drive as NFTS and that didn't help either.

The same error:

File: \Boot\Bcd
Status: 0xc000000e
Info: An error occurred while attempting to read the boot configuration data

I don't really want to give up -- I am checking the error number in google to see if anything comes up, but I would appreciate any thoughts on this

rgds, Punda

Brink · Apr 26, 2009

Punda,

Double check to make sure that you have the USB drive listed first in the boot order in the BIOS. See WARNING box at the top of the tutorial for more on this.

Is this the only partition on the USB key?

If you unplug the USB key and plug it back in, does AutoPlay have the option to run the setup.exe file?

PundaSmith · Apr 26, 2009

I think the issue is related to my bios.

I plugged the same USB drive into another laptop around, and it booted fine.

So, it must be my system-specific -- as evidenced by a lot of posts on "boot/bcd errors" in google.

Now, I have to figure out what to do. I think it is possible to edit the bcd.exe file, but I am not sure...

if you have any ideas, please let me know.

rgds, Punda

Brink · Apr 26, 2009

What brand and model is your motherboard? Perhaps someone with the same one or similar may know a specific setting in the BIOS for your motherboard that you will need to have set for this.

PundaSmith · Apr 26, 2009

It is an Asus system with an Asus Motherboard: Further details are below:

BIOS Type: AMI
BIOS Date: February 8th 2006
BIOS ID: 63-0801-000010-00101111-020806-I915M-A0120000
BIOS OEM: BIOS Date: 02/08/06 14:05:10 Ver: 08.00.10 - 0801
Chipset: Intel 2590 rev 4
SuperIO: Unknown
Manufacturer: ASUSTeK Computer INC.
Motherboard: W3A

Hope this helps --

Punda

Night Hawk · Apr 26, 2009

You shouldn't have to even go into the bius there to boot from the flash drive. Simply pressing the F8 button right when you first the drives being listed on the first post screen at startup will bring up a boot device menu for choosing floppy, which hard drive or usb flash drive listed by make and model, optical drives.

The Fat volume automatically made on the first attempt as well as reformat to NTFS for the second later both saw working installs. The two file systems worked since you always see the same thing at first being the setup files being copied to the hard drive, intended partition where Windows will be installed.

Here the 7 installer started while being booted in 7 to see one installation go right on without even booting off of the flash drive itself. The installer will see that the system restarted on it's own once all files are copied over.

mukul · Jun 7, 2009

Will I lose my usb pen drive or after installation i can reformat and reuse it as a normal usb flash drive?

Brink · Jun 7, 2009

Hello Mukul,

Sure you can format it afterwards and use it as any other flash drive afterwards.

Shawn

Night Hawk · Jun 8, 2009

Some of the more expensive models even have an onboard data backup program that comes to live when simply pressing a button. Once pressed you browse for the files and folders you want backed up.

As far as being reusable after any reformat you know who to ask about some of the reformats on the ones used here!

Right Shawn!

mukul · Jun 8, 2009

Brink said:
Hello Mukul,

Sure you can format it afterwards and use it as any other flash drive afterwards.

Shawn

Thanks for the info.
I finally gave it a go. Did a clean install of Win7 using USB. Took 25 mins including creating the usb boot disk. But I must admit there's a huge diff in boot up time. Win7 boots really fast. In a flash.

Brink · Jun 8, 2009

You're welcome Mukul.

It's a lot better now. I really do like W7.

Night Hawk · Jun 8, 2009

I keep a usb key for both of the RCs even if only to repair any start up problem that most likely won't but could come up. A small usb key can also replace the need to burn a recovery disk completely even while 7 now has that option included.

nab · Jul 14, 2009

when making the usb and transferring the windows 7 32 bit or 64 bit does it matter if i am using vista 32 bit or 64 bit?

Brink · Jul 14, 2009

Nello Nab,

If you're using METHOD ONE, then it will not matter. If you are using METHOD TWO, then it will matter as per the red warning box.

Hope this helps,
Shawn

HKLM · Jul 21, 2009

Hi Brink--

I want to complement you and Shawn and the rest. These forums do a great job and the tutorials are excellent and extremely well formated and designed. I referred to many of them for Vista Help and linked to them profusely.

I wonder if you can clear up a little bit of confusion for me. A few hours ago I wanted to help a friend out who did not have a working optical drive and had XP installed on his five year old laptop. I should have come here perhaps, but I read through a number of guides on installing Win 7 via USB stick.

I only had an 8 GB LG USB stick to use. I couldn't compare others, because people have suggested to me that the necessity of running that bootsect switch depends on what USB stick you use. What I found was, I had to eliminate the bootsect command simply because it would not run for me on an XP box or on a Win 7 box when I was making my USB stick which worked fine without it.

I understand that the bootsect command switch according to
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc749177(WS.10).aspx and a number of other resources is to
Apply the master boot code that is compatible with BOOTMGR to SYS, ALL, or <DriveLetter>. The operating system installed on SYS, ALL, or <DriveLetter> must be Windows Vista.

I've seen it used on forums when people overwrite their MBR often when installing an older OS last instead of first for example, when trying to dual boot Vista and XP. I first ran across it when Vista's Beta testing was revving up, and some of the setup team for Vista was quick to offer it for people who had overwritten their MBRs in attempting dual boots (because they installed the newest OS prior to the old one and had to fix the MBR--and a few months later Neosmart and other websites came out with methods to fix this as well.

But while it seems to be recommended in many of the instructions on thumb booting Win 7, it doesn't seem to be needed at all, and I couldn't make it run on a Win 7 or XP box. I just wanted to comment/bounce off you an experience I had .

wanted to help my friend install Win 7 RC1 on his older laptop whose optical drive was brokena before MSFT makes it unvailable August 1. I decided to do it with a thumb drive and it was easy. However, in checking out several of the many links, they all had a step that I could never make happen, and I noticed a lot of people couldn't either. I tested this command on XP boxes and Win 7 boxes. I didn't have a Vista box to test them on any more, but some of the threads I've read said the command would run on a Win 7 box.d

The command is bootsect /nt60 g: where g would be the target drive that is the thumb drive letter (of course it would be whatever letter the thumb drive assumes. The instructions all call this command the command that "codes" the USB drive. I have no idea explicitly what they mean by "coding" the USB drive. I just know I couldn't/didn't run the command but it doesn't stop my thumb drive from installing Win 7 on a box (either upgrading or custom (formatting the drive with a previous or no OS on it).

Another part of most instructions that I found unnecessary was running the diskpart and list disk commands to find out what number the usb drive is. You could get the same information by simply going to diskmgmt.msc and seeing what number it's assigned, but I fail to see the point since you don't need the number assigned to the USB drive for anything.

I wondered if you knew the rationale for these.

I did follow the part of the directions in the link you offered that changed the USB drive from Fat 32 to NTFS. I didn't know why that was necessary, since I've never needed to change a USB drive to transfer files before, but simply since Windows has gone NTFS from XP on, I decided to go on and do that.

What worked fine for me then was:

1) Extract the files from an .iso or a magic iso file via Win Rar. Right clicking the file and selecting "Extract here" gets the job done.
2) Convert the thumb drive from Fat32 to NTFS.
3) Format the drive simply by right clicking it from Disk Management reached by typing diskmgmt.msc into the run box or Search box or typing Disk Management into the Search box.
4) Select all the extracted files and folders (3 folders and five files for a total of 8) and right click copy them to the USB drive.
5) Insert USB drive into target computer and click setup and Win 7 setup will run.

Thanks,

HKLM

Brink · Jul 21, 2009

Hello HKLM, and welcome to Seven Forums.

I'm happy to hear that you got it to work for you.

I didn't include the BOOTSECT command in the manual part of this tutorial since it is not needed when the ISO or installation DVD contains the boot files. When the USB key is marked active with the boot files, then it should become a bootable USB key afterwards.

The main point of using the DISKPART command was mostly for steps 7 to 10 in the manual section of this tutorial to wipe the USB clean and prepare it to be bootable, then copy over the Windows 7 installation files afterwards. Using LIST DISK was used since we were already in DISKPART to help verify the drive volume number.

Hope this helps with some of it,
Shawn

Night Hawk · Jul 21, 2009

One thing I noticed right off using the UltraISO tool there is the format option included. When going to reuse a flash drive on different occasions that can be a time saver since you are already running that for seeing the iso written anyways.

HKLM · Jul 21, 2009

Shawn --

It does help. One thing that kept puzzling me is that I just could not run the bootsect command, but now I think I have a clue as to why. After reading over several sets of directions, including yours it seems that in order to run the bootsect command you have to actually put a DVD in a drive and change directories to the DVD drive after that where bootsect lives. In other words, correct me if I'm wrong, you can't just throw up a command prompt without a DVD actually in the DVD drive and run a bootsect command can you?

For example with the DVD in drive (say) d you would typed:
cd d:\boot

then bootsect /nt60 g: if the USB drive were g:

HKLM

Brink · Jul 21, 2009

HKLM,

The BOOTSECT command for this would work like step 19 in METHOD TWO of the Vista USB tutorial. It's not needed though when using a Windows 7 installation DVD though.

HKLM · Jul 21, 2009

Thanks Shawn.

Have you seen these instructions floating around to also make the USB stick act as a live CD for Win 7?

How To Install & Carry Windows 7 On Your USB Flash Drive

How To Install & Carry Windows 7 On Your USB Flash Drive - Windows Help Forum

I haven't tried it yet but I'm tempted.

Also I've had a lot of trouble signing in. I've signed up 3 times but I never get the email to activate, and my password for the first time I signed up in April doesn't seem to work. Appreciate any help you can give me to reinstate my original password.

Thanks,

HKLM

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