I downloaded and installed Windows 7 USB DVD Download Tool. It asks me for ISO file. What is the main point of this tool ? Thanks in advanced
Really? When (at which step) is it supposed to be doing that? Just wondering, because i could load altered 7 images (ei.cfg removed) and even Vista images just fine, and i got all the way to the last step where all that was left to do was to click 'Do It'...
I do a lot of installs & have found that it's often NOT faster than throwing in a dvd. I don't know why. I'm thinking that maybe some motherboards are booting the keys as usb 1.x & not usb 2.0... I've multiple brand keys - they all do this...
I can make a flash based install medium for 7 or vista with less steps than it takes to download and run this thing. 1. Format drive in fat32, (it should work with ntfs, but safe than sorry) 2. Use 7zip or winrar to extract iso to root of flashdrive. 3. Open cmd with admin privileges and run the following. bootsect /NT60 Driveletter /force 4. ??? 5. Profit???
The MS tool is completely useless when used with an altered .iso file. No 3rd party tools of any sort are needed to make Win7 install from flash media. Simply do the following. 1. Open Drive Management and format your flashdrive in NTFS. 2. Make sure the partition is set as Active (should be by default). 3. Open an elevated cmd prompt in the \boot folder of your share. 4. Type: bootsect.exe /NT60 H: (where H: is the drive letter of your flashdrive, this step makes it bootable). 5. copy the entire contents of your share to your flashdrive. Someone above said to format as FAT32. If you do that, it won't work. Also you don't need the /force switch with the bootsect command. I've used this method multiple times and it works. It's also much faster than using DiskPart as some methods describe and the end result is the exact same.
have you every installed win7 on a netbook with a dvd? i bet its faster and cheaper to install with a usb if you use a netbook. but thats just my opinion
I am burning a 3.6 GB all in one ISO to the memory stick right now. It does work and the tool is not completely useless for altered ISO's. It will also work for the technet MSDN iso or ISO's with the ei.cfg removed. I have not tested it with any ISO's containing loaders or third party stuff on them (because I don't have them) but it does most definitely work with altered ISO's. I wish people would try to verify their assertions before posting them. If you know it won't work with an ISO because you personally tried it then share the information but don't speak in absolutes if you don't have the facts.
My iso is the Technet/MSDN Ultimate x64 iso from which I've removed ei.cfg and added AutoUnattend.xml. There are no loaders or any other software of any sort added. .iso is then made with the following command string: oscdimg -n -m -lGRMCULXFREO_EN_DVD -b"etfsboot.com" d:\temp d:\Win7.iso The resulting iso file works just fine when burned or used in a VM, but it's rejected by the MS tool every time. At any rate, I install it from usb anyway using the manual method I posted above and that works every time. My assertion, as you put it, has been verified by myself several times, as well as by others on this board and other places. So it works fine for you, great. So instead of claiming everyone else doesn't know WTF they are doing, how about you school us in your mystic ways.
I have booted and installed off many flavors of usb sticks. From an hp branded POS, to my current 16gb patriot drive that is one of the fastest I have used. And even the slowest stick was a hell of a lot faster than booting off a dvd. If your having a slower experience than a dvd, maybe its time to trash the MBs involved...
I said use force because sometimes windows keeps a piece of the drive active even if you think its not, that will force it take it offline to write the new bootsector... Maybe its just me, but I prefer my way, its faster for me to just format the drive in CMD or via explorer and drag drop/or run xcopy. No need to bring disk management into it for people just beginning to get into this... I must be sleepy or something... NTFS is the way to go...
This is good to know. Hasn't happened to me yet though. Maybe it has something to do with particular brands of flash drives or the flash chips used in them?
No clue, although I have a feeling it has something to do with the usb drivers. Its not something I can replicate with any regularity. You can run the bootsect cmd without /force, and if it kicks back an error, add it and it will work...