The sata connection in my laptop is dead so I need to run windows from a USB removable disk. I've tried creating various windows to go configurations but so far only windows 8 works. Windows 7 just reboots before the login screen and windows 8.1 gets stuck too. Because I need to run off a USB with limited space I would like to use windows 7. Can anyone advise on what may be causing this? Thank you
must probably be the W7 iso which is wrong. Check the hash of the iso compare it to M$ one. What is your configuration (hardware.....manufacturer and so on)? give as more details as you can.
Thanks I'll look for a different one. I'm trying this on a Toshiba p750 laptop with i3/nvidia. Also tried it on an older AMD desktop with the same result. I tried downloading the official iso from ms but it didn't work with my license.
Hello @bertole - The USB port you are trying to boot from, is it USB 2.0 or USB 3.0? The reason I'm asking is that Windows 7 doesn't support USB 3.0. You'll have to add USB 3.0 drivers to the .iso image to make it work. EDIT: If you have any doubts about the integrity of .iso you're now using, you can download a clean .iso from here: https://forums.mydigitallife.net/th...has-to-offer-for-windows-7.50034/#post-835538
Sorry I should have said, I have usb 2 and 3 and I've tried it both ways. For the usb3 I used dsim to add the drivers.
OK. Stick with using a USB 2.0 port. Question: Did the machine originally come from the factory with Windows 7 installed? Or was Windows 8, 8.1, or 10 the original operating system? The reason I ask is that Windows 7 would be using MBR boot, and the rest would use UEFI boot. If your machine originally had Windows 8, 8.1, or 10 installed, did you try changing your BIOS boot settings before trying to install Windows 7? If not, go into your BIOS settings and set Legacy/CSM boot to "Enabled". Also, make sure that Secure Boot is set to "Disabled".
OK. The link I gave you in post #5 has valid images. I've download Windows 7 Starter, Home, and Pro from there and had no problems.
Hi John, I've tried again today using the official ISO, USB2 and rufus/windows to go. I tried three different USB drives on two computers and they still both just reboot after the windows logo. Do you think it may work if I copy the win7 install.wim into a windows 8 iso?