BOOTSECT.EXE /NT52 H:
Having a bootable USB is very essential, especially if you are a Netbook user. Using bootable USB to install an operating system (OS) not only makes the installation faster, but also saves a DVD. Creating or using an USB drive to install Windows operating systems is very easy if you follow the below mentioned steps.
If you are planning to use bootable USB to install Windows 7 or Vista please refer our guides: Install Windows 7/Vista using bootable USB guide And also, you can refer install Windows 7 on Acer Aspire One guide Coming back to bootable USB guide, here we assume that you are using either Vista or Windows 7 to create a bootable USB. 1. Insert your USB (4GB+ preferable) stick to the system and backup all the data from the USB as we are going to format the USB to make it as bootable. 2. Open elevated Command Prompt. To do this, type in CMD in Start menu search field and hit Ctrl + Shift + Enter. Alternatively, navigate to Start > All programs >Accessories > right click on Command Prompt and select run as administrator. 3. When the Command Prompt opens, enter the following command: DISKPART and hit enter. LIST DISK and hit enter. Once you enter the LIST DISK command, it will show the disk number of your USB drive. In the below image my USB drive disk no is Disk 1.
4. In this step you need to enter all the below commands one by one and hit enter. As these commands are self explanatory, you can easily guess what these commands do. SELECT DISK 1 (Replace DISK 1 with your disk number) CLEAN CREATE PARTITION PRIMARY SELECT PARTITION 1 ACTIVE FORMAT FS=NTFS (Format process may take few seconds) ASSIGN EXIT
Don’t close the command prompt as we need to execute one more command at the next step. Just minimize it. 5. Insert your Windows DVD in the optical drive and note down the drive letter of the optical drive and USB media. Here I use “D” as my optical (DVD) drive letter and “H” as my USB drive letter. 6. Go back to command prompt and execute the following commands: D:CD BOOT and hit enter. Where “D” is your DVD drive letter. CD BOOT and hit enter to see the below message. BOOTSECT.EXE/NT60 H: (Where “H” is your USB drive letter)
7. Copy Windows DVD contents to USB. You are done with your bootable USB. You can now use this bootable USB as bootable DVD on any computer that comes with USB boot feature (most of the current motherboards support this feature). Note that this bootable USB guide will not work if you are trying to make a bootable USB on XP computer.
This tutorial will help you in creating a bootable USB drive of Windows Vista which you can use to install Vista in any system. It might become very useful when you don't have access to DVD drive. 1. First format your USB drive in NTFS file system. You can do it by attaching your USB drive to your system and then format it from My Computer window.
2. Now open Command Prompt window from Start menu. Right-click on Command Prompt entry in start menu and select "Run as administrator" option. 3. Now type diskpart in Command Prompt window and press Enter. It'll launch DiskPart program:
4. Now provide following command: list volume It'll show a list of all drives in your system. Look for your USB drive entry. As in the below screenshot, the USB drive is "G" which you can determine from its "Type" entry. Now you have to select the USB drive volume by providing select volume no. command. Since in our case volume no. of USB drive is "Volume 4", the command would be: select volume 4 Now we have to make this drive active. So provide active command: active Now exit from DiskPart using exit command.
5. Now we need to create Boot sector on USB drive. We'll use "bootsect.exe" utility for this task. You can find this utility in Windows Vista setup disk. It'll be present in "Boot" directory. Now provide following command in Command Prompt: bootsect /nt60 G: Here G is drive letter of USB drive. Replace it with the correct drive letter if your system has some other letter for USB drive.
6. At last, copy all files/folders from Vista Setup DVD to your USB drive and you have done. Now you can boot using your USB drive and can install Windows Vista in any system.
Q: How do I format a USB Flash Drive to NTFS file system?
A: To enable NTFS on your USB Flash Drive drive (USB Flash Memory): 1. Right click My Computer and select Manage. 2. Open the Device Manager and find your USB drive under the Disk Drives heading.
3. Right click the drive and select Properties. 4. Choose Policies tab and select the "Optimize for performance" option.
5. Click OK. 6. Open My Computer. 7. Select Format on the flash drive.
8. Choose NTFS in the File System dropdown box. 9. Device Formatting is completed.
Important: To remove a device safely without data loss use a "safely remove hardware" procedure or Eject function from Windows Explorer.