noob question: turn USB into boot device

Reaper 392 · 5 Mar 2011 at 21:23

really dumb question, but how do you turn a USB into a boot device?

i have all the windows 7 files on my laptop (downloaded from my university), and i am planning to just take everything off of my USB, format it, and put windows 7 on the USB, then install it on another PC

is there anything wrong with that, or do i need to do something else?

*edit*
added a little info. the way i said it before made it look like i was gonna use the USB to install to my laptop

paradisiac · 5 Mar 2011 at 21:24

you need to format the drive with a program to make it bootable. HP Drive Key Boot Utility is pretty good.
1. Install the HP USB Disk Storage Format Tool and run the program.
2. Select the Device and the File system from the drop down menus and click start.
3. Close the above program and install and run the HP Drive Key Boot Utility. Selecting the appropriate drive letter. Click Next.
4.Select the circle on the top that says create New or Replace Existing Configuration. Click Next.
5. Select the circle labeled Hard Drive. Click Next.
6. Select Create New Filesystem. Click Next.
7. Select the circle labeled HP Firmware Flash Package. Click Next.
Click Finish

then just copy over the files i believe, i used windows7todvd as this was easier as i had the iso already on my pc.

DragonQ · 5 Mar 2011 at 21:27

Try WinToFlash.

Reaper 392 · 5 Mar 2011 at 21:33

paradisiac said:
you need to format the drive with a program to make it bootable. HP Drive Key Boot Utility is pretty good.
1. Install the HP USB Disk Storage Format Tool and run the program.
2. Select the Device and the File system from the drop down menus and click start.
3. Close the above program and install and run the HP Drive Key Boot Utility. Selecting the appropriate drive letter. Click Next.
4.Select the circle on the top that says create New or Replace Existing Configuration. Click Next.
5. Select the circle labeled Hard Drive. Click Next.
6. Select Create New Filesystem. Click Next.
7. Select the circle labeled HP Firmware Flash Package. Click Next.
Click Finish

then just copy over the files i believe, i used windows7todvd as this was easier as i had the iso already on my pc.

it says it only works for HP USB drives

paradisiac · 5 Mar 2011 at 21:36

should work on everything

paradisiac · 5 Mar 2011 at 21:36

can you make an iso? if so, use the second one i linked, is very easy to use.

Reaper 392 · 5 Mar 2011 at 21:48

just so you know, im installing windows 7 on a different computer.

the steps you give look like your formatting my current computers hard drive, something i really dont want to do

btw, what is an ISO file. looked at a bunch of the files in the windows 7 folder and none of them were an ISO filetype

Reaper 392 · 5 Mar 2011 at 22:17

the HP usb converter thing you linked to wont even install

would it be worth temporarily nicking the IDE DVD drive from my dads computer to do the install?

*edit*
that didnt work either