Vista - USB Bootable Vista Installation Flash Thumb Drive

It was a simple question and I find it hard to believe no one knows the answer.
A.Will OEM disc work or just retail?
B. Can this usb install/boot be created from an xp machine, or just vista?

Hi Leif2,

A OEM Recovery disc will not work, but a normal Retail or Retail OEM Vista installation disk will.

I have not tried it in XP, but I do not see why you could not create one from XP as long as the commands worked in XP and you are using a retail Vista installation DVD.

Hope this helps,
Shawn

@Brink

Diskpart will not see a removable device as a "disk", therefore you are not able to format it on XP. this is different in Vista... Just to inform

Anyways, I'm going to borrow a USB DVD drive to install an OS, however it would still be good to fix the USB problem..

Thank you MrT for confirming that it will not work with XP.

Shawn

Np

Weird, used the same files as before to burn a new DVD... (Just to test files for corruption), it worked all without errors... Must be something with the USB stick then..

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

hey everyone i have went through this steps a few times from different sites, but it still is not working for me whenever i come to step 21. In the command prompt, type E:\boot\bootsect.exe /nt60 F: and press Enter. (See screenshot below)
WARNING: Subtitute the letter E for your CD/DVD drive letter, and substite F for your USB flash drive letter. it keeps telling windows can not load file like its trying to open the file, i am running windows vista 32 bit and i am trying to run 64bit, but everytime i try doing step 21 its basically telling me "this is windows vista 32 bit can not run 64 bit software" and then i get stuck nothing else i can do, ieven tried copying the bootsect.exe file from the dvd onto the flash drive and it would copy but when i go to boot it will not boot i just error messages like error loading os please restart or please remove drive and then restart, do you think its because i i cant go through with step 21.

Hello K00lrav, and welcome to Vista Forums.

See if you can use your 32 bit Vista installation DVD to do step 21 with instead. When you get to step 23, replace it with the 64 bit Vista installation DVD to copy to the USB flash drive.

Hope this helps,
Shawn

hey brink thanks for the welcome, and i sure will give that a try, i did not even think of that, will update and let you know what happens.

well i got good news i got it too work, it didnt go through as fast i thought it would but it went through, now i have one issue my computer saying it used up 46.3 gigs and i have a total of 232 gigs and i got 186 free, i removed all old windows installtion form the properties menu but that didnt help i also went into the c drive checked all the folded there and they added up to about 13 gigs used, where is the other 33gig going anyone have an idea?