Operating system on a USB flash drive. Multiboot USB Flash Drive: The Promised Understatement

07.05.2019 Iron

Not every user has a DVD drive, moreover, rare PCs are equipped with them lately. But you still need to install the system, and for this it is most convenient to use a bootable USB flash drive. Let's figure out how to install Windows 7 from a USB flash drive - after all, you won't buy a DVD for this purpose.

Before proceeding to the installation, carefully study this article: various difficulties may arise in the process, which can be solved using one of the methods described below.

The installation process itself can be divided into the following steps:

downloading the installation image;
computer preparation;
creating a bootable flash drive;
PC BIOS setup;
Windows 7 installation.

Let's consider each stage in more detail.

Before you write the image to a USB flash drive and install the system from it, you need to download it. Today, there are a huge number of ready-made assemblies of the operating system, which are equipped with many applications and functions.

Very often, these distributions change the default theme or sound scheme. But not all users like such innovations. You only need to download original images created by Microsoft. A huge staff of the world's leading programmers does their job better than some artisanal modifier.

A little lower you will find a button by which you can download a torrent file for downloading the Russian version of Windows 7 with 32 or 64-bit architecture. The file is taken from the official Microsoft website and is completely original. Start downloading, and when the download is complete, proceed to the next step.

After the file is downloaded, open it with a torrent client. If you do not know how to work with such programs, follow our step-by-step instructions.

First, download the torrent client itself. This will be the qBittoorent app.
Install the program and open the previously downloaded torrent file with it.

We select the version of Windows 7 (in our case it is professional 64 bit) and click "OK".

After that, the operating system will start loading at the maximum available speed.

Getting ready to install Windows 7

First of all, you need to copy to a safe place all the important information for us located on drive C. Each user stores data in his own way, so everyone has their own choice of folders for backup. Most often these are folders: "Downloads", "Desktop", etc.

You can save files to another logical drive (the one on which the system will not be installed) or to an external drive. You can also use cloud storage if there is not too much data. For example, the Mail.ru cloud provides 100 GB of free space for free.

With an eye to the future, remember: during the operation of the PC, you need to store your data on a drive other than the one on which the system is installed. Divide the physical disk into sections and save your files on any of them, except for the system one. For installing Windows 7, a volume of 70 - 100 GB will be comfortable (depending on the type and amount of software used).

Another crucial point that should be considered before the installation starts is the drivers for our network card. If at the end of the installation of Windows 7 it turns out that there is no driver for the network card, additional difficulties will arise that will have to be solved using a second computer by transferring files from it via a USB flash drive.

If the computer was just purchased, there is no valuable information on it and cannot be, feel free to proceed to the next section, without copying the data.

Create a bootable flash drive

In order to create bootable media and start the operating system installation procedure, we need:

USB stick with 8 GB or more. Instead of a USB flash drive, you can also use a simple memory card with a card reader;
installation distribution kit "Seven" with the extension .iso;
a utility with which we will write the image to a USB flash drive;

Attention! Before you start creating the installation media, remember that all data on it will be irretrievably destroyed.

Making installation media using Ultra ISO

A well-known disk imaging program can create boot drives. Consider the algorithm for writing Windows 7 to a USB device.

Download and install the Ultra ISO program from the link.
Run the resulting file and check the box "I accept the license agreement." Proceed to the next step by clicking "Next".

Using the "Browse" button, select the installation path, then click on "Next".

We don’t change anything here and just move on.

The program is being installed, we are waiting for its completion.

The Ultra ISO installation is complete, you can run it and go straight to creating a USB flash drive for installing Windows 7.

The Ultra ISO program can be run in trial mode, so its functionality will not suffer in the least. Click on the button shown in the picture.

Go to the "File" menu and click on the "Open" item.

We select the Windows 7 image we downloaded, and then "Open".

Go to the "Startup" section and click on the item that we marked in the screenshot.

We look so that the media we need is displayed in the devices at the top of the window and click on the "Format" button.

Attention! This will destroy all your data beyond recovery. If you have the necessary files on the USB stick, save them first.

In the next window, just click "Start".

Ultra ISO will once again warn us that all information from the flash drive will be erased. Click "OK".

After the formatting is completed, click on "Write".

The process of recording "Seven" on a USB flash drive has begun. It will take about 5-10 minutes depending on the speed of the drive and the selected OS version.

Recording completed, our media can be used.

Consider a few more options for creating bootable media with Windows 7.

Rufus

This is another program that can create a bootable USB flash drive with Seven. First, let's download it.

The application, unlike Ultra ISO, does not require installation, so you can run the downloaded file and immediately proceed to the process of burning the OS to a USB device. To do this, we do the following:

Select a recording device. This will be our flash drive, in this case - 16 GB. Then click on the disk icon.

We select the distribution kit downloaded by us in the PC folder.

We begin the recording process with the "Start" button.

Rufus will notify us that all files will be deleted from the flash drive. If you have already created a backup copy or there was no important information on the media, click "OK".

As a result, Windows 7 will be written to a USB flash drive, after which you will have a full-fledged installation media at your disposal.

Attention! Before you start the process of writing the system to a USB flash drive, be sure to save all the data on it - otherwise they will be irretrievably lost.

As you can see, this method turned out to be much simpler than the previous one, but we will not stop there and consider a few more options for burning Windows 7 to a USB drive.

Making a bootable USB flash drive using WinSetupFromUSB

Another application focused solely on writing operating system files to an external drive. Let's take a utility and look at the process of working with it.

We select the path along which the program will be unpacked (click on the button with the image of three dots) and click "Extract".

We are waiting for the end of unzipping all the necessary files.

We open the directory into which the unpacking was carried out, and run the program, depending on what architecture your operating system is based on. We have it 64 bit, respectively, we click on the marked file.

We insert our USB flash drive into the USB port and make sure that it is displayed in WinSetupFromUSB. Next, check the box marked with the number "2" in the screenshot. When the bird is placed, click on the icon with the image of three dots, marked with the number "3".

Select the image of our operating system and click on "Open".

It remains only to press the "GO" key and the recording of Windows 7 will begin.

Windows 7 is being written to an external drive. Once the process is completed, the flash drive can be used to install the system.

We will not stop at WinSetupFromUSB and will tell you how to burn the OS to media using the Windows 7 USB / DVD Download Tool from Microsoft.

Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool

This is the official application from Microsoft, so it should be the one that, in theory, should best cope with the task of burning Windows 7 to a USB flash drive. Let's get started with the program.

First, download the utility from the link from the official site. Then run it and click on the "Next" button.

We are waiting for the program to install.

We complete the installation process by clicking on the “Finish” button.

We proceed to work with the program. Initially, you need to specify the file that we will write. To do this, click the "Browse" button.

After the path to the image file is registered, you can proceed to the next step - click "Next".

Here you should select the type of media on which we will put the "Seven". Since we have a USB flash drive, we click on "USB device".

We look for our drive to be displayed in the field marked with the number "1", and click on the "Begin copying" button.

After that, we will be warned that all information from the media will be erased and after confirmation, the process of transferring Windows 7 to a USB drive will start.

Upon completion, we will receive a bootable USB flash drive, with which it is easy to install OS on a computer.

The program requires the Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 library. If you do not have it, then download the program from the official Microsoft website.

We use the UNetBootin program

The UNetBootin utility is completely free. you can download it without registering or sending SMS. The program does not need to be installed - it works immediately after downloading. An application was created not only for writing to a Windows flash drive, but also for other operating systems, such as Linux or Mac OS.

We proceed to the instructions for working with the application.

First of all, set the checkbox to the “Disk Image” position and click on the button with the ellipsis image. In the window that opens, we need a Windows distribution.

In the drop-down list marked with the number "1", select the USB device, indicate our flash drive and click "OK".

The application will warn us that all the data that is already on the flash drive will be irretrievably lost. If we do not need them, click "Yes to All".

The distribution package is being written to the USB device. After it is completed, the USB flash drive can be used to install the OS.

Command line

You can create bootable media with the Seven without using any programs by the forces of the system itself. For this we will use the command line.

The whole process is described in the form of detailed step-by-step instructions, each step of which is accompanied by a screenshot for clarity.

Initially, we start the command line. This must be done exclusively as an administrator. We will create bootable media using the example of Windows 10, but in the same way you can get the result on Windows 7 - 8. Press the combination of Win + R buttons and press the "Browse" key in the window that appears.

We follow the path indicated in the screenshot by the number "1" and find the cmd application. We click on it with the right key of our manipulator and select "Run as administrator".

We write the command diskpart on the command line and press Enter.

To start writing to a disk, you must first select it, and take this choice responsibly, because all data from it will be deleted. You can view the list of disks using the operators: "list disk", "list volume" or "list partition". The first two show the list of disks, the third shows the number of partitions and their names. Insert the flash drive into the USB port and enter the command "list disk" in DISKPART. Then press Enter. You will see a list of all disks currently installed in the PC.

We select the disk that we need. To do this, enter select disk disk_number. The disk number can be viewed in the last step, we have it "1" since its size is 14 GB, which corresponds to our flash drive.

Remove the disk with the clean command. Once again, make sure that you have made the right choice - all data on the media will be completely deleted.

Now we need to create the main partition for the flash drive, from which we will boot in the future. Enter the create partition primary command and press Enter.

Set the drive letter using the assign letter=drive_letter operator. Let's do that. We know that our PC has drives C, D and E, so we specify F. The final command will look like this: assign letter=F.

You can also specify the partition size. If you skip this step, it will take up all the free space. You can set the size of a logical disk using the create partition primary size=disk_size command. The size must be specified in megabytes.

We select our disk using the select partition 1 command (specify your disk number) and press Enter.

Now we need to make our section active. To do this, use the active statement.

It remains to format the flash drive - we prescribe a command like: format fs = fat32 quick.

Exit DISKPART using the exit command. Now we need to prepare the files for recording. We unpack our Windows 7 image using any archiver (we will use the usual WinRAR) and extract all the files to our USB flash drive.

The installation media is ready, you can use it.

We use the program WinToFlash

Let's describe the process of working with another program for burning Windows 7 and other operating systems to a USB drive. To get started, download the utility from the link from the official site.

Install the program and run it. In the window that opens, select the item marked with a red frame.

At the very top, select "Windows", then specify Windows 7 and press the button indicated in the screenshot by the number "3".

Specify the path to the Windows 7 image that we downloaded. To do this, click the "Select" button.

Click on "Add".

We make sure that the flash drive we need is indicated as the target, and click "Run".

After that, the process of creating bootable media with Windows 7 will begin, after which the device will be ready for use.

Write a bootable USB flash drive using WinToBootic

This application is one of the simplest tools for writing operating systems to external media. To work with the utility, you do not need to install it, nor do you need administrator rights. It will work both with Windows files and with its images. The local interface is simple, and the speed of the program pleases.

To write Windows 7 to a USB flash drive using WinToBootic, do the following:

First, download the program from the link and run it. Check the box next to "Quick Format" and click "Do It!".

We answer in the affirmative to the request when formatting.

We are again notified that all data on the flash drive will be deleted. Do not forget to save important information from the media, if it is there, and click on "OK".

The preparation of the flash drive is completed, click "Thanks!".

Next, select the files that will be written to our flash drive. To do this, click the icon indicated in the screenshot, and select the image we need.

Press the button to start the process again.

The recording of Windows 7 to the USB flash drive will begin. When it ends, the device can be used to install the system.

How to boot from a flash drive

To successfully install Windows 7 from a USB flash drive, it’s not enough for us to simply burn the operating system to media, we also need to make the PC boot not from a hard drive, but from a USB drive. This can be done in two ways: either by modifying the BIOS, or through a special boot menu.

With regards to the Boot Menu, we can say that it starts with different keys, depending on the model of the computer or laptop. You can see which button is responsible for this on your device in the instructions for it. We provide a list of combinations for the main brands of computers and laptops:

Launching the Boot Menu on a PC:

Launching the Boot Menu on a laptop:

Below is a list of keys that launch the BIOS on different computers and laptops:

For clarity, we will show the process of installing a flash drive as the first boot device using the example of our PC with an Asus motherboard:

We turn off or restart the computer and after starting it, press the button to go to the BIOS (we have it Del).

This is what the BIOS looks like.

Go to the Boot tab.

We install our USB drive as the first device.

The process is similar on different computers, although the names of the tabs and items may differ. In order to understand how to enter the BIOS of your PC, read the instructions for it.

Installing Windows 7 from a flash drive

After the BIOS has been configured, you can proceed directly to installing Windows 7 from a USB flash drive. Let's get started.

Immediately after the system starts, you will see the following window (the data for installing Windows 7 is being preloaded).

Set regional options. Select the system language, region of residence, and keyboard layout. If desired, all this data can also be specified after Windows starts. When the setup is completed, click on "Next".

In the next step, just click "Install".

It remains to accept the license agreement, and the installation will begin. Check the box as shown in the screenshot and click Next.

We select the full installation mode - this is the so-called clean option, when all old data on the system partition is deleted.

We got into the partition settings menu. Click on the entry circled in red.

If your disk is not partitioned, you can do it here (for Windows 7, it will be best to use about 100 GB of free space, the rest will become the D drive). Don't forget to format your system partition before installing Windows on it. When the operation is completed, click on the "Next" button.

Finally, the installation of Windows began. We are waiting for the process to be completed.

Next, the system will reboot and we are greeted by the Windows startup screen

Initial optimization in progress. The system prepares all the necessary files.

System services begin to start.

After which we proceed to complete the installation of Windows

We are again told to restart the computer.

The system will check how productive our video card is.

Now we need to enter our details. We write an arbitrary name and the name of the computer. Then click "Next".

If necessary, you can set a password that the system will ask for when it starts. We skip this step since the computer will be at home.

If you have a Windows 7 key, you can enter it here, however, you can do it after the system starts. We are skipping this step.

Choose the system protection option depending on your personal preferences. We will be installing another antivirus, so we won't need a regular one.

Specify the time and time zone. Then click "Next".

Decide on the type of network. This is a rather important step, because if we specify the home network, and we are connected to the public one, our security will suffer greatly.

The settings are being applied and the network is automatically configured.

Last minute of optimization before our Windows 7 is launched.

As a result, we installed Windows 7 from a flash drive, the creation of which was described above.

Instead of an afterword

We examined a lot of different programs and tools of Windows itself in order to answer the question: how to install Windows 7 from a USB flash drive. However, these are not all options. There are many such programs on the web. They differ in their convenience and functionality. Some utilities are better suited for ordinary users, while others are better for professionals.

Which method you choose and how to burn Windows 7 to a USB flash drive should be determined from purely personal preferences. Use the option that you like, and if you have any questions, ask us in the comments. We undertake to provide a comprehensive answer as soon as possible.

The concept of running an operating system that boots from media without the need for installation comes from Linux distributions, often referred to as "live" versions. As time went on, it became possible to distribute not only Linux, but also MS Windows in different ways. But chances are slim that most users have experienced Live CD/DVD. Here we will talk about getting "live OS" from a flash drive!
This third part of a four part series covers all the ins and outs of a bootable USB flash drive. We talked about how to do them, what BIOS settings should boot with them in the article, and how, and now I'm going to get a live operating system. These environments are very useful even for regular computer users, not just hardware enthusiasts or professionals.

The main advantage of operating system management is that it does not change the files of the operating system or any other configuration of the computer from which it will run. The entire operating system is written to RAM (more precisely, a RAM disk), and therefore provides a great environment for testing, experimenting, system repair, troubleshooting, and even provides a seamless connection and secure temporary OS.

In this article, I want to introduce you to various free utilities and tools to help you create a bootable live operating system that you can use to connect a USB flash drive. We will first focus on Microsoft Windows based XP and Vista operating systems, and then describe several alternative Linux distributions (Ubuntu, Knoppix, etc.). I will describe everything, how you can create your own "live flash drive" with the software of your choice.

Before you begin, you should know what this article assumes, your familiarity with the methods needed to make a basic bootable USB, or what options you should look for in the BIOS to enable flash drive support, and organize the boot order accordingly (USB flash drive should be listed first). If you missed the previous articles in this series, please read them.

MS Windows OS

Now it's time to create a bootable flash drive. What we want to create is a copy of Windows that doesn't require installation. This is the ability to load everything on its own, without actually writing a single bit to the hard drive. It is very important to understand that the entire operating system is not loaded into RAM - mainly because there is not enough space, although this would not be bad for improving computer performance.

Booting from a flash drive certainly seems slower because there is no USB flash drive that can offer the kind of read/random access performance that you can get from a hard drive. The same situation occurs with a live CD. But this live operating system is mainly used as a "test drive" of the OS for troubleshooting, experimentation, data backup, and so on.

In general, the main advantage of a USB live operating system over a CD is that you can always access the flash drive if needed, unlike optical media. This means that the user can store personal data other than configuration data entered into the OS, and so on. This is not necessary, especially in the case of infected computers, when live USB OC is used solely as a troubleshooting and repair device.

Now we can go further. First, let me introduce the WinPE product: Windows Preinstallation Environment. It was released by Microsoft as part of the WAIK (Windows Automated Installation Kit) and was developed specifically for OEMs. Windows XP, 2003 Server, Vista, and Server 2008 editions are currently available. They can boot everything on their own and use as a lightweight yet efficient operating system.

By default, programs such as the recovery program, disk cloning utilities, and parts of WinRE (Windows Recovery Environment) are installed, which include Startup Repair, System Restore, Windows Memory Diagnostic Tool, and full computer recovery from the command line.

Here's where the real beauty comes in: The BartPE preinstalled environment is an independent project somewhat similar to WinPE, but they are quite different. The heart of BartPE is in PE Builder. This is a free utility that creates live images of BartPE that can be used as a bootable operating system on flash drive, CD and DVD.

The BartPE boot environment can be used to perform a variety of tasks, from repairing, troubleshooting, and disinfecting your computer to performing network security scans, writing hardware modules, rescue files, resetting a forgotten administrator password, accessing AD, and more. . It boots minimalistically, but fully functional features boot Windows of your choice (XP, Vista, etc.), network, NTFS, and all sorts of fancy support.

Creating your own image with the tool is quite simple thanks to the graphical interface. You just need to follow the instructions. Right after that, you'll need another tool that formats the flash drive, makes it bootable, and then, of course, all that's left is to copy the files. These tasks can be done with the PeToUSB utility, but you can also do it manually if that's your choice. Either way, be sure to follow the instructions.

This utility is useful because the boot sector (MBR) is created without problems. Otherwise, if you still remember the first part, you need to create a virtual FDD, make a virtual boot floppy, extract the boot sector from it, and then install it on a flash drive. With this utility, everything is automated. It has a simple graphical interface. It supports MBR recovery and backup. Be sure of this and check it out.

Finally, I must also present another alternative to BartPE and PE Builder. Another free utility that does the same is called WinBuilder. This is basically a script that creates different boot disk images depending on the user's requirements. It has a simple graphical interface, so feel free to give it a try. VistaPE is one of the most significant, popular projects. It is based on the WinPE environment.

It should also be said that there are various ready-to-run projects that can be downloaded for free from the Internet. The authors of such projects brought their own changes to the project, so it's a matter of personal choice, and you may or may not be satisfied with such a project. Of course, nothing beats making your own bootable flask, but who knows? You can get some ideas (like applications, include some scripts, plugins, etc.).

NIXOS distributions

At the beginning of the article, I mentioned that the term "Living Systems" came from Linux distributions. They were the first to master the technique of loading with no actual recording, little bit of hardware, relying solely on the source of information and RAM. Knoppix Live was the first to gain recognition, followed by Ubuntu Live.

Bootable USB flash drives are revolutionizing this with the ability to write to them. On flash drives, users can also save their settings. However, boot time is affected, the "live" operating system will not replace the one originally installed, but they are useful for crisis situations. For a very thorough comparative list of numerous (literally several dozen) Linux distributions, you can check it out online.

For beginners, the first recommendation is almost always Ubuntu. However, first let's learn a utility that will help us in creating a bootable flash drive. This time, it's Unetbootin. This free utility is an Internet installer. This means that it does not require installation of CDs, supports all kinds of distributions, as well as the installation of downloading images from the Internet.

The following distributions are supported by default, but others are also possible: Ubuntu, Debian, Fedora, PCLinux, Linux Mint, OpenSUSE, Arch Linux, Damn Small Linux, SliTaz, Puppy Linux, FreeBSD, NetBSD, Frugalware Linux, FaunOS, Mandriva , CentOS, Elive, Dreamlinux, Slax, Zenwalk, Gentoo, and so on. All in all, this program is a multipurpose internet installer distribution.

It is capable of creating bootloaders for multiple operating systems (for example, dual booting with existing Windows XP and with a freshly installed distribution). The program can easily install these operating systems not only on a hard disk partition, but also on a USB flash drive. This part is what really interests us here!

Just download the UNetbootin utility and run it. An intuitive pop-up interface where you can select the source of the image to burn, assuming you've downloaded it. If not, just select one of the currently supported list (Linux distributions that can be downloaded directly with the utility). But here's the catch, you need to pay attention and choose a USB drive in type: enter in the line and select its letter correctly!

Behind the scenes of this application, the following process: there is an ISO image of the distribution (if it does not exist, then the image is loaded first), the files are copied to the USB flash drive, and the bootloader is automatically created from scratch. Once the process is successfully completed, you should reboot.

This utility does everything, and you, as in the case of "PE Builder + PeToUSB" software, automated combo programs of the entire process, in the case of the Microsoft Windows operating system. Once again, you can do all of this manually. Once the flash drive is ready, you may need to double check to see if this is the first partition (or just the partition) on which the operating system can be located and active. Can be loaded, only active sections!

The bootloader that is generated should always work. However, once again, be careful, in cases where the flash drive is larger than 2 GB, it would be best to split it into two parts at least and use the appropriate partition types. We talked about this in the previous part. FAT16 only supports up to 2GB. FAT32 has higher limits. Another alternative live USB creator is Ubuntu One and Feodora One. Try 'em!

If you have read the page up to this part, then this means that we have successfully learned how to set up the OS on a bootable USB flash drive. Experimenting, trying and doing different tasks in this way is not "harmful". You don't need to install an operating system, a hard disk partition, and so on. On top of everything, there are no changes made to the system.

Also, sometimes your main operating systems get corrupted for whatever reason, whether it was your fault or not, it doesn't matter. Your computer may end up filled with spyware and malware, and before you wipe everything out and install a "clean" operating system again, this is an amazing opportunity to back up important data - or you can treat and repair the OS.

It was previously mentioned that this is the third part of a four part series. So far we have learned how to create a bootable flash drive, the BIOS changes required to boot from flash drives, how to flash the BIOS, and now we have also learned what a live operating system is.

To do this, we need the flash drive itself, a ready-made downloaded image with the operating system (in most cases, you need live CD or LiveDVD) and a special utility with which you can burn this image to a removable disk. There are a huge number of such programs, each of which has its own advantages in terms of functionality and ease of use.

Windows USB/DVD Download Tool

One such program is the Windows USB/DVD Download Tool.

The working window of the utility looks like this.

Everything is extremely simple - English-language simple and intuitive interface. You need to go through 4 steps. First, by pressing the button Browse» choose the downloaded image. It is best to use the original versions from Microsoft. In this case, the OS will work smoothly and without errors. It is advisable to use various assemblies only from trusted sources.

Choose here deviceUSB(the program also provides the ability to create a DVD disc with the installed system).

Select the desired removable media, then click " Begin copying».

A warning will appear stating that the drive will be formatted. We confirm this action.

At the 4th stage, the utility will format the disk and unpack the image.

After waiting for the process to complete, you can use this drive with the installed OS.

Using UltraISO

No less popular for these purposes is the UltraISO program.

The installation process is standard.

A trial version is available for free. We press "".

In the program window, first select the file that was previously downloaded for writing to a USB flash drive - menu item File/Open.

The image must be in *.iso format.

Files and folders intended for recording will appear in the upper working field.

hard drive.

Select the desired drive and format it.

Might have to change file system for capturing large images.

After the formatting process, we proceed to recording.

It remains to wait until the drive with the installed OS is ready.

MultiBoot USB application

Slightly less popular, but no less convenient and functional utility MultiBoot USB.

As in the previous methods, you must first format the usb disk.

To check the bootloader, click the second item Grub4Dos Installer. Choose a carrier and click Install, and then test.

If you have such a window, then everything is in order with your bootloader.

To install the OS, select item 4 WinSetup From USB.

WinSetupFromUSB allows you to install multiple operating systems at once. Installation must be done in sequence. Select the media and the desired file and press GO.

By checking the box " Test in QEMU” and by pressing GO you can start the emulator and see what happened in the end - what window the user will see when booting from this media.

We use the PWBoot program

This is an easy-to-use free program that allows you to complete the installation of Windows on a USB flash drive. In this case, you will need a regular installation image that will be installed on a USB flash drive.

The principle of operation is similar to those discussed earlier. Choose Install, then the appropriate image (image). The name must not contain Cyrillic characters, otherwise the software may not be installed correctly.

available disk- select a section with our flash drive.

Then Next and waiting for the installation to complete.

The disadvantages of such drives

Now about the shortcomings of such flash drives. First of all, this is a low data exchange rate. This problem can be solved on devices that support data transfer via usb 3.0, but it will still work noticeably slower than when booting the system from the hard drive.

Another aspect - when inserting a removable disk into another device - the system will find new hardware, Windows will be forced to constantly install drivers before. Thus, the system can become so littered that it will behave inappropriately.

Multiple use such a flash drive will lead to malfunction over time, so we recommend using a special portable USB HDD for such purposes.

Having such a flash drive will be useful for you if several people work on one PC, and you do not want to lose important data. Or to restore the OS that has failed. In this case, you need to install a special assembly on it, which contains many utilities for testing the system, devices, and components.

A full-fledged operating system on a small external media is very convenient. You can run the system on almost any computer, and have all your files and data always at hand, and you no longer need to keep a large number of systems on the main drive.

It is for these reasons that many computer users are interested in how Linux is installed on a USB flash drive, is it possible, and if possible, how to implement everything correctly. In this article, we will try to answer such questions. We will also analyze in detail the installation process on a USB flash drive for one of the most popular distributions - Ubuntu.

Despite all the advantages of using an operating system from a USB flash drive, many people say that this is not necessary. And not in vain, because such intensive use of a flash drive can simply destroy it.

Non-volatile flash memory has one significant drawback - it is a limited number of overwrites of one cell with data. There are no restrictions on the number of data reads, and the write limit is very significant - tens of millions of times. For the intended use of flash drives, this is not critical, since the recording frequency is not very high there and the flash drive lasts for a long time.

But when you install the system on a flash drive, the kernel, the file system, the programs are constantly saving their temporary files, constantly working with data and writing something to disk, the file system journaling complicates the situation, since it logs data about any file changes to the log, which further increases the number of flash drive block overwrites.

You can say that there are SSDs made with the same technology used in computers. But everything is not quite right, SSDs are designed for such a load, because they have a rewrite limit of several billion, as well as the ability to hot-swap already failed blocks with backup ones.

Therefore, when you agree to install an operating system on a USB flash drive, you must understand that the flash drive will work much less than it could. But not everything is so bad, you can perform some optimizations that will make the system write less information to disk. If you agree with the risk, then next we will look at how to install Linux on a USB flash drive.

Installing Linux on a flash drive

The Linux operating system allows the user to do whatever they want, and if you want Linux on a flash drive, that's fine too. We don't even have to resort to any special tools.

We will consider the whole process using the example of Ubuntu and everything will be done using the official installer. We will not be interested in the usual recording of an image to disk or work from RAM. In the end, we will get exactly a full-fledged operating system on a flash drive.

First, do everything as usual, select the language, software settings and updates. The differences begin at the disk partitioning stage. Here you need to choose the manual option, because the automatic markup does not allow us to do what we need.

There will be one remark here, it is necessary that the system is not loaded from the USB flash drive on which you are going to install it, otherwise you will not be able to install ubuntu on the USB flash drive. That is, in addition to the installer, another clean flash drive must be connected to the system. If everything was done correctly, then in addition to the main disk /dev/sda, a flash drive /dev/sdb will appear in the markup window:

For a flash drive, its size, disk label will be indicated, and, most likely, it will also have only one partition. This section must be removed to get free space.

The first partition must be created with the FAT32 file system and it is the first one so that Windows can work with it. For example, if you have a 16 GB flash drive, then 5-4 GB can be given for data. The mount point for this partition is /home:

The second section is used for system files, here we need at least eight gigabytes. The file system is better to take Btrfs, since we do not need journaling ext4, and btrfs has compression and optimization for ssd. Specify / as the mount point:

The last action on this step of the wizard is to specify the device for the bootloader, it must be the same flash drive on which you are installing the system.

Optimizing Ubuntu to run on a flash drive

Installing Ubuntu on a flash drive is complete, but now we just have to make it work in such a way as to write data to the disk at a minimum. All this must be done in an already installed system.

Most of the settings will be done in the /etc/fstab file, first we enable compression of all files and optimization for ssd in btrfs, which is used as the root. We used the /dev/sdb2 partition for the root, since we used /dev/sdb1 for /home:

/dev/sdb1 / btrfs errors=remount-ro,noatime,nodiratime,compress=lzo,ssd,commit=60 0 1

You may have disks in fstab named by UUID, then you will have to find the entry that specifies the mount point / and the btfs file system, and therefore already change it. Consider the options:

errors=remount-ro- remount read-only during errors;
no time- do not update file access time;
nodiratime- do not update folder access time;
compress=lzo- use lzo compression, this is the fastest zlib algorithm gives more compression but takes longer;
commit=60- by default, the file system writes all information about file changes every 30 seconds to disk, but using this parameter you can specify your own value, but not more than 300;
ssd- a set of optimizations for solid state drives.

Some folders in which temporary system files are most often written can be moved to RAM, for this, add the following lines to the end of the /etc/fstab file:

tmpfs /tmp tmpfs rw,size=100m 0 0
tmpfs /run tmpfs rw 0 0
tmpfs /var/lock tmpfs rw 0 0
tmpfs /var/log tmpfs rw,size=10m 0 0

The kernel does not immediately write data to disk, but caches it in memory, and writes it when the disk is not loaded or it can no longer be stored in memory. Files /proc/sys/vm/ are used to configure the parameters for flushing data to disk. The settings below reduce the number of entries by increasing the consumption of RAM.

Maximum time between data writes to disk:

sudo sysctl -w vm.laptop_mode=120
$ sudo sysctl -w vm.dirty_writeback_centisecs=12000
$ sudo sysctl -w vm.dirty_expire_centisecs=12000

The maximum amount of memory for the cache in percent:

sudo sysctl -w vm.dirty_ratio=10

Write data to disk when only % of memory is free:

sudo sysctl -w vm.dirty_background_ratio=1

After these settings, the installation of ubuntu on a flash drive is complete, the system is more or less ready for use on a flash drive and will not harm it so much. But still, do not forget to back up important data from time to time, because everything can break at the most inopportune moment.

Everyone knows that operating systems (OS) are installed on hard drives or SSDs, that is, in computer memory, but not everyone has heard of a full-fledged OS installation on a USB flash drive. With Windows, unfortunately, it will not be possible to do this, but Linux will allow you to do what you have planned.

This type of installation has its own characteristics - both positive and negative. For example, having a full-fledged OS on a flash drive, you can work in it on absolutely any computer. Due to the fact that this is not a Live image of the distribution, as many might think, the files will not disappear after the session ends. The disadvantages include the fact that the performance of such an OS can be an order of magnitude lower - it all depends on the choice of distribution kit and the correct settings.

Step 1: preparatory activities

For the most part, installing on a USB flash drive is not much different from installing on a computer, for example, in advance you also need to prepare a boot disk or USB flash drive with a recorded Linux image. By the way, the article will use the Ubuntu distribution, the image of which is recorded on a USB flash drive, however, the instructions are common to all distributions.

Please note that you need to have two flash drives - one with 4 GB of memory, and the second with 8 GB. An OS image (4 GB) will be written to one of them, and this OS (8 GB) will be installed to the second.

Step 2: Select a Priority Disk in the BIOS

Once you have created a bootable USB flash drive with Ubuntu, you need to insert it into your computer and run it from the drive. This procedure may differ on different versions of the BIOS, but the key points are common to all.

Step 3: start installation

As soon as you boot from the flash drive that contains the Linux image, you can immediately proceed with installing the OS on the second flash drive, which at this stage must be inserted into the PC.

To start the installation, you need:

On the desktop, double-click on the shortcut "Install Ubuntu".
Select the language of the installer. It is recommended to choose Russian so that the names do not differ from those used in this manual. After selecting, press the button "Proceed"

At the second stage of the installation, it is advisable to check both boxes and click "Proceed". However, if you do not have an Internet connection, then these settings will not work. They can be carried out after the installation of the system on a disk with the Internet connected

Note: after clicking "Continue", the system will recommend that you remove the second media, but this is absolutely impossible to do - click the "No" button.

It remains to choose only the type of installation. In our case choose "Another variant" and press "Proceed".

After all of the above, it is necessary to work with disk space, however, since this procedure includes many nuances, especially when Linux is installed on a USB flash drive, we will take it out in a separate part of the article.

Step 4: partitioning the disk

Now you have a disk partitioning window in front of you. Initially, you need to determine the flash drive on which Linux will be installed. This can be done in two ways: by file system and by disk size. To make it even easier to understand this, evaluate these two parameters at once. Usually flash drives use the FAT32 file system, and the size can be found by the corresponding inscription on the device case.

In this example, we have only one carrier defined - sda. In this article, we will take it for a flash drive. In your case, you need to perform actions only with the partition that you have defined as a flash drive, so as not to damage or delete files from others.

Most likely, if you have not previously deleted partitions from the flash drive, it will have only one - sda1. Since we will have to reformat the media, we need to delete this partition so that "free place". To delete a partition, click the button with the sign «-» .

Now instead of a section sda1 an inscription appeared "free place". From this point on, you can start marking this space. In total, we will need to create two partitions: home and system.

Create a home partition

Highlight first "free place" and click on the plus (+) . A window will appear "Create Partition", in which five variables must be defined: size, partition type, partition location, file system type, and mount point.

Here you need to go through each of the points separately.

Size. You can set it at your discretion, but there are some factors to consider. The bottom line is that after creating the home partition, it is necessary that there is still free space for the system partition. Please note that the system partition takes up about 4-5 GB of memory. So, if you have a 16 GB flash drive, then the recommended size of the home partition is approximately 8 - 10 GB.
Section type. Since we are installing the OS on a USB flash drive, you can choose "Primary" although there is not much difference between them. Boolean is most often used in advanced sections for its specifics, but this is a topic for a separate article, so choose "Primary" and move on.
Location of the new section. choose "The Beginning of this Space", since it is desirable that the home partition be at the beginning of the occupied space. By the way, you can observe the location of a particular section on a special strip, which is located above the partition table.
Use as. This is where the differences from a traditional Linux installation begin. Since a flash drive is used as a drive, not a hard drive, we need to select from the drop-down list "EXT2 Journaled File System". It is necessary for only one reason - it is easy to disable the very logging in it so that the rewriting of the "left" data takes place less frequently, thereby ensuring the long-term performance of the flash drive.
Mount point. Since it is necessary to create a home partition, in the corresponding drop-down list, you must select or manually enter "/home".

As a result, click the button "OK". You should end up with something like the image below:

Create a system partition

Now you need to create a second partition - the system. This is done in almost the same way as with the previous one, but there are some differences. For example, you should select the root mount point - «/» . And in the input field "Memory"- indicate the rest. The minimum size should be around 4000-5000 MB. The remaining variables must be set in the same way as for the home partition.

As a result, you should get something like this:

Important: after markup, you must specify the location of the system loader. You can do this in the corresponding drop-down list: "Device for installing the boot loader." In it, you need to select the USB flash drive on which Linux is installed. It is important to select the drive itself, and not its partition. In this case it is "/dev/sda".

After the done manipulations, you can safely press the button "Install Now". You will see a window with all the operations that will be carried out.

Note: it is possible that after clicking the button, a message will appear that the swap partition has not been created. Pay no attention to it. This section is not needed, since the installation is performed on a flash drive.

If the parameters are similar, then feel free to press "Proceed" if you notice differences - click "Return" and change everything according to the instructions.

Step 5: Finishing the installation

The rest of the installation is no different from the classic one (on PC), but it's worth highlighting it too.

Time zone selection

After partitioning the disk, you will be transferred to the next window, where you will need to specify your time zone. This is important only for the correct display of time in the system. If you do not want to spend time installing it or could not determine your region, then you can safely press "Proceed", this operation can be carried out after installation.

Choosing a keyboard layout

On the next screen, you need to select a keyboard layout. Everything is simple here: you have two lists in front of you, on the left you need to select directly layout language (1), and in the second variations (2). You can also check the keyboard layout itself in the dedicated input field (3).

Once defined, press the button "Proceed".

Entering user data

At this stage, you must provide the following information:

your name- it is displayed when you log in and will serve as a guide if you need to choose between two users.
Computer name- you can think of anything, but it is important to remember it, since you will have to deal with this information while working with system files and "Terminal".
Username is your nickname. You can think of anything, however, like the name of the computer, it is worth remembering.
Password- come up with a password that you will enter when logging in and when working with system files.

Note: it is not necessary to come up with a complex password, you can even specify a single-digit password to enter Linux OS, for example, "0".

Also you can choose: "Log in automatically" or "Require password to login". In the second case, it is possible to encrypt the home folder so that attackers, while working on your PC, cannot view the files located in it.

After entering all the data, press the button "Proceed".

Linux is a fairly common open source operating system. It is used in many enterprises, both on work computers and on servers. It is connected with undeniable benefits OS, although it has a number of disadvantages:

Advantages:

The system is distributed is free, no license required
Practically does not require protection antivirus
You can find an OS version for a computer of almost any power

disadvantages:

Some versions are very different from familiar Windows
Many programs for Windows on Linux does not work
A small amount of software compared to Windows
There may be problems with installation drivers

The great advantage of Linux is the ability to install it to a flash drive. To be precise, Windows can also be installed and run on a flash drive, but this will require creating a special image. And Linux has an official portable assembly, which can be downloaded for free from the official website.

Before downloading, you should decide on the version of the system. If the PC has 2 or more nuclear CPU, and RAM more 2 GB makes sense download version for x64 systems. It is more modern and will allow you to realize all the features of a PC, up to UEFI support.

Installing on a flash drive in Windows

It is assumed that the operating system has already been downloaded from the official website in ISO format. To proceed with the installation, you need to get a special program. Suitable for these purposes Universal USB installer.

For installation flash drive required at least 2 GB in size.

We launch program.

Let's analyze settings:

step 1 - prompts you to select the type of operating system. In our case, this is Ubuntu.
step 2 – you need to select the location of the system image
step 3 – select the drive on which the system will be installed. If you check the box We will format as fat32 - the flash drive will be formatted in Fat32 format
step 4 do not touch, leave the slider as it is.

After pressing the button Create image creation will begin, which usually takes a few minutes. Then the flash drive can be used.

You can use another application UNetbootin. The procedure is not much different from the above:

Installation in Ubuntu

If you need to make a bootable USB flash drive in Linux, then the procedure is approximately the same as in Windows. In this case, you do not need to download any third-party programs.

We are looking for a standard utility through the search " Create a boot disk».

In it we indicate way to the preloaded image and drive for installation. It remains only to click on " Create boot disk” and the process will begin, which will end with the creation of the necessary drive.

How to run Linux from a flash drive

After the flash drive with the system is ready, it must be run. For this it is necessary change boot order in BIOS. You can access it by pressing buttons. Del, F2 or F12 when the computer boots up. If you can’t enter the BIOS, you can see the button you need to press on initial loading screen.

or boot. The entire list of available devices will be listed here. It is necessary to place them so that the flash drive is in the first place. We leave with preservation changes and wait for the boot from the drive.

When the flash drive boots up, a menu will appear on the screen in which you need to click on tryubuntuwithoutinstalling. The system will start up in the mode live, i.e. without installation.

Check Linux for compatibility

When the Live USB boots up, you will be able to see the desktop of the operating system. By its appearance it will be possible to define whether the computer hardware is suitable for this version of the system. Can verify drivers to know if all the hardware is installed correctly.

It is worth noting that working from a flash drive will be noticeable slower due to the USB bandwidth. To evaluate the operation of the OS on a computer, it is best to use virtual machine. One of the most popular is Virtualbox.

We will not describe the settings, but problems should not arise. Intuitive tips make it easy to set up the machine.

Existing Alternatives

Ubuntu is not the only free operating system at the moment. There are several dozen of them, but we will touch on the most popular:

Debian- an old OS that is constantly evolving. Served as the basis for many similar systems, including Mint and Ubuntu. The disadvantages are that it is designed for advanced users.

openSUSE- also a fairly popular system. The advantage is the built-in YAST software package for system configuration.

linuxMINT- one of the most popular systems, not inferior to Ubuntu. It has a friendly interface, similar to Windows, which makes it convenient for novice users.

Dear friends, today we will learn how Linux is installed on a USB flash drive as a full-fledged OS. Having a portable operating system is very convenient for some users: you just put the device on a computer or laptop and get all your program files. That is, work becomes much more comfortable in some cases. And also you no longer have to install several operating systems on one computer: one can be on a PC, and the other is installed on a USB flash drive.

Naturally, there were some drawbacks here. And this is not surprising: if everything were so simple, then almost everyone would use this opportunity. But what problems can await the user when performing this operation? Let's take a look at this question.

The installed OS on the drive can simply destroy it. How does this happen? The fact is that any flash drive has a limit on the number of data overwrites on it. This limitation, of course, does not apply to reading information. For records, it reaches the number of tens of millions of times. You may think: but these millions of times need to be spent! Not everything is so simple: with the standard use of the device, you, of course, do not write down a million times, delete files. That is why in this mode the flash drive serves for quite a long time.

But the operating system is not the same as ordinary files: the file system, the kernel and its other components save and delete temporary documents all the time. That is, there is continuous work with files: the number of overwrites in one session of average work in the system can exceed tens of thousands of times. This complicates the operation of the OS on a conventional drive. Consequently, its service life for the user is drastically reduced.

So is the game worth the candle? You must answer this question yourself: perhaps you will not use this flash drive so often and it will work for you in this mode for a long time. Maybe, and vice versa: in a week it simply will not open, and you will lose all your data. Think carefully about your decision and only then proceed to actions that are performed at your own peril and risk.

How to install Linux on a flash drive

So, installing Linux on a USB flash drive as a full-fledged OS. If you still decide to do this, then you should immediately say that your device must have a large amount of memory: eight gigabyte drives are clearly not suitable. Pay attention to the fact that this memory will be both for the system and for files with programs. It is recommended to look towards drives with a capacity of 32 gigabytes or more.

When the issue with the flash drive is resolved, let's move on to the item about the device that will help us do what we have planned. This will be a computer with the Linux operating system installed. On Windows, you won't be able to do this. Another very important point: you need to connect an additional clean USB flash drive to the computer. Otherwise, at the disk partitioning stage, you will not be able to do anything. It turns out that you connect one drive for the OS and one blank flash drive.

So, we will consider the entire further process, built on the Linux kernel. If you're ready, let's get started:

background

A "pocket distribution" is quite a convenient thing, because the vast majority of computers are running Windows, and many people want to get their usual working environment outside the home.

For a long time I used an SD card with SLAX ". The distribution is convenient, customizable, can fully boot into RAM and free up a port. However, the project has been frozen for 3 years already, has outdated software. Lack of support for ext4 file systems and new hardware (especially video cards and WI-FI routers) forced me to abandon this system.

UPD: Slax has already been unfrozen and a new version has been released. Details.

Next, I had the idea of installing the OS on a flash drive using the built-in tools of the Ubuntu system. But due to the irrational saving of changes, this system had to be abandoned. In the end, it was decided to use an installer called Ubiquity. It is he who is contained in the LiveCD and installs on the hard drive. Since this option requires a lot more space than the default CD image, I purchased a new 16 gigabyte flash drive - Apacer AH325:

The distribution kit for installation was selected Linux Mint 12, which was mentioned earlier. In general, you can use any linux system, but it is better to opt for Ubuntu or ubuntu-based distributions.

Note: if you are going to "fully" use the temporary partition (for example, watching large videos on YouTube), then it is better to increase the limit of 100 megabytes. I do not advise you to remove the limit, because a hung application can hang the entire system, clogging the temporary folder with its copies.

First boot

...as always, lasts a long time. The main thing is to wait until the end of the download, do not interrupt it, otherwise the file system of the flash drive may suffer.

You should then be greeted by the LightDM menu. After entering the password, you will receive a fully functional system. You can proceed to further configure and download packages. However, the first step is to open Update Manager and bring the system up to date. Everything else depends on your needs and tastes. But that's another story...

Results

So, the result is a bootable USB flash drive, which is a full-fledged Linux desktop that can handle almost any task.

From myself, I advise you to always back up important data "to the cloud" (Ubuntu One,