Installing Windows 7 from a USB flash drive. Installing Windows from a flash drive via BIOS. Before installing Windows

Hello. It’s probably worth starting with the fact that not all computers have a CD-Rom, or there’s not always an installation disk with Windows on which you can burn an image (already discussed earlier). In this case, you can install Windows 7 from a flash drive.

The main difference there will be 2 steps here! The first is preparing such a bootable flash drive and the second is changing the boot order in the bios (i.e. include a check for USB boot records in the queue).

So, let's begin…

1. Creating a bootable USB flash drive with Windows 7

There are several ways to create a bootable USB flash drive. Now we will look at one of the simplest and fastest. To do this, you will need such a wonderful program as UltraISO (link to the official website) and an image with a Windows system. UltraISO supports a large number of images and allows you to record them on various media. We are now interested in recording an image from Windows OS to a flash drive.

By the way! You can make such an image yourself from a real disk with the OS. You can download it on the Internet, from some torrent (however, beware of pirated copies or all kinds of assemblies). In any case, before this operation you should have such an image!

Open the image with the system in the UltraISO program

After successfully opening the image with Windows 7 OS, click on “”

Selecting a flash drive and parameters

Be extremely careful, because... if let's say you have 2 flash drives inserted and you specify the wrong one... During recording, all data from the flash drive will be deleted! However, the program itself warns us about this (it’s just that the program version may not be in Russian, so it’s better to warn us about this small subtlety).

Warning.

After you click on the “record” button, all you have to do is wait. On average, recording takes min. 10-15 on average based on PC capabilities.

Recording process.

After some time, the program will create a bootable USB flash drive for you. It's time to move on to the second step...

2. Enable the ability to boot from a flash drive in bios

Many people may not need this chapter. But if, when you turn on the computer, it doesn’t seem to see the newly created bootable USB flash drive with Windows 7 OS, it’s time to dig into the bios to check if everything is in order there.

If you do not have Enabled there, then use the Enter key to enable them! Next, go to the download section (Boot). Here you can set the boot order (i.e., for example, the PC first checks CD/DVD disks for boot records, then boots from the HDD). We need to add USB to the boot order. This is demonstrated in the screenshot below.

The first step is to check for booting from a flash drive; if no data is found on it, the CD/DVD is checked - if there is no boot data there either, your old system from the HDD will be loaded

Important! After all the changes to the bios, many people forget to simply save their settings. To do this, select the “Save and exit” option in the section (often the F10 key), then agree (“Yes”). The computer will reboot and should begin to see the bootable USB flash drive with the OS.

2.2 Enabling boot from USB on a laptop (using the example of Asus Aspire 5552G)

By default, booting from a flash drive is disabled in this laptop model. To enable it when booting the laptop, press F2, then in bios go to the Boot section, and using the F5 and F6 keys move the USB CD/DVD higher than the line with booting from the HDD.

By the way, sometimes this doesn't help. Then you need to check all the lines where USB is found (USB HDD, USB FDD), moving them all higher than booting from the HDD.

Setting download priority

After the changes, click on F10 (this exits while saving all the settings that have been made). Next, reboot the laptop, inserting a bootable USB flash drive in advance and watch the installation of Windows 7 begin...

3. Installing Windows 7

In general, installing from a flash drive is not much different from installing from a disk. The only differences can be, for example, in installation time (sometimes it takes longer to install from a disk) and noise (CD/DVDs are quite noisy during operation). For a simpler description, we will provide the entire installation with screenshots, which should appear in approximately the same order (differences may be due to differences in build versions).

Starting Windows installation. This is exactly what you should see if you followed the previous steps correctly.

Here you just need to agree with the setting.

Wait patiently while the system checks the files and prepares to copy them to the hard drive

Do you agree...

Here we select installation - option 2.

This is an important section! Here we select the disk that will become the system disk. It is best if you do not have information on the disk - split it into two parts - one for the system, the second for files. For Windows 7 system, 30-50GB is recommended. By the way, keep in mind that the partition in which the system is installed can be formatted!

We are waiting for the installation process to complete. During this time, the computer may reboot itself several times. We just don’t touch anything...

This window signals us about the first start of the system

Congratulations. The system is installed and you can start working with it!

This completes the installation of Windows 7 from a USB flash drive. Now you can remove it from the USB port and move on to more enjoyable moments: watching movies, listening to music, playing games, etc.

We remind you that attempts to repeat the author’s actions may lead to loss of warranty on the equipment and even to its failure. The material is provided for informational purposes only. If you are going to reproduce the steps described below, we strongly advise you to carefully read the article to the end at least once. The editors of 3DNews do not bear any responsibility for any possible consequences.

During operation, the utility deploys the OS image (in fact, it stupidly unpacks the archive) directly to a removable drive. This will turn out much faster, but upon first boot you will have to carry out the standard system setup procedure: select language settings, time zone, create users, and so on. And this is a very small price to pay for speed.

When you launch PWBoot (with administrator rights, of course), you will be prompted to either install a clean OS on a USB drive, or patch an already installed system if you are somehow going to transfer it to an external drive. You will also have to “roll” the patch after installing service packs and, possibly, some Windows updates. Working with the program is incredibly simple, so there’s almost nothing to tell. Nevertheless, there are still a couple of nuances.

Firstly, PWBoot stubbornly refuses to work with Cyrillic. If your Windows 7 installation image supports the installation of several OS editions at once, then you need to select the one you need. How to do it? Using the ImageX utility (see above), launched with the info parameter and specifying the path to the wim file.

imagex /info x:\path\to\install.wim

In the command output, look for the Image Index item and the version description that follows it. In PWBoot, the versions in the selection list appear in the same order as they appear in the command output.

Secondly, there are two installation options to choose from - directly to an external drive (with its mandatory formatting) or to a virtual disk in VHD format. The second option is much more interesting, but, unlike the first, it definitely requires Windows 7 Ultimate or Enterprise. More precisely, these editions support booting from VHD. In fact, there will be only one file on the disk in which all your work will take place. At the same time, in the OS loaded from the VHD, the physical disk will also be visible. Interestingly, the speed of the system inside the VHD is almost the same as when working directly from the drive.

In general, using VHD provides a lot of advantages. Firstly, any self-respecting virtual machine can work with this format, and its support is built right into Windows 7. You can create, edit, mount VHD disks and work with difference images (in fact, diff for an entire disk) using standard tools. This gives rise to such opportunities as the presence of several Windows installations on one logical volume, easy rollback of changes in the system, convenience and speed of OS deployment on many PCs at once, and so on.

Let's return to PWBoot. At the next stage, you need to specify the location and name of the future VHD container. Naturally, it must be on an external USB drive. Please note that the disk must have an NTFS file system (FAT32 is not suitable due to file size restrictions) and sufficient free space. The program itself will offer to make a minimum disk size, but it is better to allocate as much as you need for software, documents and everything else. A VHD disk can be made dynamic (expandable) by checking the appropriate box. That is, physically it will occupy exactly as much information as it contains. In general, to save space, you can enable this option, but at the same time lose a little in performance.

All that remains is to select the disk where the bootloader will be installed (that is, an external USB drive), check the Update bootcode and Add boot entry to BCD checkboxes, change the description of the boot menu item if desired, and click Install. That’s it, the program will perform further installation steps itself. This usually takes no more than ten minutes, but a lot depends on the speed of the USB drive itself.

After installation, it is advisable to lighten the system a little - remove unnecessary components, disable non-critical services, turn off hard drive indexing, and generally try to avoid any operations associated with a heavy load on the drive. It is also useful to defragment the external drive by connecting it to another system. The problem with the swap file also remains unresolved - you can use the DiskMod driver to create it on a USB drive, you can abandon it altogether, but it is better to manually set its location on the normal HDD of the machine on which our portable Windows 7 is running.

Volume C: is an HD container that is physically located on volume E:

Finally, it is worth mentioning an interesting development called VBoot. It is a bootloader based on GRUB, but with support for direct booting from VHDs. And it doesn't have to be Windows. The site, for example, has ready-made Ubuntu builds. In general, it’s a ready-made and convenient solution, but, of course, it’s paid - from $79 per license. By the way, Windows 8 will have a built-in ability to transfer your entire work environment to a USB drive and boot directly from it. In the meantime, you will have to be content with the above method. Good luck with your installation!

It is best to learn how to install the OS yourself, and there are a number of reasons for this: savings, the ability to do it at any time and not depend on anyone, anonymity and security (no one but you will touch your computer), etc. In this article you will learn how to install Windows 7 from a flash drive on a computer or laptop.

Burning windows to a flash drive

In order to burn an ISO image of Windows 7 onto a flash drive, I use and recommend the rufus program to everyone. It is the simplest, free, quickly and correctly records any system. I have already written about all the advantages of the utility. It is so simple that you don’t have to follow the link and study it, but download it right away - https://yadi.sk/d/DUW30yh93RLmZq

Preparing for installation

The correct installation is considered if you format the “C” drive. This is extremely necessary for the correct operation of the new system, and also, with the help of formatting, all viruses and useless and unnecessary files are removed. As you already understood, before starting the installation, you need to move all the information you need to another drive so that you can erase everything from the “C” drive. If you have only one partition and there is nowhere to move it, or save important information to a flash drive.

Installing Windows 7 OS

All manuals on the Internet have a BIOS setup step, but we will do without it. Why touch it again if there is a way to get by.

1. After you have written Windows 7 to a USB flash drive and saved all the important information, insert the USB drive and restart your laptop/computer. When starting the PC, you need to call the BOOT menu to select a flash drive to boot, not a hard drive.

How to callBOOT menu:

Got it? Now, when you turn on the PC, call up the boot menu and select the flash drive with the system.

1. If all of the above was done correctly, and after choosing to load the flash drive, you will see this window:

This means that everything is fine, and you need to press any button once.

1. Select your native language and click “next”.

1. A simple point where you need to click “install” and proceed to the next installation step.

It's best to set it to maximum.

1. Check the box that you agree.

1. Full installation or update. We need to click "full".

1. We select the HDD partition we need, i.e. drive “C” and click disk settings.

1. Click “format”. (all information on it will be destroyed). We talked about this above.

1. Confirm formatting and click next.

1. The installation has started. Now it takes time (3-15 minutes) until the operating system is copied from the flash drive to your computer and installed.

12. Enter your name (nickname) and computer name and move on.

13. Set a password (if necessary), this is optional.

14. You must enter your product license key. Click next and we'll talk about it below.

16. Set the date and time. To prevent the clock from getting lost after each reboot, set your time zone.

17. Set up your Internet connection. If your computer is at home, select 1 item.

1. All! Congratulations, you did it. Windows 7 has been successfully installed.

Installation completed. What's next?

Installing the operating system took you about 20 minutes, it would seem that’s all, but I have to disappoint you because... now you need to install everything else:

• Drivers. If you still have disks that came with your computer/laptop, use them. If not, I recommend downloading the “DriverPack Solution” program and it will select all the necessary drivers and install them.
• Download and install all the programs you need, including: browsers, flash player, directx, microsoft visual c++ and microsoft net framework.
• Customize your computer for yourself. Create the necessary shortcuts on the desktop, change their scale (size) by holding ctrl and scrolling the mouse wheel, configure the video card (if necessary), and everything else.

Also, more than likely, you installed an unlicensed Windows, and of course you do not have an activation key. It's not scary, and you can activate it in 2 minutes. I wrote how to do this.

How to install OS from USB: Video

Results of the work done

Most of what was written above was not necessary, but for proper installation it is recommended to do so. As a result, you received a fully working computer that works like new without spending your savings on it. Now you can reinstall the OS yourself and configure it in less than an hour (this time is equal to the time you would have spent transporting it to a service center).

It doesn’t matter whether you need to install Windows 7 via a USB flash drive on a laptop or install Windows 10 via a boot disk on a computer, or vice versa in any combination, this article will solve your problem quickly and without nerves. Installing Windows 7 from a flash drive to a laptop in clear language - installing Windows 10 on a computer step by step.

After we have selected and downloaded a version of windows suitable for our PC and purposes in the form of an ISO image. We create a bootable DVD or bootable USB flash drive. We do not recommend installing Windows from another operating system; most likely you will not succeed.
Installation of Windows 10, windows 7 and any other version takes place in three stages. First, we boot from the media (flash drive or disk we created), which is already prepared in advance. We install the system and configure it. The following provides detailed instructions.

How to boot the system from media.
The first way to download a program is to select it from the boot menu on the media BOOT menu. This option is the simplest, as it does not create the need to change anything after the system is installed. It is recommended for those who have a relatively new device. With older computers, this boot path may cause problems.
The second way is that you need . It is possible for all computers, however, if you do not have the necessary skills, it may seem difficult. This is due to the fact that after Windows is installed, all settings are reverted back.
Let's start with the first method.
When the Windows logo or motherboard information appears on the screen, you need to press a key. This opens the BOOT menu.
There is no single key for all companies and motherboards. In order to find the desired key, enter a query with the name of your computer model into a search engine. For example, "LENOVO Legion Y520-15IKBN enter boot menu"
It is important that if the fast boot function is enabled on your computer, you may not get to the menu.
In order to disable the fast boot function, you must follow the following path: Control Panel – System and Security – Power Options – Actions of the power buttons. Uncheck the “Enable fast boot” checkbox.
So, to boot the system from media, you need to:

Connect the media to the computer.
Reboot the system, and while your equipment is turning on, go to the boot menu.
Select the desired media, then press Enter; if the command Press any key to boot from CD\USB appears, press Enter again.
Start installing Windows.

For those who perceive information better through video, we recommend watching the video instructions on how to install Windows 7 from a flash drive.

Video review of how to install Windows 10 from a flash drive or disk. A guide for dummies.

Connect the media to your computer. There is a specific key to open the BIOS. But since the basic system is varied, there are different keys for each type. Therefore, the following description will be universal and not specific for certain models.
To use this method, it is best to know at least a little English. Carry out the installation strictly according to the instructions. A step to the left, a step to the right - and some equipment may be damaged.
After you have opened the BIOS, look in the menu for Boot, Boot Options or Boot Priority.
Having opened the “First” section, select “Next”, and then select “media”. And again – Enter.
Be sure to check out the other items. They should show the Hard Disk device. If this is not the case, then set it manually.
Save your work and close the base system.
The BIOS settings are individual for each device. Therefore, it is best to search the Internet for a specific case.
Once you have exited the BIOS, the computer will begin to reboot and detect your media. If the command comes up again: “Press any key to boot from CD\USB” – press some button on the keyboard.
When the computer reboots for the first time, you need to go into the BIOS again and return all the settings back.
Installation of the Windows operating system.
It is important that before installation you need to save all important files from drive “C”, because during the process it will be formatted.
First, you need to select the Windows bitness if your computer asks for it. There are 32- or 64-bit bits. But there can only be one of them on the media. Then you can skip this step.
The OC manager window will appear on the screen: Image.
If you are inactive for 30 seconds, the computer itself will select the first bit in the list. Therefore, decide in advance what kind of system you need.
After you click on the bit depth, the system logo will pop up on the screen, but the system icon will be missing. It will appear after the download manager scans the files on the flash drive or disk.
Now you should select the language and set the options. It is important that you can change the language only after installation, but not at the moment. Other parameters, such as keyboard layout, date and time, can also be changed.
Once you have set everything, press "Enter".
Next, you will need to enter the license key. You don't have to choose.
Now you need to select the OS edition. It is associated with the image that is on the bootable media. For example, home or professional edition.
It is important to choose exactly the one to which there is a key. Keep in mind that the key from the home edition will not fit the professional edition and vice versa.
Next you will be asked to read the license agreement. Read the document and accept it if you are satisfied with everything in it.
However, if you don’t like something about it, you won’t be able to install Windows.
Since we are considering installation from scratch, as soon as you are asked to select an installation option, click on the “custom installation” item. But you can take a simpler route and update your system.
Click on the drive where you decided to install the OS.
If you are installing an operating system on your computer for the first time, then free space will be available. In this case, you need to select partitions in the hard drive.
By clicking “Create”, write the volume of the section, and then “Apply”. Do this until you have the number of sections you need.
The “C” drive on which Windows will be installed requires about 30 GB.
If the computer already has partitions, then you need to select drive “C”, format and delete. Then there is a free space where you should create a partition by specifying the largest partition possible. This is the newly created “C” drive.
Do not do anything with other drives, otherwise you risk losing all the files on your computer. In order to expand them, use certain programs.
Finally, select drive “C” and finish installing the operating system.
This may take a long time and the computer will restart several times. However, do not perform any actions with it until the first settings window appears.

After you have read - installing windows 7 from a flash drive on a laptop in clear language and successfully installed, we recommend installing

Installing Windows on a laptop from a flash drive or disk via BIOS, problems installing Windows 7 are the most common problems when installing Windows 7, we will look at them all here. These recommendations and installation instructions also work not only for a laptop, but also for a computer and for installing any version of Windows. Since a laptop is essentially no different from a computer, the installation of all versions of Windows works according to a similar scheme.

I myself don’t like to read a lot, much less write a lot. That’s why everything here is written in the most understandable language, without fluff and verbiage for SEO search engines. Even an autistic person will understand it.
- So, download the image itself from Windows 7 to your laptop or computer, the image format is ISO, the most stable build of Windows 7 or the original image of Windows 7 can be found on our website and downloaded via a torrent client. To make sure that the file is downloaded entirely and without errors, we check the checksums; if you don’t know what it is, then we don’t bother and don’t check it; most often the image is downloaded without problems.

Now we need to create a bootable USB flash drive or a bootable DVD disc. To do this, you need to use the UltraISO program or the Rufus program.

We insert our boot disk into the disk drive of a laptop or computer, or the created bootable flash drive into a USB connector. On relatively new PCs there are two types of USB. USB2.0 and USB3.0. So you need to insert it into USB2.0. If you don’t know where which ones are, try inserting them into different connectors and see what works.

Now we need the laptop or computer to boot from our boot DVD or flash drive. Besides how to do this through the BIOS, there is a much simpler and faster option. Just call the BOOT menu and there we select the media from which we want to boot.
The keys that call up the boot menu are different for each laptop, look at the picture with the table below and determine which button calls up the boot menu on your computer or laptop.

If you still want to configure the BIOS for installing Windows 7, then keep in mind two things: after the first installation stage, at the time of reboot, do not forget to remove the USB flash drive or remove the disk from the DVD drive, otherwise the first installation stage will be repeated endlessly. And that after installation you will have to change the priority back in the BIOS from the flash drive to your hard drive.

The BIOS window is called up by the button indicated in the same table above, slightly different for each manufacturer. Either the DEL or F2 button. Next, select the Boot tab and there we see the line Boot device Priority. We go there and put our storage media, either a flash drive or a DVD drive, in the top place, and don’t forget to go to the Exit tab and select the Exit & Save Changes line there so that all changes are saved.

That's it, our BIOS is configured for installing Windows 7. Now we boot from our flash drive or disk and install Windows 7 in semi-automatic mode, choosing our parameters.

Upon completion of the win7 installation, do not forget to activate windows 7, then install the windows drivers and update the system from the Internet or from the standalone windows 7 SP1 update package.