[Tutorial]Windows 8 to Go without Enterprise Edition

By ingramator
in Microsoft (Windows)

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Neowinian

nitrobg

Posted
Posted

Oh my god, how many people ran bcdboot.exe from the flash drive after the OP specifically said NOT TO, if you guys can't follow simple instructions, then don't do it. Run the thing from your installation of Windows on your hard drive, not your flash drive.

I've tried this, it didn't work either. Starting the command prompt as an administrator is the solution.

  • 1 month later...
  • 5 weeks later...
  • 1 month later...
Neowinian

nookls

Posted
Posted

Hi, sorry to bump an old thread but when I tried this, the USB wasn't bootable at all. I then realized I forgot the part where you mark the USB as active; however, I couldn't do that. It's greyed out but it doesn't say it's active anywhere - it just says it's a primary partition. I'm on Windows 8 Pro x64 but I'm installing Windows 8 Pro x86 to the USB drive. It's a 64gb USB 2.0, but I'm not that bothered with speed. I have write caching disabled and it's NTFS. I followed the steps pretty much correctly (only issue was forgetting to mark the USB drive as active, and then not being able to do it at all)

 

Any suggestions?

  • 2 months later...
Neowinian

charcoargento

Posted
Posted

Windows_To_Go_USB_Drive.png

Windows to Go

Hey guys this is a tutorial on how to set up a Windows to Go (a live Windows 8 boot) USB using any version of Windows provided you have a copy of Windows 8.

Things you will need:

  • A USB or external HDD with 16GB of space (It is actually possible to do it onto an 8GB drive but depending on its actual formatted capacity you may have to remove a few drivers etc.)
  • A copy of a Windows 8 disc or ISO (Any version is fine including upgrade ones) you can grab a free 90 trial here
  • Less that 30 minutes of time depending on your hardware
Instructions:

  • Locate your Windows 8 disc or ISO and mount it
  • Navigate to \sources and copy the install.wim file to your desktop or other convenient location
  • Insert your USB or HDD and format the partition as NTFS with the default allocation
  • Download the free GImageX (http://www.softpedia...s/GImageX.shtml) and extract it
  • Run the x86 or x64 version depending on the version of Windows you are using
  • Navigate to the "Apply" tab
  • In the source section enter or browse for the location of the install.wim we copied earlier
  • In the destination section enter or browse for the location of the device you want to use for Windows to Go
  • Leave the checkboxes unchecked and hit apply
  • After imaging process is complete navigate to Disk Management (type in partition at search and you will find it)
  • Find the partition you are using for Windows to Go and right click it then -> "Mark partition as active" - this will allow us to boot from this partition, if its already active then don't worry about this step
  • Navigate to your Windows to Go disk and go to \Windows\System32
  • Open up CMD from this location (or change directory to the above folder) and enter
    bcdboot.exe X:\Windows /s X: /f ALL
    where "X" is your Windows To Go drive letter
  • Congratulations! Your Windows to Go device is now ready and all you will have to do is boot from the USB at startup then run through the one time configuration settings!
Tips:

  • Double check the drive letter when flashing the device because if you have other partitions then you will screw them up
  • Use a USB device with a high read/write rate because it will enhance disk IO performance on the machine you are running it on. USB 3.0 and or an SSD will greatly increase performance!
  • Copy a few installers to a folder on the USB for easy setup when you're up and running
  • Try not to unplug your Windows to Go device whilst the computer is still running because it may cause data corruption but if you do you will have 1 minute before it shuts down
  • You can use this method to quickly flash SSDs, HDDs, USBs and SDs with a custom image of Windows 8!
If you have any problem feel free to comment below and PM me!

 

 

Hi there! I followed all these instructions and tried to boot a "windows 8.1 pro TO GO" on a pavilion 5637la, celeron 2.8GHz, 1024MB of ram.

 

Error message was 0x0000000A 

 

Do you have some advise to fix this in order to boot properly? Should I try W8 instead of W8.1? Any suggestions?

 

This computer is running W7 Ultimate, having trouble loading internet heavy pages only.

 

Greetings

  • 3 months later...
Neowinian

Ztruker

Posted
Posted

You're putting temporary files on the installation target. Maybe that's why?

EDIT: The tutorial doesn't mention setting the temp location, I guess.

 

How do you set the temp location? According to the help file it uses the same logic as Imagex which uses %temp% I think. I did try setting D:\temp on the Capture tab but that did not seem to help.

 

I just tried again and after 15 minutes it said there was 75 minutes to go. This is on a Intel 4th Gen I7 3.4 Ghz Quad Core with 16GB of ram and a 250GB SSD  to a new 16GB USB 3.0 Kingston Datatraveler flash drive formatted for NTFS.

 

post-521293-0-44371600-1402801032.jpg

 

As shown, it's using the flash drive for temp files. How do I change this?

  • 5 months later...
Neowinian

salmanr86

Posted
Posted

Hi

Yesterday I made a wtg bootable on win 8 pro on my 1 tb wd Ultra external USB 3 drive.

Installed perfectly and even booted on my Inspiron 1560 however when I try to boot it in my Hp Elite book 8460p and Probook 4530s it says "disk read error"

Can anybody help what am I doing wrong?

  • 2 weeks later...
Grand Master

TPreston

Posted
Posted

Or more likely the 1560 has legacy boot sources enabled and 8460p 4530s have UEFI only

 

Why does my Windows To Go drive have an MBR disk format with a FAT32 system partition?
This is done to allow Windows To Go to boot from UEFI and legacy systems.

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-ie/library/jj592680.aspx#wtg_faq_fatmbr

 

If you want compatibility with both you need a usb drive that is a fixed disk and can have a FAT32 system partition AND an NTFS windows partition.

  • 4 months later...
Neowinian

rlyster

Posted
Posted

Wondering....  I've got a laptop with a full internal hard dik and have just bought a new WD passport USB 3.0 external drive with twice the capacity.  I would like to move all of my programs (not just the OS) to the external drive and run everything from there.  Once I have the Windows-to-go up and running, is there a simple way to get everything else running there as well - or do I have to re-install everything from scratch?  Also, will the old internal drive be visible to the system when running from the new external drive?

Contributor

whs37

Posted
Posted

Your choice, but a WD passport is not a good device to run an OS from an external drive. I would recommend to use a SSD.

 

And yes, once you have installed the OS on an external drive, you can do everything with it as if it were an internal drive. Try it with the Windows 10TP. There you do not need a product key. Here is how. My tutorial says Flash drive, but a disk would be the same.

  • 1 month later...
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