If you've poked around PC World in recent weeks, you've learned. Today, let's talk about one of my favorite approaches for installing Windows 8, well, anywhere: by way of a flash drive.See, when you download something like the (which anybody can check out, not just developers), you're left with an ISO file that must be burned to a DVD before you can actually install it.

• Windows 8.1 Repair Tool
• How To Install Windows 8.1 With Usb

Or must it?The lets you copy that ISO file to a flash drive, then use that drive to install Windows. And don't let the name fool you: although the 1MB utility says it's for Windows 7, it works like a charm with Windows 8. (Also notwithstanding its name, there's no real downloading involved.)For this task you'll need a flash drive with at least 8GB of available storage.

The utility will necessarily erase everything on the drive as part of the setup process, so make sure you've offloaded any important data. You'll also need to have if you haven't already. I recommend the x64 version without the developer tools, though you may want to choose the x86 version if you're planning to install it on an older PC with limited RAM (i.e. 3GB or less).Once you run the utility, it's a simple four-step process to select the ISO file, wipe the USB drive, make it bootable, and load Windows 8. So simple, in fact, that I'm not going to reiterate the steps here.

But allow 10-20 minutes for the job to finish.When you're done, you can 'safely eject' the drive, then pop it into whatever PC is going to be your Windows 8 guinea pig. (If you have trouble booting from the drive, consult your manual; you may need to tweak the BIOS settings.)I'm sorry to say you can't actually run Windows 8 from the flash drive like you can some versions of Linux; you'll have to go as far as to install it. But it'll be a lot faster going with the flash drive than it would be with a DVD.

Plus, you can load it on a netbook, ultrabook, or any other system that lacks an optical drive.Contributing Editor writes about business and consumer technology. Ask for help with your PC hassles at hasslefree@pcworld.com, or try the treasure trove of helpful folks in the. Sign up to have the e-mailed to you each week.

How to CLEAN Install Windows 8 directly from Hard drive – NO DVD or USB needed! For example, you have a netbook or desktop that you want to install Windows 8 onto, but can’t use DVD or USB for whatever reason (or don't want to, like me).

This method will allow you to boot and install Windows directly from the hard drive. This guide involves plugging the hard drive into another working computer, preparing the hard drive, placing it back in the system, and installing Windows as usual. This was tested with Windows 8 and Windows 8.1. The guide for Windows 7 is exactly the same. Using Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7, or Windows 8 open CMD as Administrator (Windows key + R, type CMD, hit Enter) Enter the following commands, (replace X with what applies to your hard drive): diskpart list disk select disk X list partition select partition X active exit X:bootbootsect.exe /nt60 X: (See picture for example) Exit and shutdown. Note: If you’re working on a 32-bit system, and you want to install 64-bit Windows, you may get problems trying to run the last command (X:bootbootsect.exe /nt60 X:). Solutions: Use a computer with a 64-bit version of Windows OR A little trick that worked for me: If you have a 32-bit Windows 8 disc, you can copy bootsect.exe from that and replace the 64-bit one (bootbootsect.exe).

I just finished building a gaming desktop from components for the kids, and experienced major issues while trying to install Windows 10 from USB drive. I didn't find a right tutorial by Googling the issue, but managed to do installing with the following steps.

I'm a Mac user, so first I downloaded the Windows 10 ISO file and purchased license from After downloading the file, I made it bootable USB drive using the following commands in my Mac's terminal: 1. Diskutil list - Locate the USB drive 2. Diskutil eraseDisk MS-DOS 'WIN10' GPT disk# - Replace '#' with the USB drive number 3. Hdiutil mount /Downloads/#.iso - Replace '#' with your ISO file name, and modify the file path, if it isn't in your 'Downloads' folder.

Cp -rp /Volumes/#/. /Volumes/WIN10/ - Replace '#' with the name of the mounted volume.

Hdiutil unmount /Volumes/# - Replace '#' with the name of the mounted volume. Then I took the USB drive and plugged it into my PC setup. Start the computer while holding and pressing F2, or similar, to enter BIOS settings. Modify boot order so that the computer boots from the USB drive's 1.

Reboot the computer, and it should start in Windows 10 installing mode. Instead of 'Install', select 'Fix my computer', or similar. Select 'Command Prompt' to enter DOS. I created two disk partitions for the hard drive in DOS.

Select disk # - Replace '#' with the hard drive number. Create partition primary size=10000 - This will create a 10 Gb partition that you will use for storing Windows 10 install files 6. Assign letter=D 7. Create partition primary size=500000 - This will create another partition where the Windows 10 will be installed.

Modify the size according to your needs and size of the disk. Assign letter=C 9. Opnet modeler 14.0 license plates.

List volume - Take note of the assigned letters to each volume. Select volume # - Replace '#' with the number of the volume D 11. Format fs=ntfs quick 12. Select volume # - Replace '#' with the number of the volume C 13.

Windows 8.1 Repair Tool

Format fs=ntfs quick 14. Xcopy #: /s d: - Replace '#' with the assigned letter of the USB drive I shut down the computer, removed the USB drive, and the Windows 10 installation functioned without problems. I selected the volume C as the location of the installation.

I hope this helps someone. I see many people on here having trouble.

How To Install Windows 8.1 With Usb

What this person has posted, not only have I done it the way it was posted, removing the drive etc, however you can literally create your own USB bootable drive the same way, or even better, you can copy the files to a VHD or use your ISO from your C: drive. Yes, the last one is more difficult but let me give you all some direction and options that work.Using a tool to create a USB bootable Drive.Using the prompt to create a USB BOOTABLE DRIVE.Booting from a VHD on C drive with the setup files on it.Booting from an ISO on C drive with the files on it.Creating a 5 gig Partition( d:) and copying the ISO files to it and booting from it.Copying the ISO files to C: or D: and booting from it.Booting from a USB drive using a VHD or ISO.

What is needed to do the above stuff is done for many reasons. You want a quick way to Install windows, you don't have flash drive or your flash drive is too slow, or you have one flash drive and can't give up the space on it to do your deed. Now I am going to provide you with some good helpful tools that go above using the DOS prompt, DISKPART, BCDEDIT, bcdboot, BOOTSECT, etc. Of course these are handy to know, however, some tools help too. Creating a bootable drive, USB, VHD is kind of simple using DOS, but getting into the command line BCD bull, well, even I don't like it if I don't have to.

So in come programs Like RUFUS, EasyBCD and Easy2boot. All these are GUI, so no promp knowledge is needed. You can use EasyBCD to boot to a VHD on C, Set up a Native BOOT, BOOT From an ISO etc.

A free and totally cool program that even fixes up your BCD, instead of using the command line to create a new bcd store. You can Use RUFAS to make a bootable USB Flash Drive and windows to go drive, and not have to buy a special drive for that.

And my third favorite, is using Easy2boot. IT is totally cool.

Easy2boot, requires things, flash drive, easy2boot setup program and the ISO of your choice. Use easy2boot to create your UEFI/BIOS multiboot USB, then (copy) your ISO to the windows folder that is on the USB which was made by Easy2Boot. The bigger the drive, the more ISOes you can copy onto it. Then boot it, and it creates a menu that will find the ISO and show you as a choice.

The DEMO of it is on YOUTUBE. RUfas is cool, as it will prep your drive to boot either EFI or BIOS and it does extract and copy the setup files. More time consuming. EasyBCD is cool too. No matter which partition or HDD you put it on, it will boot an ISO, VHD, or WimRE and I forgot, it will boot LINUX too to put it on your computer. I even used to set up a USB drive after I copied the files to it and make it bootable. I have used other USB tools and BCD tools, but these are the easiest and most useful.

Have a nice day. Any questions or need some direction, leave me a reply. I know people read directions on the web and seem to have a hard time still getting it to work or someone leaves out a vital part that needs it to be working only by mistake. Note: Linux supports Multi partitions on USB flash drives.

As of Windows 10 release 1703, it supports and sees more than one partition. This way, can create two partitions, a recovery boot partition and second larger partition to dump windows setup on it. Or a wim, pending your choice of installing windows. Remember ONE large file copies faster to a USB then extracting. So if you copied on your HDD the files from a mounted ISO to VHD you can just copy the VHD to the second partition. After booting to the first Partition, you need a little know using DISKPART, and mount the VHD on the second partition.

Then you can run setup from the VHD without troubling with using an ISO or not, just use Easy2boot, and copy the ISO to the Windows 7, windows 8 or Windows 10 folder and boot and install.