USB flash drives are a great way to store boot and systems files.
It’s not uncommon for personal computer owners to discover that their computer running Windows 2000 is unbootable. Though such an occurrence may cause some PC owners to panic, you don’t need to be one of them. It is possible and not difficult to create a bootable USB drive that will support Windows 2000 and ensure that fixing an unbootable computer is as simple as inserting the USB drive into your computer.
Step 1
Insert the Windows 2000 installation disc, the restore disc or boot CD into the computer’s optical drive.
Step 2
Navigate to the disc’s «Boot» folder.
Step 3
Locate and copy «bootsect.exe» to the computer’s C: folder.
Step 4
Insert the USB drive into one of the computer’s USB slots. Right-click the drive within «My Computer» and select «Format.»
Step 5
Double-click on «My Computer» on the desktop or select «Computer» from the «Start» menu.
Step 6
Locate the USB drive within the «My Computer» directory. Rick-click on the USB drive. Select the «Format» option. Select the «FAT32» option within the «Format» option. Click «OK» or «Start.»
Step 7
Click on the «Start» button on the bottom left of the screen. Click on «Accessories.» Right-click «Command Prompt.» Select «Run As Administrator.» Enter the appropriate password, if necessary.
Step 8
Type «diskpart» into the Command Prompt window. Press the «Enter» key on the computer’s keyboard.
Step 9
Type «list volume» into the Command Prompt window. Press the «Enter» key. A list of all available drives will appear. Locate the USB drive, which will be identified as removable media. Write down the USB drive’s associated volume number and letter (which may be identified as Ltr).
Step 10
Type «select volume X,» replacing X with the appropriate volume number provided in Step 9. Press the «Enter» key.
Step 11
Type «activate.» Press «Enter.»
Step 12
Type «exit.» Press «Enter.»
Step 13
Type «cd C:\» if the command prompt reads»C:>_.»
Step 14
Type «bootsect.exe /nt60 X:,» replacing X with the appropriate letter (Ltr) provided in Step 9. Press «Enter.»
Step 15
Type «xcopy X:. /s/e/f Y:.» Replace «X» with the appropriate drive letter for your CD drive (this is often «D» or «E»). Replace «Y» with the appropriate drive letter for your flash drive (this is often «E,» «F» or «G»). Allow the files to copy onto the USB drive.
As we all know that Microsoft already launched a tool for making USB bootable and install Windows 7 via USB but still we have to go for CD or DVD boot menu in order to install Windows 2000/XP/2003. But here is a way for making possible to install via USB the same. Just follow some simple steps while fulfilling few pre requisites.
Pre requisites to be fulfilled:
-
Windows 2000/Xp/2003 source installation files.
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WinSetupUSB tool
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USB Storage Drive (PEN DRIVE) of atleast 1 GB
Steps to follow:
First of all get the tool downloaded and install it from here. Here are the steps of installation with screen shots.
Install 1:
Install 2:
Install 3:
Install 4:
Install 5:
Install 6:
Now after the installation finishes, simply plug your pen drive and ensure that it is ready.
You can see below the GUI of tool after its installation. Just have a look over it and option being provided by it.
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First of all browse for the source of installation files of Windows 2000/XP/2003.
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Now USB disk selection is for selecting the USB drive which is to made bootable for installation.
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Either your USB get automatically reognized else click on refresh for it. If your USB disk is not displayed make sure it’s formatted and has MBR and an active partition.
Use the buttons, launching HP USB format utility or PEtoUSB for disks < 2GB and format your USB disk. Click Refresh button to refresh USB disk information. -
Uncheck the check box entitled as: Copy setup boot files only.
GUI:
PE2USB:
As you select the appropriate USB drive click on start and the USB will get formatted and ready to become bootable. Now simply click on the GO button from main Window of tool It’ll take few minutes and following confirmation you’ll get:
Now reastart the PC and keep USB plugged in. Choose boot from USB and follow the 3-Steps Installation.
Start from USB 3 times while keeping USB plugged in for whole time. The 3-Steps installtion process includes:
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Text mode part of setup
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GUI mode part of setup
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Start Windows for first time
Ensure that USB is always plugged and do not power off in between.
Source code of the tool can be seen where it gets installed as it is an open source product from MSFN.
Thats all !!! Happy Windows Computing !
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I’d like to install Windows 2000 from USB flash disk. I’ve tried many different programs described here but they either don’t support Windows 2000 source, don’t run in Windows 2000 or even if I finally manage to transfer the source to the flash disk, there are always errors during text setup.
Is there any program that you can say for sure that it supports Windows 2000?
Did you try WinSetupFromUSB 1.0 beta7?
Do you need to run the program on WIndows 2000 , or just need to put 2000 on USB stick from XP/Vista/7?
You may want to get «back to the basics», follow this:
and report the EXACT errors/problems you find (if any).
jaclaz
- Author
Posted
Did you try WinSetupFromUSB 1.0 beta7?
Do you need to run the program on WIndows 2000 , or just need to put 2000 on USB stick from XP/Vista/7?
I’d prefer to run it in Windows 2000 if possible.
I tried WinSetupFromUSB but I get this when trying to format the drive:
I tried WinSetupFromUSB but I get this when trying to format the drive:
That is seemingly related to the RMPREPUSB only.
Partition/format the device manually.
A «not-so-simple» approach (BUT surely working on 2K as it was actually developed on 2K), is detailed here:
http://reboot.pro/5000/
http://reboot.pro/5000/page__st__1
I will anyway «ping» steve6375 (RMPREPUSB Author ) to let him know about the issue you reported.
jaclaz
- Author
Posted
Actually my system is pretty unstable at the moment so this problem may not be necessary related to the RMPREPUSB.
I guess I need to a clean installation. I’ll see if RMPREPUSB works after doing so.
Actually my system is pretty unstable at the moment so this problem may not be necessary related to the RMPREPUSB.
I guess I need to a clean installation. I’ll see if RMPREPUSB works after doing so.
Also, Steve6375 just:
- confirmed that RMPREPUSB was never tested on 2K
- hinted that the problem may be caused by the differences in the FormatEX API between 2K and XP (and as such not easily solvable )
You may try formatting as FAT32 instead of NTFS, but you are currently working in a totally UNexplored ground.
jaclaz
I’ve also never tested WinSetupFromUSB on Windows 2000 as a host OS, nor can recall any reports anyone had.
- 2 weeks later…
- Author
Posted
I reinstalled my system and tried to run RMPREPUSB once again but it’s the same as before. It doesn’t matter whether it’s set to FAT or NTFS. Bootice also doesn’t seem to work.
Is there any other program I could use to prepare the drive for WinSetupFromUSB?
Did you try WinSetupFromUSB 1.0 beta7?
Do you need to run the program on WIndows 2000 , or just need to put 2000 on USB stick from XP/Vista/7?
I’d prefer to run it in Windows 2000 if possible.
I tried WinSetupFromUSB but I get this when trying to format the drive:
Did you try if the stick is bootable, ignoring the error message? From what I can see RMPrepUSB did its job.
I reinstalled my system and tried to run RMPREPUSB once again but it’s the same as before. It doesn’t matter whether it’s set to FAT or NTFS. Bootice also doesn’t seem to work.
Is there any other program I could use to prepare the drive for WinSetupFromUSB?
There are also FBinst/FBinstTool (you need to google a bit or search in reboot.pro for its usage) and PEtoUSB (limited to 2(4) GB disks) in \files\tools folder. You may also use HP USB format utility which is included in 0.2.3 version.
Under 2000 you also might be good simply to use the built in disk management.
- Author
Posted
(edited)
PEtoUSB doesn’t work.
I can format the drive using HP USB and I’ve already tried it before but the problem is that it’s still not detected in WinSetupFromUSB.
What system files exactly do these program use when formatting the drive? Format.com? Would replacing the 2K native format.com with the one from XP help?
Edited by tomasz86
PEtoUSB doesn’t work.
Have you tried another flash drive?
I can format the drive using HP USB and I’ve already tried it before but the problem is that it’s still not detected in WinSetupFromUSB.
Which version of HP USB format tool did you use? Later than 2.0.6 if I recall correctly do NOT do the job, 2.0.6 is included in WinSetupFromUSB 0.2.3. Another possibility is that the WMI query if the device has a primary partition does not work that way in Windows 2000 or does not work at all.
What system files exactly do these program use when formatting the drive? Format.com? Would replacing the 2K native format.com with the one from XP help?
They should be using Windows APIs part of kernel.dll, ntdll.dll etc. etc, not executing single files such as format.com and the likes so I wouldn’t be taking this path at all.
Reminder:
Under 2000 you also might be good simply to use the built in disk management.
- Author
Posted
I’ve tried disk management — the drive is still not detected.
HP USB 2.0.6 — also no difference.
BUT I’ve also tried using another drive and this time PEtoUSB worked! However, it’s still not recognised by WinSetupFromUSB
Posted
(edited)
I wonder what is the sense of asking for advice, and then NOT doing what is suggested.
Right now we have NO way to know if there is an actual problem with the way the stick is partitioned/formatted, or if it is an issue of Install Windows from USB when running under 2K that cannot detect a correctly partitioned/formatted stick..
Possible ways to solve this doubt:
- partition/format the stick in a SURELY correct way (see above)
OR: - try the Wnsetup from USB on a machine running XP on the stick «as is».
jaclaz
Edited by jaclaz
You may also try in advanced options in WinSetupFromUSB to select «Display disk drives on all interfaces, not only USB» and press refresh button.
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Table of Contents
Windows 2000 Installation ISOs are not supported by E2B, however WinSetupFromUSB does support Win2K, so we can make a WinSetupfromUSB flash drive and then make an image of the flash drive and add the image file to our E2B drive.
You will need to install the MPI ToolKit to your Windows PC system first and create the MPI_NTFS and other Desktop icons.
Note: The target system that you want to install Win2K to, must contain an IDE disk drive.
You can add Win2K to E2B as follows:
1. Download WinSetupFromUSB
2. Format a spare USB drive as NTFS (e.g. using RMPrepUSB)
3. Mount the Win2K ISO as a virtual drive (e.g. using ImDisk) or extract the contents to a folder
4. Run WinSetupFromUSB and create a bootable USB Flash drive
5. Test that the bootable flash drive can now install Win2K – now we can ‘clone’ the USB drive…
6. Drag-and-Drop the USB Flash drive icon\letter in Windows Explorer to the MPI_NTFS Desktop icon – choose a filename of say C:\temp\Win2K.imgPTN.
7. When prompted – choose Y=Yes to combine menu.lst files
8. Copy the new Win2K.imgPTN file to your E2B USB drive (e.g. copy to \_ISO\MAINMENU or \_ISO\WIN folder).
9 Run \MAKE_THIS_DRIVE_CONTIGUOUS.cmd Now you can boot to E2B and select the Win2K.imgPTN file.
Then choose the Windows XP/2000/2003 Setup menu entry…
Troubleshooting
Stop error 0x00000007B Inaccesible Boot Device – Do not use the ISO on an E2B drive – instead create a WinSetupFromUSB flash drive. Then make a .imgPTN file as described above.usbohci.sys could not be found – see here