VERSION 0.2.1 BETA Release date 29/October/2005-by Jacopo Lazzari

EVERYTHING YOU EVER WANTED TO KNOW ABOUT BOOTING FROM AN USB PENDRIVE ... AND DARED TO ASK

FAQS (frequently asked questions)

FOREWORD:

From the feedback I received since the original VERSION 0.1 ALPHA Release date 02/April/2005 was published, I noticed that the document is evidently not clear enough in some parts, so I am gathering here some FAQS and their answers, to help people "in a hurry" to get faster the info they are looking for.

FAQ #1

Question:

Can I boot Windows (NT 4.00/2000/XP/Server 2003) from a USB stick?

Short Answer:

NO. Let me type it slowly, N - O, there is NO known way at the moment to boot ANY of the above operating systems directly from an USB pendrive. (but read Long Answer below).

I sincerely hope that someone will prove I am wrong on this topic.

Ok, text above corrected on the 29th October 2005, someone did prove me wrong, see below...

BREAKING NEWS! It seems like Dietmar has found a way! Read this thread at 911CD forums:
http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?showtopic=14181

FAQ #4

Question:

Do I really have to read all your lenghty article to learn how to make a USB key bootable?

Short Answer:

No, just Google for "USB boot howto" or "USB bootable howto" (WITHOUT quotes) and you'll find quite a lot of easier tutorials.

Long answer:

If you plan to use your key on just one computer (a newish model with good USB support) or to a series of computers all complying to the said USB support, this guide here will be enough:

http://www.bay-wolf.com/usbmemstick.htm
it is simple, it is graphic and it has links to needed files, what do you want more?

As a side note, you can try formatting as FAT instead of FAT32, if the latter does not work on your PC, see this article also:

http://fuzzymunchkin.dyndns.org:8080/tdot/usbkeyfob/index.php
that covers also Linux booting and is at the moment both in English and German (French is expected soon)

FAQ #5

Question:

My motherboard does not support booting from an USB device, what can I do?

Short (and rude) Answer:

Buy a new one.

Long (and polite) Answer:

There are several ways to boot from a floppy then run programs on the USB device; traditionally it is just a matter of adding USB DOS drivers to the floppy, info on this drivers can be found here (among many other places):

http://www.stefan2000.com/darkehorse/PC/DOS/Drivers/USB/
http://www.pcxt-micro.com/dos-usb.html
You'll have to experiment both the Panasonic "Motto Hairu" and the Cypress "Duse" drivers to see which fits best your motherboard(s).

Read these also:

http://fd-doc.sourceforge.net/faq/cgi-bin/viewfaq.cgi?faq=General_Information/219

http://www.goosee.com/puppy/boot2pup.htm
Here is a project you should keep an eye on:

http://www.georgpotthast.de/usb/index.html

There is also a new approach using Grub (see answer to FAQ#3 for a link to Grub).

This approach is "hinted" here:

http://www.8ung.at/spblinux/
I did not test it, as soon as I find time to do so I'll add results to the main guide.

FAQ #6

Question:

Why don't you use Partition Magic - Acronis - BootitNG - Flashboot - (any other Commercial/Shareware title) in your guide?

Short Answer:

I have the strongest belief in OpenSource/Freeware programs, which does not mean that Commercial/Shareware programs are evil, but simply that most users (read hobbyists like me) will not be able to afford them.

Long Answer:

Short answer above is long enough.

FAQ #7

Question:

I work as an IT Consultant (in a computer shop/in a big corporation/as technical support) I would like to have an USB stick bootable to quickly deploy OS images to 300 new PC's (to backup data of client PC's/to upgrade software on 150 PC's/whatever) by friday (next week/next month), but I don't understand your guide, can you help me?

Short Answer:

NO.

Long Answer:

No, remember this is just my hobby, besides I did not "invent" anything, just gathered info found on the Internet, if you really are an IT expert, you should already know everything I wrote about, and much more.

FAQ #8

Question:

I managed to boot to DOS from the USB stick but I cannot see my fixed disk, why does that happen?

Short Answer:

Most probably the version of DOS you used does not recognize the filesystem you have on your hard disk.

Long answer:

Each version of the Microsoft DOS based Operating Systems has some limitation regarding filesystems, see following table:

Notes:

1) Long filenames are NOT supported

2) Long filenames are supported ONLY in full GUI mode

3) This version supports Large Disk mode, i.e. disks/partitions with more than 1024 cylinders, ÷

4) You need to patch some code to extract DOS from Windows ME

Same thing applies with FREEDOS, which, at the moment, supports FAT12, FAT16 and FAT32.

There are a few COMMERCIAL apps that can access NTFS filesystems in read/write mode, such as:

http://ntfs.filerecovery.biz/
and products from:

http://www.winternals.com/
the latter has two FREE read-only drivers here:

http://www.sysinternals.com/

http://www.sysinternals.com/Utilities/NtfsWindows98.html (GUI mode)

http://www.sysinternals.com/utilities/ntfsdos.html (DOS mode)
and here is another read-only app from the GUI:

http://diskinternals.com/products/ntfs-reader/

There is however a FREEWARE for PRIVATE use only read/write one:

http://www.datapol.de/dpe/recovery/ntfs/index.html

FAQ #9

Question:

I managed to boot to DOS from the USB stick and I have the drivers for NTFS working, but I made all this to copy data to another disk and it's so slow, why does that happen?

Short Answer:

Most probably the version of DOS you used does not have ULTRADMA capabilities.

Long answer:

If you managed to run on the USB stick some "lite" version of the Win9x graphical interface, you should be able to load in it ULTRADMA drivers, if you are in plain command-line mode, you will need to add real mode ones:

http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/micro/pc-stuff/freedos/files/dos/udma/devel/
http://johnson.tmfc.net/freedos/xdma.html

FAQ #10

Question:

I tried everything you suggested, but I still cannot boot from the USB stick, where am I wrong?

Short Answer:

It is quite possible that you did eveything right but did not try hard enough, on many motherboards USB booting seems to be a procedure involving some magic, see long answer for a list of things that could have possibly gone wrong.

Long answer:

Even if the motherboard supports USB booting, its implementation may be defective, results and direct observation lead to find that there are motherboards with one or more of the following “defects”:

1. motherboards that do not boot from USB when you switch the PC on, but do so after a warm boot (CTRL+ALT+DEL)

2. motherboards that do not boot from USB after a warm boot (CTRL+ALT+DEL), but do so when you switch the PC off then on (cold boot)

3. motherboards that sometime boot and sometime do not

4. motherboards that ONLY boot from USB media formatted as “Superfloppy” (a drive formatted as to have no MBR, but directly the BOOTSECTOR as Sector 0)

5. motherboards that ONLY boot from USB media formatted as “Hard Disk” (a drive that has a “normal” MBR and one or more partitions)

6. motherboards that only boot from a FAT 16 Primary partition (hex 06)

7. motherboards that only boot from a FAT 16 Primary partition (hex 06) or from a VFAT16 (or FAT 16 LBA mapped) Primary partition (hex 0e)

8. motherboards that can boot from Win 9x files but do not with NT/2K/XP/Server 2003 ones or FREEdos ones

9. motherboards that need a setting like "USB keyboard support from BIOS" enabled and some that need it disabled

10. motherboards that will only boot from the "special" ZIP disk like formatting

11. motherboards that will only boot from USB after having "Enabled" the "Reset Configuration Data" in the BIOS

A reasonable troubleshooting path is the following (if you are not lucky enough to get it at first try), I assume that you DID change the setting in BIOS as to boot from USB, didn't you?:

1. Jolt down all current settings in the BIOS (so that you will later be able to restore them)

2. Load "Failsafe settings" in BIOS

3. Disable EVERYTHING you do not need for the test, such as Hard Disk(s), Floppy Disk(s), Audio, etc.

4. Try using a FAT16 (hex06) partition formatted USB key with a MBR (Hard Disk Simulation) and Windows 9x boot files

5. Try switching on and off the "USB keyboard support from BIOS" BIOS setting

6. Try with a Cold boot

7. Try with a Warm boot (CTRL+ALT+DEL)

8. Try after having "Enabled" the "Reset Configuration Data" in the BIOS

9. If you get as far as getting a message on the screen or the Windows 98 bootscreen, DO NOT give up, even if it hangs, as said there some "magic" factor involved, try a couple more times and most probably it will boot, it seems like there is some kind of "timing" problem

10. Loop to # e) after having formatted the key as "Superfloppy" (no MBR)

11. Loop to # e) after having formatted the key as "ZIP" (no MBR and special geometry)

Once you have established that the combination of USB key / motherboard works, you can try some other options, like formatting as VFAT 16 (hex 0e) or FAT/VFAT 32, respectively (hex 0B) or hex (0C), then as NTFS or whatever.