WinXP and Win7 installer on one USB

Discussion in 'Software' started by jacklantern, May 9, 2011.

  1. jacklantern

    jacklantern Private E-2

    Just want to ask if its possible to create a bootable USB holding WinXP and Win7 installers. Any help, advice, idea would be appreciated.
     
  2. abekl

    abekl First Sergeant

    I don't think what you're trying to do is possible.
     
  3. jacklantern

    jacklantern Private E-2

    What if I could divide a USB drive to two different partitions and make them both bootable? Or is this impossible too?
     
  4. abekl

    abekl First Sergeant

    I've never partitioned a USB flash drive into two partitions. I guess in theory it could work.
     
  5. mcsmc

    mcsmc MajorGeek

    How about 2 USB sticks? They're most certainly cheap enough, and small enough. It'd be much easier than trying to put both on one.
     
  6. tgell

    tgell Major Geek Extraordinaire

  7. Earthling

    Earthling Interplanetary Geek

    Grub4DOS will boot multiple ISOs straight off a flash or hard drive. I use it as my boot manager and have a choice of ISOs at boot time, in addition to the installed OSs. Very easy to set up and configure. Excellent guide HERE. No boot manager will succeed in booting every ISO though, so it may or may not work with the XP and Win 7 ISOs.
     
  8. jacklantern

    jacklantern Private E-2

    Thanks for the tips guys.

    While looking at Grub4DOS, I encountered this nifty program (WinSetupFromUSB) and I successfully created the multi-OS installer boot easily.
     
  9. collinsl

    collinsl MajorGeek

    Some computers (older ones mainly) don't like having multiple partitions on a USB drive. Just something to think about.
     
  10. Earthling

    Earthling Interplanetary Geek

    You don't have to have multiple partitions for multiple ISOs.
     
  11. collinsl

    collinsl MajorGeek

    Yes, but ISOs are not bootable unless extracted or mounted.
     
  12. Earthling

    Earthling Interplanetary Geek

    See my earlier post about Grub4DOS. I have five bootable ISOs on my start menu, plus Win 7 and XP as installed OSs.
     
  13. asher_friends

    asher_friends Private First Class

    Hi guys....I have created a bootable menu using grub....but except windows vista and windows 7 everything is loading...I dont know why...Please help...


    splashimage /bgimage/yourimage.xpm.gz
    color blue/black yellow/blue
    timeout 120

    title Ultimate Boot CD For Windows
    map (hd0,0)/U_B_C_D_4_WIN.iso (hd32)
    map --hook
    chainloader (hd32)
    boot

    title XP home
    map (hd0,0)/Install_XP_home_SP2.iso (hd32)
    map --hook
    chainloader (hd32)
    boot

    title Vista
    map (hd0,0)/InstallVista.iso (hd32)
    map --hook
    chainloader (hd32)
    boot

    title Win 7
    map (hd0,0)/Win764bit.iso (hd64)
    map --hook
    chainloader (hd32)
    boot

    title spinrite
    map (hd0,0)/SpinRite.iso (hd32)
    map --hook
    chainloader (hd32)
    boot

    title Vista Recovery
    map (hd0,0)/Windows 7 64-bit Repair Disc.iso (hd32)
    map --hook
    chainloader (hd32)
    boot

    title Xp Recovery
    map (hd0,0)/rc.iso (hd32)
    map --hook
    chainloader (hd32)
    boot

    title
    kernal
    initrd

    title Restart The Computer
    reboot

    Whenever I try to boot Windows 7...it says error 13 .... file cannot be extracted etc etc....Please help me guys..I thought after using grub4 dos...and putting iso images, it would boot......but windows 7 image doesnt booting at all. Any ideas geeks:major
     
  14. Earthling

    Earthling Interplanetary Geek

    You need to add a line after timeout to tell it what to do when it times out.

    Try default 0, where 0 is the first item in the list. So if you want XP as default it's default 1. During the timeout you can use the up/down arrows to select an alternate boot.
     
  15. asher_friends

    asher_friends Private First Class

    Wow...thank you for quick reply....... but problem I have is not with time out ..... I can boot other options... except windows 7 and vista.....why is that...any suggestions would be helpful...thank you
     
  16. Earthling

    Earthling Interplanetary Geek

    Sorry - misunderstood your problem. You cannot run either 7 or Vista from an iso, they have to be installed to a hard disk. Also your entries, if they worked, would only install 7 or Vista, not run them, so not very useful. You can run Linux from an iso, but not Windows.
     
  17. asher_friends

    asher_friends Private First Class

    @earthling.....so shud I extract them and make file bootable??
     
  18. Earthling

    Earthling Interplanetary Geek

    If these files are ISOs of original Windows disks then I believe it may be possible to extract them to a different disk or partition and perform what is called a 'flat install' to a different disk or partition. Or simply burnt as an ISO to DVD, i.e not just copied. For that you could use Imgburn or any good burner. Don't see how you can usefully use them in Grub though.
     

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