Let’s say you want to install Microsoft Windows on a computer, but the computer has no CD/DVD drive. Can you say “Netbook”?
Or, in the case of SBS 2011, the downloadable .iso file is +6GB in size, which means you are not going to burn this to a standard DVD drive; you will need a newer double layer DVD drive, and double layer media!
A better alternative is to put your iso image onto a bootable USB drive. Most newer workstaitons and servers all support booting from a USB drive. On Dell computers, you can usually press F12 at power up time to select the device you wish to boot from. I’m sure there are tons of web sites telling you how to do this, but I’m posting it here so I can find it in the future. (And a tip of the hat to Mikael Nystrom from the instructions!)
One note before you being: if your target system is 64 bit, then you need to do these instructions from a 64 bit computer; likewise you need to do these steps from a 32 bit computer if your target system is 32 bit.
How to create a bootable USB Stick
- Insert USB stick in Win7/2008R2 box
- Start – Run – CMD
- DISKPART
- List Disk (notice the number of the your USB stick)
- Sel Disk 5 (if the number was 5)
- Clean (will erase the disk)
- Cre Part Pri (will create a primary partition)
- Sel Part 1 (select the partition just created)
- Active (will make it active)
- Format FS=NTFS QUICK (will format the drive)
- Assign (will give it a drive letter)
- Exit (will close Diskpart)
Now you have a bootable USB stick, the only thing you need to is a bootmgr and a OS, easiest way is to insert the normal OS install DVD and xcopy DVD:\ to USB:\ /s Done