[sdlion]

Windows images that are over 4.3GB(I don't remember the exact max size) most image burning tools will fallback to NTFS on the USB formatting and some motherboards/laptops don't like this. (Even on my rather modern Dell laptop)

The best solution so far I've found is to manually partition the USB into a 1GB FAT32 partition and the rest NTFS. Then you extract the files where needed [0]

I learned this method just last year but it seems it's pretty universal. At least for Win10 ISOs. And I don't have to boot Windows and wait for its updates!

[0] https://techbit.ca/2019/02/creating-a-bootable-windows-10-ue...

[Stratoscope]

I'm as big a Rufus fan as anyone, but for Windows 10 why wouldn't I just use Microsoft's boot image creator?

That's what I've done lately, and it works every time with no fuss.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10

Edit: I just remembered that you might not be on a Windows device, in which case you may well want to download the ISO and use Rufus to make a bootable stick from it.

[chrisandchris]

If you‘re under Windows and want any stick, use Rufus. If you‘re under Linux (or Mac) and have an Iso, use dd.

At least that‘s how I do it.

[foxrider]

WoeUSB is what you have to use on Linux to create a bootable Windows thumbdrive, dd only works for isohybrid images, and Windows isn't one.

[selfhoster11]

WoeUSB hasn't been very reliable for me. I've had better results booting up a Windows VM to use Rufus with USB passthrough to the drive instead.

[wooben]

I'm love/hating this idea because now I want to burn a LiveUSB running Linux with a QEMU Windows VM already set up on it. I can run it live and have Windows 10 "PE" or I can install it to a host and have Windows up and running fairly smoothly without going through the OOBE.

[moistbar]

IIRC you used to be able to make a bootable Windows stick on Linux simply by extracting the contents of the ISO onto a USB stick and marking it bootable. Is that still possible now that EFI is everywhere?

[antibuddy]

My memory is a bit hazy, but I remember dd not working for Windows images. Did you test that recently?

[chrisandchris]

Some SO user mention it seems to work with dd, however I did not test that recently. Most comments seem to mention that it‘s more difficult than dd.

[0] https://unix.stackexchange.com/a/598632

[vetinari]

Normally, for UEFI boot, you could be able just to create a FAT32 partition and copy the ISO content there. In the past, it was perfectly workable way to do so.

Except for the unfortunate install.wim file. The first releases of Windows 10 were fine, they had it under 4GB, but some of the half-year releases have it grown over 4GB, and FAT32 cannot handle that. Thus all the mitigations you see here.

The Microsoft's USB tool does not use install.wim; it contains install.esd instead. It is basically the same thing, but with different compression, so it is still a bit under 4GB. You can recompress install.wim into install.esd, if you have the inclination ...and a windows machine nearby (dism /export-image).

[Strom]

The official Windows media creation tool is a bit of an abomination. Primarily because it is slow and has very quirky requirements that it doesn't advertise and only checks for at the very last second.

You download the tool and want to create a Windows 10 bootable USB, so you run the executable.

Then you find out that it won't let you choose where to save the temporary ISO file that it wants to download. It's hardcoded to the C:\ drive which can easily be a small SSD that is already almost full. You grumble a bit, proceed to delete/move some files off of C:\ so that it could download the ISO and then restart the tool.

This time the download finishes successfully, but after the download you get an error because it turns out it wants to extract what it downloaded - and of course hardcoded to the C:\ drive. You moan a bit, proceed to delete/move even more files off of C:\ and restart the tool.

Third time's the charm right? Well after waiting around forever, it has once again downloaded the ISO and this time also extracted it. Then it informs you that it can't actually create the bootable USB stick because it needs to be run as an administrator. You scratch your head in disbelief, wondering why instead of giving you an error message it doesn't just launch a privilege escalation prompt - or at least have the privilege requirement defined in its manifest.

The fourth time has to work. You manually run it as administrator, it re-downloads & re-extracts the ISO, and you still get the error message that it needs to run as an administrator. What is going on? You google for answers and realize that you've found the only Windows app in existence that is not satisfied with mere privilege escalation but instead demands you to be running directly as the administrator.

You log out of your regular user account, log in as the administrator, re-download & re-extract the ISO - and then finally the tool is willing to create the bootable USB.

...

On the other hand it is possible to create the Windows 10 bootable USB with just the command line [1] and this can be done without having the ISO on your C:\ drive, without having to extract the ISO files to a temporary location before being copied to the USB, or having to directly log in as administrator. A simple escalated privilege command prompt will do just fine.

Thus I'm left wondering what is going on at Microsoft. Did they assign some random intern to create the Windows 10 installation media tool? It is very incompetently made.

--

[1] https://davidzych.com/install-windows-10-from-a-usb-flash-dr...

[userbinator]

Thus I'm left wondering what is going on at Microsoft. Did they assign some random intern to create the Windows 10 installation media tool? It is very incompetently made.

I get the same feeling with a lot of other things in Win10 (which I'm only using because I'm forced to). IMHO it's a sign of the shift to a metrics-driven culture, where the "unquantifiable" parts of quality are being completely ignored in favour of bettering numerical ones. Microsoft isn't the only one, this seems to be happening industry-wide.

[artificialLimbs]

It's pretty terrible.

If you go to the Windows 10 download page, you can trick it into giving you the ISO by changing your responsive view mode in dev tools to an iPad or something and refreshing the page. Then burn with Rufus.

[Nexxxeh]

Rufus is vastly more reliable, flexible, and orders of magnitude faster.

So long as you enable updates (to enable online functionality), the "SELECT" button has a dropdown to change it to "DOWNLOAD".

Click "DOWNLOAD", it walks you through a script ("Fido") that grabs the latest Windows 10 ISO (and lets you download it directly or using a browser). You can then use that ISO to make your bootable USB.

[verst]

I have used Rufus from Macs (my primary work devices) to create bootable Windows installers on USB to reinstall my gaming PCs plenty of times :)

[sascha_sl]

Rufus does in fact have a long explanation of this on their FAQ:

https://github.com/pbatard/rufus/wiki/FAQ#blah-uefi-blah-fat...

You probably left Secure Boot on. That prevents loading the NTFS UEFI driver.

[sdlion]

I think I did that, then have problems with the windows installer. A driver prompt. I regularly have to give services to laptops, so I prefer options that "just works". This is also the reason I don't usually use the Windows installation media creator, because is slow and won't burn my several ISOs. There was a time the new Win10 iso installation process would fail on any configuration I would try... I lost somewhat around THREE DAYS trying to solve each f*"** cryptic error message and an old iso did the trick. Just a few hours updating and it was done.

Sadly most of my clients won't just accept the option of installing Linux ;)

[pxeboot]

That seems far more complicated than just using DISM, PowerShell or wimlib (on Linux or Windows) to split the install.wim file into two parts, which I believe older versions of Rufus (or a similar utility) offered to do.

https://wimlib.net/man1/wimsplit.html

[jevinskie]

Yep, wimlib is the portable magic that makes FAT32/4GB a non-issue.

It is still annoying to have to use Windows to run NTLite. ;)

https://evanshortiss.com/create-a-windows-install-usb-via-ma...

[vxNsr]

Or use ventoy and never worry about large files again.

[VMtest]

I used the same method as you, but from different source.

I tried to dig into my documentation for the link that I saved, it doesn't seem like I saved the google search terms for it, but they can be deduced from the link anyway.

1. https://win10.guru/usb-install-media-with-larger-than-4gb-wi...