# windows 2003 drive image to usb drive



## amaurym (Mar 20, 2011)

I have ghost of a windows 2003 drive to a usb drive. I need to know what I need to change in order to make it bootable. It does load to the windows load screen only.


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## Elvandil (Aug 1, 2003)

Images are not bootable. Windows cannot be installed to an external drive. Images are proprietary archive-like files (like zip files) that contain the information about the imaged OS. They are not meant to be bootable. 

Windows will only boot from the drive that it was installed to.

USB drives are not bootable unless they have an MBR and necessary boot files for the boot type that is needed for the OS on the drive.


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## antosingh (Mar 19, 2011)

1. Make the flash memory as bootable by using HP format utility with win98 boot files
2. Copy "Ghost.exe" and the Image file to flash memory
3. Switch the computer to USB boot
4. It will reach command prompt; type "Ghost.exe" which will lead to restore by browsing the image file


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## Elvandil (Aug 1, 2003)

antosingh said:


> 1. Make the flash memory as bootable by using HP format utility with win98 boot files
> 2. Copy "Ghost.exe" and the Image file to flash memory
> 3. Switch the computer to USB boot
> 4. It will reach command prompt; type "Ghost.exe" which will lead to restore by browsing the image file


There is no way on this Earth that that method will boot a Ghost file, even if the original was a DOS partition, which is the only type of bootability that the HP tool supplies.


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## antosingh (Mar 19, 2011)

Very long time I am using the same method to boot ghost through USB as well network boot.


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## Elvandil (Aug 1, 2003)

antosingh said:


> Very long time I am using the same method to boot ghost through USB as well network boot.


He is not trying to boot Ghost. He is trying to boot a Ghost image of Windows.


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## antosingh (Mar 19, 2011)

As mentioned in step-4 it is not fully automatic; we need to run ghost and browse the windows image file from USB. For network we can use ghost with tftpd32.


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## DoubleHelix (Dec 10, 2004)

The poster asked how to make the file bootable, not restore it. Those are two different processes with two very different results. Your steps will wipe out the current system and replace it with the Ghost image.


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## Elvandil (Aug 1, 2003)

antosingh said:


> As mentioned in step-4 it is not fully automatic; we need to run ghost and browse the windows image file from USB. For network we can use ghost with tftpd32.


He doesn't want to "browse" it. He wants to "boot" it.


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## Rockn (Jul 29, 2001)

I don;t think they get what he is trying to do Elvandil. Like he said you cannot boot a ghost image as a live OS....will never happen


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## Elvandil (Aug 1, 2003)

Rockn said:


> I don;t think they get what he is trying to do Elvandil. Like he said you cannot boot a ghost image as a live OS....will never happen


Well, it is not something completely beyond the realm of possibility. Booting an image is no more complex technically than booting an iso image which Grub will do easily. But I don't think the functionality exists at present, nor is it something that anyone really needs to do. Nobody is burning the candle at both ends to make a tool to do this.


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