How to create Bootable USB Key?

There is a write-up at memorykeytools.com, but I'll put it in my words:

First, you need a system that has BIOS support for USB keys. On an OptiPlex system, you can check this by going into setup (F2 at power-on), going to LegacySelect, tabbing down to USB Emulation, and pressing spacebar to cycle through the options. If you see ON & OFF, you do NOT have USB key support. if you have ON, OFF & NO BOOT, you DO have USB key support. Leave it set to ON so you can use this support (setting it to NO BOOT disables booting from any USB device).

Now that you are sure you have support, you need:

1) A DOS floppy with FDISK & FORMAT on it
2) A USB key

Insert your USB key into any USB port, and reboot your machine. Go into SETUP and you should see a "Hard Disk Drive Sequence" setting. You won't see this if you don't insert your USB key. Select this option, and you should see "System BIOS Boot Devices" and "USB Device". You want to move "USB Device" to the top. This will make your USB key the C: drive, and your normal boot partition on your hard drive will become D:. Why? There is a "feature" in DOS FDISK that prevents a partition from being marked ACTIVE (bootable) unless it is on the FIRST hard drive. So, we need to force the USB key to be in front of your hard drive when we run FDISK.

Now that you've got the SETUP change made, insert your floppy and reboot (use F12 to force a boot from your DOS floppy). Once DOS boots from the floppy, you can try a DIR on C: to make sure you get an error or you get a DIR of your USB drive (an error is normal if your key isn't formatted). You just want to make sure that C: isn't your hard drive, because we're about to DESTROY C:

run FDISK and you should see that your first hard drive is the size of your key (another verification that we're not going to destroy your hard drive). Create a PRIMARY partition as big as the drive, and then tell FDISK to mark it as ACTIVE (this is the step that wouldn't work if we didn't do that SETUP change). Exit FDISK, and you'll be told to restart your machine. Use F12 to force it to boot from the floppy again. Do a DIR on C: to make sure you get an error and not your hard drive (how paranoid am I? Can you tell I've destroyed a few hard drives by mistake?) Now use FORMAT C: /S to get the DOS system files on your USB key. You can now remove your floppy, reboot, and you should be booting off the USB key. Once you know it works, go into SETUP, and re-arrange the BIOS & USB boot devices so you can boot off your hard drive as normal. Whenever you want to boot of the key, just use F12 - you'll see that the USB flash device is listed.

go to http://www.bay-wolf.com I believe it's there

Ok, I've tried everything I could find on this subject.

What I have and what I've done:
- Dell GX260, BIOS version A03.
- USB Emulation set to ON
- Dell 64MB Memory Key.
- The "USB Mem Key" tool from http://www.bay-wolf.com/downloads.htm
- Used the mentioned tool to make the Memory key bootable.
- Put the USB key in one of the USB ports behind 'door'

Tried to boot ... press F12 .... booting from USB was _not_ one of the options.

Where did I go wrong ?

Where you went wrong is that you have a GX260.  I believe only the GX270 and higher in the Optiplex line will boot off of the USB key.

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@shadetc wrote:
Where you went wrong is that you have a GX260. I believe only the GX270 and higher in the Optiplex line will boot off of the USB key.

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The impression I got from this thread, this thread and this thread is that it is possible on a GX260 with the right BIOS settings and the right bits & bytes on the USB memory key.

I therefore assume there is something else missing.... but what ?

If you look at my instructions, there is a first step that says go into SETUP and see if you can set USB EMULATION to NO BOOT. If you try this with a 260 with BIOS A03, you'll see that it doesn't work - that's your proof that you don't have USB key boot support.

Put A04 or newer on and try it again - you'll see that you CAN set it to NO BOOT, which shows that you DO have boot support, and now when you put a bootable key in your system and press F12, you WILL see a new entry in the menu, and (if you prepare the device properly), you will be able to boot from that device.

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@Duhhh wrote:
If you look at my instructions, there is a first step that says go into SETUP and see if you can set USB EMULATION to NO BOOT. If you try this with a 260 with BIOS A03, you'll see that it doesn't work - that's your proof that you don't have USB key boot support.

Put A04 or newer on and try it again - you'll see that you CAN set it to NO BOOT, which shows that you DO have boot support, and now when you put a bootable key in your system and press F12, you WILL see a new entry in the menu, and (if you prepare the device properly), you will be able to boot from that device.

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I followed your description and the system I have did have the option of setting USB Emulation to "NO BOOT". This only proves to me that the "Boot from USB Memory Key" feature is present is BIOS version A03 but apparently it is broken. I've updated my BIOS now to the latest version I could find (A06) and booting from USB Memory Key now works like a charm.

Thanks for all the help.

I have a GX260, and I did some testing on it to see what's up with A03. That version of the BIOS supports USB floppy, but not USB key, and that's why you see the NO BOOT (so you can disable USB floppy). So, the only valid way to tell if you have USB key support is to press F12 with a key inserted and see if it lists the USB flash device.

I'm glad you got it working. I've really gotten used to being able to boot my USB key!

Everything will work fine once you upgrade your bios to A6 (latest release).  I have a GX260 & 270 and drove myself nuts looking for it on the 260 before realizing that I had a slightly dated (A3) bios.  That is what shipped with my 260, as soon as I upgraded the bios, both now support the USB boot drive.

Good Luck

Sorry did not mean to post it yet...

I followed the link above to http://www.bay-wolf.com/ but made one minor mistake, in WindowsXP, if you PC ships without a floppy drive, it will allow you to assign your A:\ drive letter to the USB device  -- Don't fall into the temptation, just write that letter off as you will never be able to use it again, just like the B:\ (unless you are in Japan).  If you assign it the A:\ drive, it will not be visible by the utility.  As soon as you change your drive letter, it will find the USB memory key and allow you to select it.

I just go to disk administration (win2000), format the stick with fat and use ptedit32 (nice tool) to make it bootable (set it active). My motherboard does not support boot from usb, but this should work.

 

Hendrik

Very similar to what "Duhhh" wrote above. I wrote up some instructions on how to make a USB flash drive bootable. Check it out @ http://ucsu.colorado.edu/~shaher/Bootable_USB.html

Instructions are here and

http://www.memorykeytools.com/win98.asp

The Driver is here

http://www.memorykeytools.com/downloads/memorykeydriver.zip