Installing Windows XP from USB flash drive

What do you do when there is not optical drive in your PC and you want to install a new operating system on it ? before you invest in new optical drive we will tell you about a more cost effective solution. You can make a install windows XP by your USB flash drive. Follow this step by step instruction to make a  Bootable USB flash drive.

Step 1: Download the software 'Komku-SP-usb.exe' from the website mentioned earlier and execute it. The executable file will extract the necessary utilities to a folder called 'C:\kumku'.

Step 2: Once the package has been extracted, go to the folder 'C:\komku\PeToUSB' using Windows Explorer. Execute the file 'PeToUSB.exe'. Plug in the USB flash drive and make sure you choose the following (see image below) before clicking the start button. Select 'USB removable', 'Enable Disk Format', 'Quick format', 'Enable LBA (Fat 16x)' and finally give the drive a name under 'Drive Label'. Once it's done, click start to let the utility format the drive.

Step 3: Next you will need to start the command prompt. Click 'Start | Run', type 'cmd' and press [Enter]. Then go to the 'bootsect' directory by typing the command 'cd c:\komku\bootsect' and pressing [Enter]. Now type the command 'bootsect /nt52 F:' and press [Enter]. (The 'F:' is the USB flash drive letter represented in 'My Computer'. Check to verify the drive used by your USB flash drive). Let the utility do the needful. Do not exit the command Prompt yet.

Step 4: Now you will need to change to the directory 'Usb_Prep8' by using the command 'cd C:\komku\usb_prep8' and pressing [Enter]. Here execute the command 'usb_prep8' and press [Enter]. Press any key to continue and you will see a welcome screen with a menu appear in the Command Prompt.

Step 5: Now at this stage, you will have to insert the Windows XP installation disk into your optical drive. At the Command Prompt menu, type '1' and press [Enter]. A new popup will appear asking you to choose the location (path) of the Windows installation disk. Select the optical drive and click 'OK'. Next choose '2' from the menu and change the drive letter to any drive letter which has not been taken. It drive 'T:' by default and you can ignore this step unless you do have a 'T:' drive on your computer.

After this, choose '3' from the menu and enter the drive letter of you USB flash drive (in this case it would be 'F'). Finally choose '4' from the menu and press [Enter] wait for a few seconds for the process to complete and you will see a prompt to allow the utility to format the USB flash drive. Type 'Y' and then press [Enter] at this stage to let the utility proceed and install the necessary files from the Windows XP installation disk to the USB flash drive. This process will take a few minutes and depends on the speed of the flash drive.

Step 6: After the files are copied, you will see a popup window asking you for permission to copy files form the temp drive to the USB flash drive. Select 'Yes'.

Step 7: Next there will be another popup window asking you to allow the utility to change the boot drive letter of the USB flash drive from 'F:' to 'U:'. Select 'Yes'.

Step 8: Finally, after all the processes are complete, you will see yet another popup window asking if you want to unmount the virtual drive. Select 'Yes' Exit the Command Prompt now and you will see that your flash drive is ready to install Windows XP to another computer. To install Windows XP to the computer you will have to go to the BIOS and enable the option of booting from a USB removable device. This option is usually found under the boot sequence menu of the BIOS. Plug in the USB drive to the computer before you turn it on. Now your computer will beet form the USB flash drive and will be ready to install Windows XP. Follow the necessary steps to install Windows XP and your computer will be up, raring and ready to go and running Windows in no time.

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How to do backup for my computer data

A wide range of technology solutions are currently available for backup. Most commonly used backup media are as :

Use Tape for Backup : A tape is a sequential storage medium used for data collection, backup and archiving. Like videotape, computer tape is made of flexible plastic with one side coated with a ferromagnetic material. Tapes come in reels, cartridges and cassettes of many sizes, shapes and capacities. The major drawback of tape is its sequential format. Locating a specific record requires reading every record in front of it or searchig for markers that identify predefined partitions.

Use Hard Disk for backup : The primary computer storage medium, a hard disk (often called a disk drive, hard drive or hard disk drive), is a magnetic disk that generally resides permanently in the drive. Data (i.e. files such as email, spreadsheets and documents) is stored on the the hard disk as a collection of bytes. Hard disks provide relatively fast retrieval because they rotate constantly at high speed.

 Use Floppy Disk for Backup : A floppy disk is a soft magnetic disk contained inside a small ircular piece of metal-coated plastic. Unlike most hard disks, floppy disks (often called floppies or diskettes) are portable, because you can remove them from a disk drive.

Backup to DVD : DVDs, or digital vesatile discs, were originally used predominantly as a storage medium for movies but are now commonly used as a general storage medium. they look and operate similarly to a CD-ROM, but they have a much greater storage capacity (tyically 4.7GB, but up to 8.5GB for dual sided disks).

Backup to removal Hard Disk : A removable hard disk, also called a "Removable Rigid Disk " is similar to the fixed hard disk in a computer but housed in a plug-in cartridge and can be removed much like a tape, allowing data to be taken out of

the drive for alternative backup media. Rugged, removable disk media offers increased portability and durability over standard USB- based hard drive storage that may be faster and less expensive when compared to tape storage alternatives, although they do not yet provide the large capacities available on tape.

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