Why is it so difficult to produce installable OS Thumb drive

[dwolfer]

I have a Lenovo computer with win7 pro. The DVD drive stopped working on it and I had to install a new hard disk. I have searched everywhere trying to find a way to create a bootable thumb drive with the Windows 7 Pro install files on it from the install DVD. No matter what I have tried, I cannot find a way to create a bootable thumb drive that I can then install the OS from.
Anybody have any good ideas? I have already tried everything I can find on this forum to produce on without success.

Thanks
Dave Wolfer

 

[Cycloid Torus]

Not easy, but doable...
https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us...indows-7/0ae269fd-167e-423b-94ef-26133f89e10c

You might want to check the 'Lenovo' note at the end of the detailed post.

 

[dwolfer]

I need to create a bootable USB memory stick out of the OEM installation disks. The link you provide does not do that nor does the link by Lenovo. The one they provide only applies to systems that use UFEI (sp?) boot process. My wife's computer is a BIOS system and does not use. UFEI. So any other recommendations? Thanks.

 

[Cycloid Torus]

"Burn ISO to DVD or to USB flash stick (minimum size of 4GB required) usingWindows 7 USB-DVD Download Tool or alternatively to DVD using ImgBurn at 4x speed, to flash stick using Rufus selecting UEFI for GPT for UEFI BIOS, or Legacy MBR for Legacy BIOS."

Read about Rufus here: https://rufus.ie/ Note, "Creating an ISO image from a physical disc or from a set of files is very easy to do however, through the use of a CD burning application, such as the freely available CDBurnerXP or ImgBurn."

I haven't done this to an OEM copy of Win7 - but I have done it with Win10 and with other OS.

This may help too:
https://www.howtogeek.com/228886/how-to-create-iso-files-from-discs-on-windows-mac-and-linux/

 

[dwolfer]

Thank you for the input but none of these things worked either. That is why I said at the beginning in my problem is re-installing the original OEM version of windows. It sure seems to me that if you can create a DVD you should be able to totally duplicate it on a USB Memory stick. This is crazy. I appreciate your input but I am pretty much dead in the water now.

 

[Cycloid Torus]

Perhaps... https://neosmart.net/wiki/bootable-windows-usb/

Covers XP, Vista, 7, 8 &10

 

[dwolfer]

Thanks, I will try this method as well. Thanks again.

 

[dwolfer]

Unfortunately, even that last method from NeoSmart did not work. For some reason the Lenovo bootable DVD does not turn into an actual installable version when turned into a USB memory stick. It goes through the Lenovo startup but stops when it tries to reformat the drive. It never goes any father than that no matter what method I used.
I finally borrowed a portable USB DVD player/burner popped the Lenovo DVD into it and it worked like a charm. I have no idea why Lenovo DVD does not want to co-operate. I even tried leaving this same request on the Lenovo forum but never even got a response from anybody. I will never buy a Lenovo ever again. There is no excuse for this.
Thank you for all of your suggestions and help. At least I was able to borrow a USB DVD player and get it installed even though I might have to go through this all over again if the hard drive ever crashes again. Frustrated with Lenovo but very satisfied with your help here and that I finally have it up and running again. Wife happy, I am happy. Thanks again.