USB_MultiBoot Will not accept any format of usb drive

[Haxzor]

Hello all.

I am trying to create a bootable USB install for Windows XP. I am running Windows 7 Ult. x64. I have elected to use USB_MultiBoot_10. I am using a Kingston 16gb USB flash drive and have also tried a 2gb. I have formated the drive to NTFS, my FS of choice, using a few different methods. ie. Windows format, BootICe, RMPrepUSB, and both tools included with multiboot. I have also tried all the other formats just to be sure. However, when I select option 2 to select target drive no matter what I receive that pesky little

"E: has NOT FAT FAT32 or NTFS Format and is NOT Valid" error and I have scoured through the internet and different forums for a good few ours now and I must say I am just stumped as nothing I find seems to fix this error. This thread comes the closest but I have tried everything on it still to no avail.

What I'd really like is to find a detailed tut on how to prepare a bootable USB XP install with just the XP CD files and a little Command know how and maybe possibly some help from something like bootIce. That how ever isnt a priority.

I'm going to go get some sleep and check back with you guys in the morning so I can keep my head on. If I missed anything or broke any forum rules my appologies I've been at this for some time now and I'm a little foggy. Thanks in advanced!

[jaclaz]

No Forum Rule broken nor anything really missed, rest assured.

You found a good "base" resource for your issue, but as often happens your report is a bit "vague".

The referenced thread lists a number of different possible solutions, but you cannot put them all in a "I tried everything statement" (BTW one of the suggestion there was to try the GUI WinsetupfromUSB which you obviously did not try) and you seem like having, besides the "everything" in that thread triead also "every" other partitioning/formatting utility.

JFYI you are using two of the worst (not "generally" but "specifically") possible environments, WIndows 7 AND the 64 bit version of it.

My suggestions are (in this order):

1. FORGET (temporarily) about USB_multiboot_10.cmd and try INSTEAD WinsetupfromUSBwithGUI (please remember how you have a GOAL and that the path through which you can reach it is fundamentally irrelevant)
   
2. If the above works, good
   
3. if it does not, post the log of it (it may help to troubleshoot anyway your issue as it will contain a number of info about the environment in which you run it) and try again with USB_multiboot_10.cmd
   
4. CHOOSE one of the two USB sticks you have available (the smaller 2 Gb makes "more sense" for this project, though there is no real reason why the 16 Gb should not work)
   
5. DETAIL which EXACT (among the several suggestions on the related thread you have actually implemented (see list below)
   

The related thread lists about the possible causes/solutions (among possibly others that I missed at first glance):

• UAC on/off
  
• FixPath.exe
  
• change in .cmd VER | find "6.1." > nul
  

jaclaz

[steve6375]

1. Try the Quick Size Test in RMPrepUSB

2. If it passes, try CLEAN and then format as NTFS + Boot as HDD

3. Run WIndows chkdisk on the drive

Now follow jaclaz's suggestions.

[Haxzor]

You know what I never tried the GUI lol.

I did how ever try all three of :

UAC on/off

FixPath.exe

change in .cmd VER | find "6.1." > nul

All in diferent combos. I'm going to go try the GUI. I'll post results positive or otherwise. Now would you say that the error with multiboot I am having is possibly directly related simply to the fact that I formatted the NTFS system on my USB drive while running Windows 7? After I get this to work I'd really like to explore a little deep into how this all works.

edit--

Also I forgot to mention I also tried WintoFlash GUI and that was just a nightmare.

Edited January 15, 2013 by Haxzor

[Haxzor]

Success! WinSetupFrom USB worked flawlessly without any kind of hitch. Thank you. Now that I've got that working, would anyone mind helping me to understand what made this successful over what I did before? Also if is there a way to tell RMprepUSB and/or WinSetupFrom USB to stay within the current partition like if I had 3 partitions on that 16gb flash drive could I in theory still format just one of those partitions to NTFS + boot as Hdd with out touching the other partitions. I am pretty comfortable with cmd interface so if I need to do it the the cmd versions of these programs I would actually even prefer that. Would BootIce possibly help here?

Also, here is my successful WinSetupFromUSB log:

2013/01/15 13:47:41- WinSetupFromUSB 0.2.3 started
2013/01/15 13:47:41- OS: WIN_VISTA  Architecture type: X64 ServicePack:  OS Language: 0409
2013/01/15 13:47:41- Getting USB drives information
2013/01/15 13:47:42- Found USB Physical Disk: Kingston DT 101 II USB Device -- \\.\PHYSICALDRIVE1
2013/01/15 13:47:42- Found USB Disk Partition: Disk #1, Partition #0
2013/01/15 13:47:42- Found USB Logical Disk: E:  File system: NTFS Bootable: -1
2013/01/15 13:47:42- Found USB Disk Partition: Disk #1, Partition #1
2013/01/15 13:47:42- Target drive selected- E:
2013/01/15 13:47:42- Drive letter of the active partition in selected disk- E:
2013/01/15 13:47:42- Total target size avialable- 15169 MB
2013/01/15 13:47:42- Checking sizes...
2013/01/15 13:47:42- Total source size- 0 MB
2013/01/15 13:47:42- Target space available- 15169 MB
2013/01/15 13:48:42- Checking sizes...
2013/01/15 13:48:42- Total source size- 510 MB
2013/01/15 13:48:42- Target space available- 15169 MB
2013/01/15 13:48:42- Windows source selected- C:\XP_HE_SP3_x32
2013/01/15 13:48:42- Source version- Windows XP Home Edition
2013/01/15 13:48:42- Service Pack- Windows XP Home Edition Service Pack 3 
2013/01/15 13:48:42- AMD64 flag- 0
2013/01/15 13:48:45- Removing TEMP folder
2013/01/15 13:48:45- Checking if grub4dos is installed properly
2013/01/15 13:48:45- grub4dos BS/MBR and files are NOT installed properly
2013/01/15 13:48:45- Installing grub4dos BS/MBR and files
2013/01/15 13:48:45- Backing up MBR of disk #1
2013/01/15 13:48:45- C:\WinSetupFromUSB\files\grub4dos\grubinst.exe -s=mbrdisk1-20130115-134741.dat -t (hd1)
2013/01/15 13:48:47- Backed up MBR of disk #1
2013/01/15 13:48:47- Backing up BootSector of disk #1 partition #0
2013/01/15 13:48:49- Backed up BootSector of disk #1 partition #0
2013/01/15 13:48:49- Checking for grldr string in BootSector of disk #1 partition #0
2013/01/15 13:48:51- Saved BootSector of disk #1 partition #0
2013/01/15 13:48:52- Grub4dos bootsector not found
2013/01/15 13:48:52- Checking for grldr string in MBR of disk #1
2013/01/15 13:48:54- Saved MBR of disk #1
2013/01/15 13:48:55- Grub4dos MBR not found
2013/01/15 13:48:55- Installing grub4dos bootsector to (hd1,0)
2013/01/15 13:48:55- C:\WinSetupFromUSB\files\grub4dos\grubinst.exe (hd1,0)
2013/01/15 13:48:55- Launching fsutil volume dismount E:
2013/01/15 13:49:00- Checking for grldr string in BootSector of disk #1 partition #0
2013/01/15 13:49:02- Saved BootSector of disk #1 partition #0
2013/01/15 13:49:03- Grub4dos bootsector found
2013/01/15 13:49:03- Copying grldr
2013/01/15 13:49:03- Copying menu.lst
2013/01/15 13:49:03- Copying default
2013/01/15 13:49:03- grub4dos installed
2013/01/15 13:49:04- DOSNET.INF parsed, 117 files for ~BT folder
2013/01/15 13:49:04- C:\XP_HE_SP3_x32\I386\disk1---> C:\WinSetupFromUSB\TEMP\$WIN_NT$.~BT\disk101
2013/01/15 13:49:04- C:\XP_HE_SP3_x32\I386\ntdetect.com---> C:\WinSetupFromUSB\TEMP\$WIN_NT$.~BT\
...... copying -edit
C:\WinSetupFromUSB\TEMP\$WIN_NT$.~BT\system32\smss.exe
2013/01/15 13:49:05- C:\XP_HE_SP3_x32\I386\flpydisk.sy_ ---> C:\WinSetupFromUSB\TEMP\$WIN_NT$.~BT\
2013/01/15 13:49:05- C:\XP_HE_SP3_x32\I386\classpnp.sy_ ---> C:\WinSetupFromUSB\TEMP\$WIN_NT$.~BT\
...... copying -edit
2013/01/15 13:49:06- Preparing ~BT folder completed
2013/01/15 13:49:06- Launching MkMigrateInf3.cmd
2013/01/15 13:49:08- Adding lines for binifix5.cmd and start64.exe
2013/01/15 13:49:08- Preparing ~BT folder and boot files
2013/01/15 13:49:08- Preparing ~LS folder
2013/01/15 13:49:10- Preparing BOOT.INI
2013/01/15 13:49:10- Preparing winsetup.lst
2013/01/15 13:49:10- Copy started
2013/01/15 13:49:10- C:\WinSetupFromUSB\TEMP\NTLDR---> E:\NTLDR
2013/01/15 13:49:10- C:\WinSetupFromUSB\TEMP\TXTSETUP.SIF---> E:\TXTSETUP.SIF
2013/01/15 13:49:10- C:\WinSetupFromUSB\TEMP\NTDETECT.COM---> E:\NTDETECT.COM
......... coping -edit
E:\$WIN_NT$.~LS\I386\AUTOFMT.EXE
2013/01/15 13:49:14- C:\WinSetupFromUSB\TEMP\$WIN_NT$.~LS\I386\AUTOCHK.EXE---> E:\$WIN_NT$.~LS\I386\AUTOCHK.EXE
2013/01/15 13:49:14- C:\WinSetupFromUSB\TEMP\$WIN_NT$.~LS\I386\binifix5.cmd---> E:\$WIN_NT$.~LS\I386\binifix5.cmd
2013/01/15 13:49:14- C:\WinSetupFromUSB\TEMP\$WIN_NT$.~BT\system32\smss.exe---> E:\$WIN_NT$.~BT\system32\smss.exe
2013/01/15 13:49:14- C:\WinSetupFromUSB\TEMP\$WIN_NT$.~BT\system32\ntdll.dll---> E:\$WIN_NT$.~BT\system32\ntdll.dll
2013/01/15 13:49:15- C:\XP_HE_SP3_x32\I386\HOSTS---> E:\$WIN_NT$.~LS\I386\HOSTS
2013/01/15 13:49:15- C:\XP_HE_SP3_x32\I386\DISK1---> E:\$WIN_NT$.~LS\I386\DISK1
........ LOT'S of copying -edit
2013/01/15 13:55:31- Copying completed. Took: 380.632384906958 seconds
2013/01/15 13:55:31- Fixing unattended section in winnt.sif
2013/01/15 13:55:31- setupORG.exe not found, replacing the original file
2013/01/15 13:55:31- Removing duplicate entries in boot.ini
2013/01/15 13:56:08- Checking sizes...
2013/01/15 13:56:08- Total source size- 0 MB
2013/01/15 13:56:08- Target space available- 15169 MB
2013/01/15 13:56:08- Getting USB drives information
2013/01/15 13:56:08- Found USB Physical Disk: Kingston DT 101 II USB Device -- \\.\PHYSICALDRIVE1
2013/01/15 13:56:08- Found USB Disk Partition: Disk #1, Partition #0
2013/01/15 13:56:08- Found USB Logical Disk: E:  File system: NTFS Bootable: -1
2013/01/15 13:56:08- Found USB Disk Partition: Disk #1, Partition #1
2013/01/15 13:56:08- Target drive selected- E:
2013/01/15 13:56:08- Drive letter of the active partition in selected disk- E:
2013/01/15 13:56:08- Total target size avialable- 14644 MB
2013/01/15 13:56:08- Checking sizes...
2013/01/15 13:56:08- Total source size- 0 MB
2013/01/15 13:56:08- Target space available- 14644 MB
2013/01/15 13:56:12- ---------------------------------Program quited-----------------------------------------------

Edited January 15, 2013 by Haxzor

[jaclaz]

The Log you posted seems OK (obvious, but I mean that there seems to me like there is no particular action carried by WinsetupFromUSB in the sense of "out of ordinary").

This is the "only" (BTW normal) change made to the stick:

2013/01/15 13:48:45- Checking if grub4dos is installed properly
2013/01/15 13:48:45- grub4dos BS/MBR and files are NOT installed properly
2013/01/15 13:48:45- Installing grub4dos BS/MBR and files

it is *possible* that the corresponding actions in USB_MultiBoot_10 were not carried or not carried successfully (as an example - NOT necessarily applying specifically to your case) because of different paths in the 64 bit version or due to some of the "queer" behaviour of windows 7 with UAC, disk protection and what not.

If Wimb happens to pass by, he may have a more appropriate idea of what may have happened or be able to suggest you a specific troubleshooting procedure, it's quite a bit of time since I used USB_MultiBoot_10, but I remember discussing about the use of a tee command to have steps logged as well, check the documentation, your (failed) attempt with USB_MultiBoot_10 should have also produced a log.

USB_MultiBoot_10 and WinsetupFromUSB are NOT the "same" tool in a command line and GUI version, they are distinct project, both born from common grounds but that took separate "evolution paths" over the time.

Though the basics are the same and info is migrated back and forth between the two apps the are different in the sense that they may use different strategies/implementations to reach the same goal.

Beside these two "main" approaches/apps, there are more, just check the stickies , as I see it, unless you want to take the RED pill :

since we have now several approaches you could otherwise just stick with the one that succeeds.

jaclaz