Ubuntu – How to create a bootable USB stick using windows 7

usb

I've downloaded Ubuntu desktop (the .iso file that is) on a windows 7 machine and want to create a bootable USB stick in order to install it onto a laptop which currently has no OS. Is there a way to do this?

Best Answer

This is just to mention that Canonical now recommends the Rufus USB Installer. (I haven't used it myself.)

Instructions (copied from the Canonical instructions):

Open Rufus and select your USB stick in the 'Device' dropdown

Click the CD Rom icon next to the 'FreeDOS' dropdown, then find your downloaded Ubuntu ISO and click 'Open'

Click 'Yes' when it asks to download Syslinux software

Click 'OK' to write in ISO Image mode

Confirm that your USB stick is selected and then 'OK' to continue

When it is finished, just restart your computer and start using Ubuntu, or you can install Ubuntu

1: Download Ubuntu

2: Convert the ISO file

Convert the .iso file to .img using the convert option of hdiutil

hdiutil convert -format UDRW -o ~/path/to/target.img ~/path/to/ubuntu.iso

Note: OS X tends to put the .img ending on the output file automatically.

3: Determine the media to install

Run diskutil list to get the current devices. Insert your USB and the run again diskutil list. The new device its your USB.

4: Install into the USB

Unmount your device (not physically) with diskutil unmountDisk /dev/diskN where N is your USB number and execute

sudo dd if=/path/to/downloaded.img of=/dev/rdiskN bs=1m

Notes:

Using /dev/rdisk instead of /dev/disk may be faster
If you see the error dd: Invalid number '1m', you are using GNU dd. Use the same command but replace bs=1m with bs=1M
If you see the error dd: /dev/diskN: Resource busy, make sure the disk is not in use.Start the 'Disk Utility.app' and unmount (don't eject) the drive

5: Eject

Run diskutil eject /dev/diskN and remove your flash media when the command completes.

6: Boot

Restart your Mac and press alt/option key while the Mac is restarting to choose the USB stick.

Ubuntu – How to create a bootable USB stick on windows but to install on linux

Your best alternative would be to create a bootable USB, assuming you have access to the ISO.

Windows

The easiest way to create a bootable USB on Windows (in my opinion), is to use YUMI. It allows having multiple bootable systems on the same USB and it's easy to use as it can download the distro ISO for you.

Download YUMI and follow the instructions. Make sure you choose "Format this drive" but remember that this deletes all the data on the USB drive.

Ubuntu

You can create a bootable USB on Ubuntu aswell. You can either use the graphical interface, or the terminal. If your system is having troubles detecting the drive, you can go into the terminal and run the command sudo fdisk -l you may have to enter your password. This outputs a list of all the disks and their partitions. An USB drive usually looks like this:

> Disk /dev/sdb: 4.0 GB, 40007761920 bytes 64 heads, 32 sectors/track,
> 38154 cylinders
> 
>   Units = cylinders of 2048 * 512 = 1048576 bytes Disk identifier:
> 0x00b4c6f2
>      Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System 
>   /dev/sdb1               1       38154    39069680   83  Linux

If the ID of the partition (/dev/sdb1 in this case) is set to "??" or if the System is set to "Unknown" this means that your partition is formatted in an unrecognized filesystem. You can reformat to FAT32 with the following commands, but please note that this erases all data on the drive.

sudo umount /dev/sdb (change /dev/sdb according to the results from before)
sudo mkfs.vfat -n ‘NEWDRIVE’ -I /dev/sdb (format the drive)
sudo mount /dev/sdb /mnt (mount the drive again)

Once the drive is recognized by your system, you can follow directions from the community wiki: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Installation/FromUSBStick