Ubuntu – WinUSB install error Installation failed! Exit code: 512

winusb

I am unable to solve this problem, I'm using Ubuntu 14.04. I already tried as root, and I still have not had success.

WinUSB reports this error:

Installation failed!
Exit code: 512
Log:
Formatting device...
Mounting...
mount: block device /home/flavio/Área de Trabalho/windows xp sp3 sata.iso is write-protected, mounting read-only
Copying...
Installing grub...
Installing for x86_64-efi platform.
grub-install: error: /media/winusb_target_1405019929_19723 doesn't look like an EFI partition.
.
Error occurred!
Syncing...
/usr/bin/winusb: line 78:  5376 Terminated               while true; do
    sleep 0.05; echo 'pulse';
done
Cleaning...
/usr/bin/winusb: line 78:  6975 Terminated               while true; do
    sleep 0.05; echo 'pulse';
done
Umounting and removing '/media/winusb_iso_1405019929_19723'...
Umounting and removing '/media/winusb_target_1405019929_19723'...

Best Answer

The problem here is with the method used to install GRUB. It has nothing to do with the current filesystem on thumbdrive as WinUSB formats it.

To fix it you must edit the winusb script which is located in /usr/bin. Open it with any text editor with root permissions (e.g. gksu gedit /usr/bin/winusb). Now search for grub-install in that file (it may be on line 401 - 402) and change that line so it looks like this:

grub-install --target=i386-pc --boot-directory="$partitionMountPath/boot" "$device"

Save the script. Install the package grub-pc-bin as follows:

sudo apt-get install grub-pc-bin

Now, try again to use WinUSB.

WinUSB only creates MBR bootable USB drives. If you want to install Windows in EFI mode a different method should be used.

I also wrote about this on my website.

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