Slightly OT: create bootable Windows 10 USB key from OpenSUSE

Hi,

This is probably slightly off-topic, but here goes. My workstation as well as my laptop are both running OpenSUSE Leap. Now I need to create a Windows 10 installation on a sandbox PC for testing purposes. So I downloaded the installation ISO from microsoft.com. It weighs about 5.5 GB. How can I create a bootable USB key from this ISO, preferably using simple command line tools (gdisk, mount, mkfs, etc.)? There’s lots of information about this on the Internet, but what I’ve found until now doesn’t work.

Any suggestions?

Easy
Use dd - first make sure you unmount the usb drive before the dd.

dd if=path_to_windows_iso of=/dev/(id of usb - sdb, sdc, sdd)

to see what the of=/dev/sd? use gnome_disks to see what your usb drive id is.

when it finishes, you have a bootable windows iso.

don’t forget to safely eject it when done.

I’ve tried several approaches. The classical dd method doesn’t work. Neither does WoeUSB.

On the other hand, Ventoy works perfectly.

https://www.ventoy.net/en/index.html

Are you sure you where copying to the device and NOT to a partition on the device???

an ISO is a bootable image and should work if you copy it to the device it will not work if you copy to a partition on the device

https://bugzilla.opensuse.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1180037
https://forums.opensuse.org/showthread.php/548040-Updating-WoeUSB-installing-WoeUSB-ng

An ISO is an image indeed, but it’s not necessarily bootable. Just try it out for yourself, you’ll see.

sorry, just saw: english forum… it ok like this or do you need english?

jop, das geht nicht einfach mit dd. es liegt am windows image, denn das sind dvd/cd- images und nicht usb-stick fähig (anderes bootvorgehen wegen iso9… ach egal)

Ich hab da mal ne Anleitung, was bei mir funktioniert hat, das erklärt das Vorgehen grdstzl. Keine Ahnung, ob das noch geht.

Falls ja: können wir in den Suse-Docs das Vorgehen dokumentieren?


# GERAET VORHER ANPASSEN
#Natürlich als root ausführen und vorher durchchecken, ob alles stimmt. keine übernahme von Verantwortung von irgendwem für irgendwas.
DEVICE=/dev/sdxxx

# Partitionierung auf dem USB Stick löschen
dd if=/dev/zero of=$DEVICE bs=1M count=1

# Partitionen einrichten
fdisk ${DEVICE}
#manuell eingeben
# n
# p
# 1
# ENTER
# ENTER
# t
# c
# a
# w

# Formatierung, mounten des Laufwerks
mkfs.vfat ${DEVICE}1
mkdir /mnt/usb
mount ${DEVICE}1 /mnt/usb

# Kopieren der Daten
mkdir Win10
mount -o loop Win10_1909_German_x64.iso Win10
#fehler massenweise wegen rechten - nicht beachten!
cp -a Win10/* /mnt/usb

# Aushängen der Laufwerke
umount /mnt/usb
umount Win10

Und ab gehts mit dem Stick, wenn das Bios mitmacht, funktioniert das schon. Falls nicht: arghrotfl!

@obel1x

You are using the wrong language for this section. This is the English section and the other posts in this thread prove that.

yes sorry for that! maybe you can get the neede steps anyway without me having to translate? rgs, daniel

The post will be removed. Feel free to post an English version.

Agreed but in this case it is a bootable image. and needs to be a direct binary copy to the device.

ok, me again in english trying to help… well iso ist not bootable from usb, it depends which type that iso is. windows is not working like this. i have not managed to get it working with unetbootin or sort of whta should work, but with this:

# Please adjust to you USB-Stick device
DEVICE=/dev/sdxxx

# Erase Partitionierung on USB Stick
dd if=/dev/zero of=$DEVICE bs=1M count=1

# Partitionen setup
fdisk ${DEVICE}
#manuell enter
# n
# p
# 1
# ENTER
# ENTER
# t
# c
# a
# w

# Format and mounten the stick
mkfs.vfat ${DEVICE}1
mkdir /mnt/usb
mount ${DEVICE}1 /mnt/usb

# copy windows files from windows iso, which is mounted as loop device
mkdir Win10
#adjust to your needs:
mount -o loop Win10_1909_German_x64.iso Win10
# ignore all errors:
cp -a Win10/* /mnt/usb

# umount
umount /mnt/usb
umount Win10

After that, you can boot the stick if your bios supports it. good luck