My hard disk crashed.. I can run Ubuntu using a pendrive by making a live USB of Ubuntu, which I made using Windows 7. In the similar way, I want to run Windows XP too using another pen drive (without hard disk) and I want to make it from Ubuntu (12.04). The resources I have are Ubuntu's live USB, Windows XP and Windows 7 installation disk, some blank DVDs but no hard drive. I have very basic knowledge of Linux. Thanks

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2 Answers

WinUSB is a simple tool that enable you to create your own usb stick windows installer from an iso image or a real DVD. This package contains two programs: - WinUSB-gui: a graphical interface which is very easy to use. - winusb: the command line tool.

Supported images: Windows Vista, Seven+ installer for any language and any version (home, pro...) and Windows PE.

Install WinUSB in ubuntu

Open the terminal and run the following commands

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:colingille/freshlight
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install winusb

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I've tried various approaches to this in the past, and in the end, there are a few possible ways you can do it, but nothing that is guaranteed to work.

For me, the easiest method is to install Hiren's BootCD which includes a copy of a "windows live" version with it.

Another method would be to create a BartPE install using a VirtualBox Windows VM.

With your given resources, you might install your Windows 7 copy in a VM, and use something like WinBuilder to create a legal live version of Windows 7. You can then boot into a live Windows 7 version from your USB.

For Windows XP, you can use the similar BartPE tool to build a live Windows XP install.