Windows 10 is a little like Marmite; you either love it or hate it. However, if you haven’t gotten around to installing it yet or need to do a system reinstall, you need bootable media. That way you always have a copy hanging around when your computer needs a fresh start. In this article, we’re going to tell you how to create a bootable USB flash drive.
Creating a bootable Windows 10 flash drive
Before we begin, you need to know that the tools you’re going to need to build this Windows 10 drive come from Microsoft. It’s called the Media Creation Tool, and it makes the process of creating a bootable drive easy. Once you have gone through the following tutorial, you will be able to perform a fresh install of the operating system whenever you want to.
The tutorial
So now that you understand what we’re going to do, let’s move on to the tutorial. Please make sure that you have read and understood each step before acting upon it.
- Download the Windows 10 Media Creation Tool. There are two versions to choose from: 64-bit computers and 32-bit computers. Clicking the link for your chosen system will auto-start the download.
- When you have the Windows 10 Media Creation Tool, you need to run it.
- Next you will be asked, “What do you want to do?” To move forward, select Create installation for another PC, and then click next.
- In the following windows, select your language and the version of Windows 10 that you want (64-bit or 32-bit).
- Next, make sure you have a free USB port and insert your USB flash drive. At this point, you should have 4GB of free space, and the drive should be formatted.
- In the window in front of you, there will be two options to choose from. Select USB flash drive, and then click next.
- You will next be asked to select your USB flash drive; do so and click next.
- The Windows 10 Media Creation Tool will now transfer the files required to create a bootable USB version of the operating system. You should be patient while this process is running.
- When the progress information reaches 100% and the process is complete, click finish.
So you now have a bootable USB drive with which you can install Windows 10. In fact, you should probably keep the drive in a safe place. It may come in handy multiple times in the future. If you’re running Windows 7, Windows 8.1 or a preview version of Windows 10, you can use the drive to upgrade by inserting the drive into your computer and running setup.exe.
Got any questions about this tutorial or anything else related? Please ask them in the comment section below. Alternatively, you may be interested in learning how to remove the (877)764-4192 pop-up in Windows 10.
