Bootable Usb Maker Software

[Ken Reels]

The Universal USB Installer (Imager), also known as UUI, is USB bootable pendrive software. This ISO to USB utility allows you to easily create a multisystem bootable USB from ISO files. It enables you to boot from USB Windows setup installers, Linux operating systems, stand alone Antivirus software, along with several system diagnostic and PC repair tools.

Take all your favorite Live Linux distributions, Windows Installers, system recovery, backup, and diagnostic tools with you, capable of booting from one USB drive. The most popular antivirus scanners, disk cloning software, penetration testing, and system diagnostic tools can be stored on and configured to boot from the same single multisystem bootable pendrive. You can even use UUI to fully install, boot, and run Windows 11 entirely from USB.

Using this open source USB boot maker software is easy as 123. Simply select your target flash drive, choose your distribution from the list, browse to the ISO file (or choose to download the ISO), and then click Create. Once finished, you should have a ready to run Live USB containing the Live operating system, Windows installer, or system diagnostics utility, or advanced system cleaner tool you previously selected.

Some boot from USB tools use simple DD (Disk/Data Duplicator) copy and convert commands to directly burn ISO to USB. The DD method of copying, also commonly referred to as "Data Destroyer" works by overwriting the entire file system on a flash drive with that of a CD or DVD image. This process causes the drive to appear limited to the size of the chosen ISO file which can prevent you from continuing to use the drive for storage purposes. However, if the filesystem used by the CD/DVD image supports expansion, it may be possible to recover lost USB drive space or storage capacity by extending the space and creating another partition to use for storage.

UUI offers a more practical method than DD through the use of an exFAT partition for storing bootable ISO files and block images, along with a separate hidden secondary FAT boot partition which is used to boot those files. This method allows your USB drive to appear to Windows as a regular exFAT formatted flash drive and enables you to continue using your removable device for traditional storage purposes.

Another key feature of this bootable USB maker is the use of persistent storage, where available. This persistence feature allows you to save changes and then restore those changes on subsequent boots. Ubuntu based Casper persistence works with FAT32, NTFS, or exFAT formatted drives. Starting with version 2.0.1.6, the USB drive is formatted with an exFAT filesystem, so an option to use a larger than 4GB casper-rw or live-rw persistent block file, (also known as an overlay image) is now possible. Currently supporting up to 40GB persistence.

Instead of relaunching this Live Linux USB Creator to add more distributions, you can simply drag additional ISO, IMG, WIM, VHD(x), VDI.vtoy, and EFI files from any folder on your computer and drop them onto any folder under the UUI folder on your flash drive. You can also create your own folders within the UUI folder to use for storage. During bootup, the system will automatically populate the menu entries for those newly discovered items.

Important: UUI will show drives detected by Windows as either removable media (USB Drive) or a fixed (Local Disk). See the recommended list of some of the fastest and best USB flash drives to use with this tool.

WARNING: You must backup any data you wish to keep before using this tool on any Disk. When choosing the "Prepare this Device" option, all volumes and partitions on the select (Disk #), even if they are hidden, will be wiped clean.

You can use the UUI4Linux UUI.sh bash shell script to prepare and make a Multiboot bootable USB from Linux. After the drive is prepared, you can proceed to add ISO distributions and create persistence files by running the Universal-USB-Installer-2.0.2.4.exe executable from WINE.

Once finished, the included Universal-USB-Installer-2.0.2.4.exe executable can be run from within WINE to learn more about a distro, download related ISO files, and install additional distributions + create persistence files on any prepared drive.

This USB boot maker software allows you to make a custom bootable USB drive from ISO files of the following Live Linux Portable Operating Systems, Windows Installers, Windows PE, System Diagnostic Tools, Cloning Tools, and Antivirus Utilities. Choose from a selection of Windows Installers and popular Live Linux distributions to put on your flash drive. It's easy as 123.

More Live ISOs, USB Windows Installers, portable Linux distributions and System tools will be added as time permits. Let me know about any unlisted Live Linux distributions that should be included or version revisions, and I will do my best to update the UUI tool to support them. Feel free to contact me to submit your recommendations and suggestions.

The Persistence feature works with most Arch Linux, Fedora, Ubuntu, and even Debian based distributions like KALI Linux. However, for some reason the persistent option is broken with the newest official Debian distribution. The Debian persistent block file and label are currently being named persistence, and hold a persistence.conf file containing / Union.

Perhaps Debian no longer supports persistence in a loopback mounted file and will only detect partitions? If you have any information regarding why this might be, please contact me and let me know so I can try to make the necessary changes to fix it.

If an ISO filename does not appear when browsing for a selected distribution, you can try to force the selection of that ISO file. This is useful in situations where, for example, you know that a distribution like Cinnamon is Ubuntu-based, but an installable entry for it does not exist yet, i.e., it does not match any of the options.

This bootable USB maker was created to be useful and free of viruses, malware, or anything intentionally malicious. Being open source, the source code is also made available for each release. That source pertaining to the released version can be found next to the download link for anyone to view.

Both tools are excellent choices and their popularity has varied depending on use case and evolution over the years. Today, the modern version of UUI supports the use of an exFAT file system for storage (a feature that originated with Rufus), along with the Multibooting feature which was recently adopted from YUMI with a Ventoy bootloader. Out of this group of bootable USB maker software, the Universal USB Installer was the first boot from USB tool created for Windows, having been developed several years before Rufus, Ventoy, and YUMI.

Since its original inception as a simple tool meant to boot DOS from USB, Rufus has also evolved over time, adopting many of the Universal USB Installer's unique features. In addition, it offers some options that are not currently available in UUI. Rufus was the first tool to offer a Fat16/32 boot partition with a separate NTFS or exFAT partition to use for storage through the use of custom drivers. Thanks to Pete Batard's work, his NTFS and exFAT drivers and methods of using multi partitioning for separate boot and storage are now used in most modern USB boot tools, including Ventoy, YUMI, and UUI.

CD and DVD writers are a thing of the past. You are not likely to find them in modern-day laptops. If your goal is to create a bootable medium, then creating a bootable USB drive from an ISO file remains your best option.

There are quite a number of tools that can help you create a bootable USB drive. Some will even go further and let you create a multi-boot USB drive where you get to choose the OS that you want to install.

UNetbootin is a free and cross-platform utility for creating live bootable USB drives using an ISO image from all the major Linux distributions, even the lesser-known ones such as Tails, and AntiX.

In fact, Ventoy takes away the need to format your USB drive over and over again. Simply copy the ISO file to your Pendrive drive and boot it. You can copy multiple ISO files concurrently and Ventoy will provide a boot menu to select your preferred image to boot from. Ventoy supports over 420 ISO files.

Abbreviated as UUI, Universal USB Installer is a Live Linux Bootable USB Creator Software that allows you to easily create a bootable USB from your favorite Linux distribution or Windows installer. It runs only on the Windows operating system.

PowerISO is a robust and fully-featured application for burning CDs/DVDs. In addition, It allows you to extract, burn, create, encrypt, compress, and convert ISO images and mount them on an external drive.

MultiBootUSB is a free and open-source cross-platform tool that also allows users to install multiple Live Linux distributions on a USB drive and boot from it. It provides a simple and user-friendly UI that enhances the seamless creation of the bootable USB drive.

Last on the list is the ImageUSB Writer. Just like GNOME multi-writer and multi-boot USB, this is a free utility for Windows systems only that allows you to write an ISO file concurrently to several USB devices. It also supports direct imaging between the devices.

That was a roundup of some of the utilities that you can leverage to create a bootable USB drive from an ISO image in Linux. We have compiled tools that work on both Linux and Windows in case you are working on either system. That is all for now. Your feedback is highly welcome.

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