Usually Windows is installed from DVD disc, but these days it's much more convenient to install operating system from USB thumbdrive. A lot of modern hardware does not even have a builtin DVD reader/recorder. With FlashBoot, you can install Windows from USB, and so avoid using external USB DVD reader/recorder for Windows installation.

This article explains how to install Windows from USB thumbdrive or USB HDD using FlashBoot. Step by step guide.

An attempt to install Windows 7 to new computers usually leads to "A required CD/DVD drive device driver is missing" error, which is caused by missing USB 3.0 drivers.

This article explains how to circumvent "A required CD/DVD drive device driver is missing" error and install Windows 7 to new laptop or new PC. This is especially useful on Skylake, Kaby Lake, Coffee Lake and Ryzen platforms.

Contrary to the popular belief, Windows 7 can be installed to modern hardware like NVMe and Optane solid state drives — and it will be fast on these storage devices, much faster than Windows 10/11. It just needs proper drivers.

This article explains how to avoid "No drives were found" warning during installation of Windows 7 to NVMe solid-state drive.

It’s a well-known fact that Windows 7 works best in CSM mode, which, unfortunately, is not supported by the firmware of many modern motherboards and laptops.

Contrary to the popular belief, it’s possible to install Windows 7 x64 to the pure UEFI systems without CSM support. Read below to find out how.

Sometimes Windows installation or upgrade can stuck in the endless reboot loop related to the following error: "The computer restarted unexpectedly or encountered an unexpected error. Windows installation cannot proceed. To install Windows, click "OK" to restart the computer, and then restart the installation."

This problem can be easily fixed by changing registry value HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\Setup\Status\ChildCompletion\setup.exe from 1 to 3. Emergency Boot Kit will be of great help in this case, because it can edit Registry outside of Windows, even if Windows doesn't boot.

Sometimes, during installation of Windows 7/8/10/11 from USB thumbdrive, the following error occurs: “Setup was unable to create a new system partition or locate an existing system partition”.

In this case, setup files should be copied to the temporary partition on the internal HDD, and installation should be restarted from the temporary partition. When the Windows has been installed, new system reserved partition should be created manually, and the temporary installation partition should be cleaned up. This article explains how to do it step by step.

"Windows cannot be installed to this disk" problem is caused by mismatch between boot method (UEFI/non-UEFI) and disk layout (GPT/MBR). Windows assumes GPT layout for UEFI boot method, and MBR layout for non-UEFI boot method.

This Windows installation problem can be resolved either by switching boot method between UEFI and non-UEFI in BIOS/UEFI setup or by changing disk layout from GPT to MBR or vice versa.

If your keyboard works normally in BIOS/UEFI setup, but does not work during Windows installation or stops working after first reboot into Windows, then most probable reason is missing USB 3.0 drivers.

While you can resolve this problem by reverting to PS/2 keyboard or by toggling various options in BIOS/UEFI setup, much better approach is to integrate USB 3.0 drivers into Windows installation media.

If your computer does not have TPM chip, has less than 8 GB of RAM, or its firmware does not support Secure Boot feature, you will encounter "This PC can't run Windows 11" problem during the installation of Windows 11.

But there's a workaround. To solve this problem, you need to tweak a few registry keys in the Windows preinstallation environment. This article explains which registry keys exactly need to be tweaked and how to do it.

During the installation of Windows 10 or Windows 11, on the partition creation and formatting page, you may encounter error 0x80300024. This error occurs on hardware configurations with multiple hard drives or SSDs. It is caused by inability of Windows Setup to correctly recognize which internal storage device is bootable.

But there is a workaround for error 0x80300024: by manually transferring the bootloader, BCD registry hive and bootable ramdisk to internal bootable storage device and booting from that device, we can hint Windows Setup which of the multiple internal storage devices is bootable. Windows installation will then proceed as usual.

Netbooks, mid-level notebooks and tablet PCs often do not have a CD/DVD drive, but you still need a way to install operating system on such computer. Diskless OS installation is especially painful for older operating systems like Windows XP which were not originally designed to support booting from USB. Here FlashBoot comes in handy: it provides an easy way to install Windows from USB.

This article describes an easy way to install Windows XP from USB thumbdrive using FlashBoot on notebook, netbook, tablet PC or other computer without CD/DVD drive.

Sometimes installing Windows can be a truly challenging problem. For example, if you need to install Windows XP (because it's an old hardware uncapable of running something better), and you need to install operating system to the SATA HDD in AHCI mode or to the RAID controller (with appropriate F6 floppy drivers), but you have neither CD/DVD nor floppy drive available, just USB ports!

Using the power of FlashBoot, you can solve even this challenge. This article explains step by step, how to install Windows XP with builtin F6 floppy drivers for AHCI/RAID disk using USB thumbdrive only.

Blue Screen of Death (BSOD) which sometimes occurs during Windows installation or just after Windows installation can be particularly annoying, especially when you don't understand its cause or what to do about it.

This article explains in detail why does Blue Screen of Death occur during Windows XP installation and how to solve Stop 0x0000007B (Stop 7B, INACCESSIBLE_BOOT_DEVICE) error.

Windows XP requires that drivers for AHCI/RAID disk controllers must be supplied on floppy disk (activated by F6 key during installation). However today there are many computers with USB ports and CD/DVD drive, but without floppy drive.

This article explains how to use USB thumbdrive instead of F6 floppy disk with AHCI/RAID drivers for Windows XP installation to the AHCI/RAID disk.

If you are installing Windows 7 or newer version after Windows XP on the same computer to establish dual-boot configuration, then you are safe. But if you are doing it in the reverse order (i.e. installing an older OS after newer one), then you can run into a nasty problem: you will no longer be able to boot into the newer OS.

This article explains step by step, how to restore Windows 7 boot after installing Windows XP, fix Windows 7 boot after Windows XP installation, and repair dual boot configuration when Windows XP was installed after Windows 7.

Windows To Go feature of Windows 10/8.x is very convenient, but it requires Enterprise license, certified USB thumbdrive, and USB 3.0 ports on your PC.

With FlashBoot Free, you can use Windows To Go feature on non-Enterprise Edition of Windows, or with non-certified USB thumbdrives, including USB 2.0 hardware.

Windows To Go installer won't allow you to use most USB thumdrives, because they appear as removable USB mass storage devices to Windows. Also, Windows To Go in default configuration won't work properly on the removable USB thumbdrives.

Using FlashBoot Free, it's possible bypass Windows To Go installer restrictions and install Windows To Go to any USB thumbdrive. Also FlashBoot will make removable USB thumbdrive always appear as fixed to Windows To Go.

When powering up you computer, you may encounter the following error: "Operating System not found". This boot problem is related to the MBR signature 55 AA.

This article explains step by step, how to fix Operating System Not Found error. Operating System Not Found Windows boot problem can be fixed quickly and easily using Emergency Boot Kit.

If you're having boot problem on your Windows PC related to the following error: "Missing operating system", then you can easily get rid of it, using Emergency Boot Kit, and boot your PC like before.

This article explains how to fix Missing Operating System error, related to Windows 7 and other operating systems, by setting active partition flag in the partition table.

If your PC fails to boot with the "Error Loading Operating System", then you can fix it in a few minutes using Emergency Boot Kit.

This article explains how to get rid of Error Loading Operating System. Repair this boot issue quickly and easily by recovering the boot sector.

Boot error INACCESSIBLE_BOOT_DEVICE is caused either by missing driver for bootable storage device, or by wrong state of HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\MountedDevices registry key.

Learn how to fix INACCESSIBLE_BOOT_DEVICE by updating reference to disk C: in SYSTEM registry hive using Emergency Boot Kit.

If the error message "NTLDR is missing" appears when you are trying to boot Windows XP, then you can quickly fix it using Emergency Boot Kit.

This article explains how to fix NTLDR is missing error, by restoring original NTLDR file from OS installation media.

One day, after powering up your PC, you may find out that it fails to boot with "BOOTMGR is missing" error. You've come to the right place. Fortunately, this error is easily fixable.

Learn how to fix BOOTMGR is missing error by restoring original copy of BOOTMGR file from Windows installation DVD or from installed Windows directory, using Emergency Boot Kit.

Boot Error "An operating system wasn't found" is caused by missing BOOTMGR file at the root directory of System Reserved Partition. This is a variation of "BOOTMGR is missing" error which applies only to Windows 10/11 and Windows 8.x.

Learn how to fix "An operating system wasn't found" error by restoring original copy of BOOTMGR file from Windows installation disk or from installed Windows directory, using Emergency Boot Kit.

Boot Error 0xC000000E (Required Device is Inaccessible) is caused by misconfiguration in the BCD (Boot Configuration Data) registry hive.

Find out how to fix error 0xC000000E (status 0xC000000E) by repair of Boot Configuration Data using Emergency Boot Kit.

Boot Error 0xC000000F (An Error Occurred While Attempting to Read the Boot Configuration Data) is caused by missing or corrupt BCD registry hive.

Find out how to fix error 0xC000000F (status 0xC000000F) by rebuilding BCD from scratch, using Emergency Boot Kit.

Boot Boot Error 0xC0000098 (Windows Boot Configuration Data file does not contain a valid OS entry) is caused by incomplete or corrupt configuration in the BCD registry hive.

Learn how to fix error 0xC0000098 (status 0xC0000098) by recreating BCD from scratch, using Emergency Boot Kit.

Boot Error 0xC0000225 (Application is Missing or Corrupt) is caused by missing or corrupt system file.

Find out how to fix error 0xC0000225 (status 0xC0000225) by recovering original file from WinSxS Component Store using Emergency Boot Kit.

Boot Error 0xC0000034 (The Windows Boot Configuration Data file is missing required information) is caused by missing self-referencing Boot Manager entry in the BCD registry hive.

Error 0xC0000034 (status 0xC0000034) can be fixed by rebuilding Boot Configuration Data registry hive from scratch using Emergency Boot Kit.

If Windows boot on your PC hangs at Preparing Your Desktop, or if Windows 7 boot hangs when displaying glowing logo, usually this boot problem can be fixed with Emergency Boot Kit.

This article explains how to fix Windows hangup before logon by restoring mount point for disk C: in the SYSTEM registry hive.

One day starting Windows Registry Editor, you may encounter an error message that registry editing has been disabled by administrator. This is usually caused by malware which protects itself from being wiped out from the registry. Whether regedit.exe is allowed to run, is controlled by a particular registry value. But the situation is nasty: in order to change that particular registry value, you must be able to run regedit.exe!

Here Emergency Boot Kit comes in handy. It's an independent tool which runs outside of your OS and lets you change everything in the Windows Registry. This article explains how to fix registry editing has been disabled by administrator error message. Enable registry editing in Windows. Fix regedit disabled problem.

In addition to disabling registry editing, various Windows malware often disables Windows Task Manager, for the purpose of hindering experienced user's ability to detect it in the list of running programs and kick it out of the system.

This article explains how to fix task manager has been disabled by administrator error message. Enable Task Manager in Windows back again, restore ability to run Windows Task Manager.

Sometimes, when you are trying to delete or rename a registry key, you get access denied error. It is usually caused either by poorly written software which created another user account on your PC and failed to clean up properly on deinstallation, or by transferring registry hive from another PC. Anyway, this is due to registry key permissions stored in ACLs (access control lists).

Emergency Boot Kit contains offline Registry Editor, which operates at low level and can directly manupulate ACLs in the registry keys. This article explains step by step, how to fix access denied error in registry, take ownership of a registry key, and fix permissions of a registry key.

This article explains the cause and how to fix Windows Device Manager Error Code 19: Windows cannot start this hardware device because its configuration information (in the registry) is incomplete or damaged.

This error is caused by broken association between device-related registry keys in the SYSTEM registry hive: software key, hardware key and service key. It can be fixed by removing first two keys from registry and triggering Windows Plug and Play device installation sequence.

During the first run of freshly installed Windows 11, “Let’s Connect You To a Network” screen appears. There is no obvious way in GUI to skip this screen, but you would like to skip it anyway (for example, because drivers for your network adapter are not installed yet).

To skip this screen, you need to create a special registry value (BypassNRO) in the registry key associated with OOBE, and restart your computer to re-enter this phase of Windows 11 setup. All of this can be done solely from the command line, and the rest of this article explains exactly how.

If your are servicing somebody other's PC, you may have need to access the local administrator account for a short time. But sometimes it's not possible to get in touch with PC owner (e.g. late at night), and it's undesireable to reset password permanently, because people don't like their things broken.

This article explains how to change Windows password temporarily, gain access to the user account for a short time, perform system maintenance, and restore original password back.

Recently a lot of ransomware started to emerge. It's a kind of malicious software which installs links to itself into Windows startup lists, gets control on every reboot, and effectively locks users out of their own computers. To get rid of ransomware, expericenced user can run command prompt with SYSTEM privileges right on the Windows logon screen, before first logon session is established and Windows startup lists get executed.

This article explains how to bypass Windows Logon Screen and run system command prompt with key combination without entering Windows password, in order to get rid of ransomware, remove SMS blocker, remove Winlock manually.

It's easy to leave domain on the Windows workstation, but it's hard to get back if it turns out that none of local administrator accounts were functional. Also you can run into similar issues if you mistype the domain name when rejoining the domain. Fortunately, this situation is easily fixable using Emergency Boot Kit.

This article explains how to restore computer membership in the domain, how to rejoin computer back to the domain, if you can't login after domain to workgroup change in Windows.

Mid-level notebook computers with limited RAM and slow HDD or SSD can be tweaked in order to run faster and make more RAM available to the web browser and other useful applications.

This article explains how to speed up Windows on notebook computers, boost Windows performance, turn off unnecessary system services, and make your computer run faster.

Disk controller for SATA HDDs and SSDs can operate in both AHCI and IDE compatible mode, and usually can be reconfigured in the BIOS setup. AHCI mode is faster, has more features, and totally makes sense for modern operating systems. Unfortunately, if you forgot to switch from IDE to AHCI before installing Windows Vista/7/8.x/10/11, then you will get a BSOD (blue screen of death) during the next boot, whenever you switch.

This article explains how to switch disk controller from IDE to AHCI mode after installation of Windows, change from IDE to AHCI without reinstalling Windows.

In dual-boot configurations, like Windows 7 and Windows 10/11, sometimes an interesting phenomena occurs: a full disk check is executed each time Windows 7 boots after Windows 10/11.

This erroneous disk check is caused by combination of two seemingly unrelated factors: hybrid boot of Windows 10/11 (enabled by default) and a new format of NTFS logfile introduced in between these OSes.

Unlike other websites suggesting to disable Windows 7 disk check at boot time, we fix this issue properly, so that disk check will run whenever necessary, but not on every reboot.

A number of registry and filesystem tweaks can be applied to Windows XP running on SSD-based computers in order to make it run faster and consume less memory.

This article explains in detail how to optimize Windows XP for running from SSD. How to speed up the slow computers, boost Windows XP performance, and make your computer run faster.

Disk controller for SATA HDDs can operate in both AHCI and IDE compatible mode. You can switch between them the in BIOS setup. AHCI mode works faster and has more features, while IDE compatible mode requires no special drivers to install older operating systems like Windows XP. Unfortunately, if you decide to switch between IDE and AHCI after installing Windows, you will get a BSOD (blue screen of death) during the next boot.

This article explains how to switch from IDE to AHCI after installation of Windows XP, how to change disk controller mode from IDE to AHCI without reinstalling Windows.

Due to write amplification effect, write operations on flash memory can be quite slow, and negatively impact SSD lifetime. In order to make SSDs quick and last long, operating system should defer writing to flash memory device as long as possible (keep changes in RAM), and also avoid in-place rewrites of the single block.

This article explains how to protect SSD against wear-out using Enhanced Write Filter (EWF), how to speed up the slow SSD, and also how to establish rollback integrity filesystem in Windows XP.

Rather than waiting for digital disaster to happen and then trying to fix it with various tools and approaches, it's better to act proactively and have a full backup of your computer, so you can always get back to known good state at a glance.

Emergency Boot Kit can backup your whole computer (applications, documents and other data) or a chosen subset of your data. Backup copy is saved in open format, so it can be restored either with Emergency Boot Kit or other tools if necessary.

SSDs are undoubtedly much more faster, reliable and energy-efficient in comparison with traditional HDDs, but it's a real pain to manually move entire operating system, including user profiles, installed software, games, documents, settings, and all of your data from HDD to SSD. Fortunately, it's possible to perform migration from HDD to SSD without reinstalling Windows and everything else, by using Emergency Boot Kit.

This article explains step by step, how to transfer Windows from HDD to SSD, migrate to a solid-state disk without reinstalling Windows and applications.

Your installation of Windows no longer boots, and unfortunately you don't have a copy of your Windows product key in order to reinstall the operating system? Don't worry, it's possible to recover Windows Product Key from registry in offline mode, even if Windows is no longer bootable.

This article explains how to find and recover Windows Product Key from the registry, extract Windows Serial Number from registry in offline mode, and get Windows CD Key from unbootable computer.

If you want to try out Windows 10, but hesitate to upgrade due to performance or privacy concerns, you can use Emergency Boot Kit to make a full backup of your system, so you can revert from Windows 10 to your previous version of Windows later at any time.

This article explains how to get ready to uninstall Windows 10 and go back to Windows 7 or 8 after expiring 30 day period, and how to downgrade from Windows 10 to your past operating system at any time.

If you bought new computer with Windows 10/11 and if you dislike it because of OS-builtin advertising, forced updates, untimely reboots and pervasive telemetry — then way to go is to return to Windows 7.

To downgrade from Windows 10/11 to Windows 7: obtain valid product key and installation media, integrate drivers to Windows 7 installation media, and boot your computer from it.

If you have a modern computer where Windows 7 Setup halts at boot time when displaying OS logo, then you need to apply the patch for Windows 7 UEFI loader in FlashBoot Pro. This patch provides emulation of VGA BIOS (INT 10H) over UEFI GOP framebuffer, thus enabling installation and use of Windows 7 on the modern purely UEFI-based computers without CSM.

And if you have a dual-boot configuration of Windows 10/11 and Windows 7, you need to have two UEFI loaders simultaneously: a new one, capable of booting Windows 10/11 (with modern features, frequently updated by Windows Update); and older one, dedicated for booting Windows 7, patched by FlashBoot Pro for VGA BIOS emulation (thus, Windows Update preferrably should leave it alone).

This article explains in detail how to establish such a dual-boot configuration.

Unlike Linux and other operating systems, Windows recognizes only one partition on USB thumbdrives (but multiple partitions on USD HDDs). USB thumbdrives and USB HDDs are told apart by Windows using removable/fixed bit as reported the USB storage devices.

This article explains how to create multiple partitions on the USB thumbdrive, and how to flip removable media bit for all USB storage devices recognized by operating system.

System reserved partition is a small (100 MB) non-NTFS partition containing Windows Boot Loader and its configuration (BCD registry hive). Usually there is no drive letter assigned in Windows for system reserved partition, albeit this partition is mounted, accessible via volume-GUID path, and its BCD hive is usually mounted at HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\BCD00000000.

Windows will not boot without system reserved partition.

This article is for people who accidentally deleted or formatted system reserved partition and need to rebuild system reserved partition from scratch without reinstalling Windows.

EFI system partition is a small (100-500 MB) FAT16 or FAT32 partition containing UEFI-compatible Windows Boot Loader and its configuration (BCD registry hive). This partition may also contain other files (e.g. Linux Boot Loaders) in dual-boot configurations.

When UEFI-based computer is powered up, its firmware searches for EFI system partition on all attached storage devices. If EFI system partition does not exist, then computer will not boot.

This article is for people who accidentally deleted or formatted EFI system partition and need to rebuild it from scratch without reinstalling Windows.

Windows Recovery, when run from USB thumbdrive or USB HDD, sometimes produces the following error: "Failed to save startup options". This error is caused by multiplicity of System Reserved Partitions. First one exists on your HDD, another one exists on the USB thumbdrive you are running Windows Recovery from. An attempt to update System Reserved Partition located on USB removable storage device leads to the "Failed to save startup options" error.

Instead of Windows Recovery, Mount & Boot Center of Emergency Boot Kit can be used to fix various Windows boot problems.

Bootrec console command, when run from USB thumbdrive or USB HDD in Windows Setup/Recovery session, sometimes produces the following error: "The requested system device cannot be found". This error is caused by multiplicity of System Reserved Partitions. First one exists on your HDD, another one exists on the USB thumbdrive you are running Windows Setup/Recovery session from. An attempt to update System Reserved Partition located on USB removable storage device leads to the "The requested system device cannot be found" bootrec error.

Instead of Bootrec console command, Mount & Boot Center of Emergency Boot Kit can be used to fix various Windows boot problems.

You may encounter a situation when you can't boot Windows anymore, but there is no specific error message or error code to search for. Windows just keeps rebooting in a loop, and BSoD (blue screen of death) appears just for a tiny fraction of second, so details about the error can't be read.

There's a special registry value to prevent automatic reboot on BSoD. After changing this registry value with Emergency Boot Kit, you will have enough time to read details about the error (such as error code and error message), and continue your search for the solution.