My goal is to have a dedicated USB for running Windows with persistent storage, so that if it would save something to the hard drive it instead saves it to the flash drive. I do not want to dual-boot or install it.
Normally I’d be able to Google this and find my own way around. However, I don’t know what this is called. Some people seem to be calling this a bootable USB, some people seem to be calling it a live USB. And of course, none of the guides I’ve seen show them using it, shutting down and unplugging it, and then demonstrating the persistent storage on the next boot. The most I’ve gathered is that windows needs to be packaged in a special way to run like this, but it seems unclear what that means for me.
So. What is this thing called? How have you gone about making a bootable/live windows flash drive with persistent storage? Any direction would be greatly appreciated
Windows To Go is a search term you can try, it’s supported on Win 8 and 10.
Windows To Go is removed in Windows 10, version 2004 and later operating systems. The feature does not support feature updates and therefore does not enable you to stay current. It also requires a specific type of USB that is no longer supported by many OEMs.
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/deployment/planning/windows-to-go-overview
Windows to go still works fine for me on my regular Samsung flash drive, I used Rufus and a regular windows 10 iso to install it to the flash drive
I wonder why you cannot just clone the bits to a usb flash drive. Is there some sort of check that the operating system has not been moved to some other hardware in there?
There are tools out there that can create a bootable usb drive specifically with persistent storage. You can try Sardu (https://www.sarducd.it/sardu-multiboot-creator). I believe it has an option in the GUI to specifically enable persistent storage.
I thought that choosing a USB flash drive as the installation path/location in the Windows installation process would get the job done no special software required!
Use Linux for this purpose to keep your mental health better. Even with USB 3.0 Windows can be painfully slow.
My daily driver is Zorin OS. I just want to be able to use windows without dual-booting, if I have to.
Although tbh my only hesitancy with setting up dual-booting is that I don’t want to have to format my computer again. It might be my best option in the end though.
If it’s desktop computer, then use gpu passthrough with any amd gpu and you have a hardware accelerated virtualized Windows with 98% of gpu power what that card has.
Youtube is full of guides. Amd is much easier than Nvidia, but Nvidia is possible too with extra steps.
If memory serves, I did install an AMD graphics card. Definitely need to look into this. Thank you so very much
Some things don’t work in VMs at all, like valorant for example.
I did this a few years ago because for university I needed the
spywaresoftware “Respondus Lockdown Browser” that is specifically designed to not run in VM or wine and only supports Windows. I needed it only a very few times so a dual boot would take away disk storage I may use in better ways. If you too are obliged to stay away from a VM I’ll try to remember the tool I used, it was windows only but allowed to create windows bootable USB for free, without even a license. I partitioned my 500Gb SSD to not waste it all for Windows. Otherwise, a VM would probably serve you way better (and faster)I’m interested. Comment when you remember.
It should be this one: https://www.easeus.com/partition-master/install-windows-10-on-external-hard-drive.html
Lookup pebuilder.
