Install Win7 FROM external USB 3.0 HDD

Hello, Im receiving my NEXOC (clevo p150hm) laptop tomorrow
Specs for the curious ones:
CPU - Core i7 2760QM, 2.4-3.5Ghz
RAM - Kingston 1x4GB 1333mhz (gonna be putting in more in a few days)
HDD 1 - 320GB 5400rpm (gonna be getting SSD and selling that one)
HDD 2 - empty slot (gonna be putting a WD Scorpio Black 750GB)
VIDEO - AMD 6990M
SCREEN - Non-Glare (Matte), 1080p FULLHD (dunno the brand)
EXTRAS - Revoltec Freeze Thermal Paste on CPU & GPU
Price - 1190,50 EUR (including shipping!!!)


So, back on-topic. I ordered it with an extra HDD bay (instead of the optical drive) so I will have to install my OS by other means.

Currently, I've got my external WD Caviar Green 2TB drive on a nice Chronos 3.5" USB 3.0 enclosure and I have an empty partition on it (I think its NTFS). So, I've got a few working Windows 7 ISO images, question is - how do I make this empty partition on my external HDD bootable so I may extract one of my working Win7 installation ISO's and install the OS to my new laptop by booting from the external HDD?


P.S. CANT WAIT for it to come delivered! I will be at work and I'll be screaming like a girl when it comes (first Clevo laptop)

 

Ironically, I have the same laptop (sager branded) and used an external hdd to install windows 7 a few weeks ago. I'm not sure if usb 3.0 will work or not, since that's not natively supported by the chipset. But I'd imagine it would correctly downgrade to usb 2.0 though since 3.0 is backwards compatible.

Anyways, it took me a long time to figure out to make my secondary partition in my external hdd bootable, since the first couple of links on google missed a key step. I believe there is a windows usb tool out there, but I've heard it only works on usb pen drives. Anyhow, I made my secondary partition in my external hdd bootable by following this video on youtube: Install Windows 7 From a USB Flash Drive or USB Hard Drive - YouTube
He only has 1 partition in that video, but it will still work even if your hdd has multiple partitions. Just make sure you mark the correct partition as active and make the correct partition bootable (the ntfs partition that you will copy your windows 7 files to will be the one that you want to mark as active and make bootable).

I'll summarize what to do, but you'll have to watch that video for the exact command line arguments.

1. Obtain the windows 7 iso and format your hdd partition that you want to boot from as ntfs, which you have already done it seems. I assume you assigned the ntfs partition a drive letter, but if you haven't you can do so by right clicking My Computer, clicking manage, going to disk management, right clicking the correct partition, and clicking change drive letter and paths.
2. Mount the windows 7 iso (I think I used magiciso, but any mounting program should work) and copy all of the files from the mounted drive into the ntfs partition on your external hdd.
3. Mark the ntfs partition with the windows 7 files as active. You can either do this by a) right clicking My Computer, clicking manage, going to disk management, right clicking the correct partition, and marking it as active, OR b) opening the command prompt as administrator as shown in the video and typing in the commands shown in the video. Make sure to select the correct disk and partition; after you have run the appropriate commands, the active partition will have a star next to it in the command prompt display.
I went with method b) since that's how they did it in the video, but either method should work.
4) Now, make your drive bootable. Open the command prompt as administrator if it isn't open already. Make sure you are running as administrator or you will get an error. In the video he types "e:\boot\bootsect.exe /nt60 e: /mbr". You should replace the "e" drive with the letter of your partition that contains the windows 7 files (the same partition that you made active in part 3). So if your active partition that holds the windows files is "g", replace "e" with "g". If you typed in this command correctly, your partition should now be bootable.
5. Finally, you need to boot from your external hdd. Connect your external hdd to one of the usb ports on your sager/clevo. Sager has its own bios, so I'm not sure if the buttons are the same, but press F2 (or whatever button your setup is) on the startup menu and change the boot order to ensure that your usb external hdd boots first (you should reset this to default later after you have installed windows). Save changes and restart. Then press F7 (or whatever button it is for the clevos bios) on the startup menu and select that drive to boot from it (make sure you have the correct harddrive/usb port selected!).
6. Now install windows!

If you have any questions feel free to ask. There might be other methods, but this method worked perfectly for me. I also assume you have another computer with windows vista or 7 to do this procedure with. The command arguments will be slightly different if you are using xp.

 

Thanks man! I will prepare my external HDD when I get home, so tomorrow when my laptop comes shipped, Im gonna unpack it and start installing!

And yes, I got my mother's laptop with me (HP Compaq 6720s, old and buggy) with Win7 Starter on it, so I will use that to prepare the HDD for booting (and test it).

Gonna check the Clevo Drivers thread and download the drivers real quick, gotta be prepared. Besides the WiFi, Video and Audio, what other drivers are good to have? I'm almost sure the Win7 Ultimate SP1 x64 will have some initial drivers for the webcam, bluetooth and stuff, but do you reccomend installing all chipset drivers that come from Clevo? Or just leave the default windows drivers..?

 

It should be easy. Pretty much the same as making a flash drive Windows installer.

 

Actually, a lot of the methods I tried from google searches wouldn't work for my external hdd, even though people claimed that they worked for usb flash drives. It took me forever to figure out how to make my external hdd bootable.



As for the drivers, I just installed the ones that were on the drivers disk that came with the laptop. I don't know if those are the best ones though.

 

Im not even sure if I will get a DVD with drivers. Chances are 50/50. On the Nexoc site, they have downloadable drivers, chances are they won't make the effort of supplying me with a drivers DVD in the package :S But - never mind that! I still have internet connection, might as well go ahead and download all drivers just in case and burn me a DVD with them.

 

Hi Im getting this error:

"the selected disk is not a fixed mbr disk" in command prompt. Any workaround for this one?

 

Strange, I didn't encounter that error. What command is giving you this error?


EDIT: Actually, I think I may know what the problem is. Are you having trouble setting a partition to active? Check if your disk is MBR or GPT. To do this, right click My Computer, click manage, go to disk management, right click the correct Disk (should say Disk followed by some number) to the left of the list of partitions: if it says convert to GPT then your disk is MBR, and if it sats convert to MBR then your disk is GPT.

 

its GPT, what do I do now? I have 3 partitions, 2 of these are full with valuable data. I hope these can stay in-tact, dont wanna lose the stuff there. Should I attempt converting to MBR?

 

Well, I didn't have this problem because my drive was already MBR. Only solutions I can see now are:

a) converting from GPT to MBR. I've never done this, but according to Google searches it's possible to do this without data loss if you have 4 or less partitions. Convert GPT Disk to MBR with Windows Disk Manager Software I haven't used this tool, so I can't comment on its reliability.
b) trying to make your drive bootable by another method. Took me hours of research just to find out how to make my MBR drive bootable, but there are probably other methods out there that I don't know about.
c) worst case scenario, you'll have to buy a 4+ gb usb flash drive. Then you can just use the windows usb tool to make it bootable.

Or maybe someone else here can help you with this.

 

I finished installing Win7 with my dad's external USB DVD drive. Thanks for the help anyways. Now installing drivers...man 1080p resolution on 15.6" monitor is sick, cant read anything