How to create bootable usb from iso linux

How to create bootable usb from iso linux

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1. Overview

With a bootable Ubuntu USB stick, you can:

Creating a bootable Ubuntu USB stick is very simple, especially from Ubuntu itself, and we’re going to cover the process in the next few steps.

Alternatively, we also have tutorials to help you create a bootable USB stick from both Microsoft Windows and Apple macOS.

2. Requirements

3. Launch Startup Disk Creator

We’re going to use an application called ‘Startup Disk Creator’ to write the ISO image to your USB stick. This is installed by default on Ubuntu, and can be launched as follows:

4. ISO and USB selection

When launched, Startup Disk Creator will look for the ISO files in your Downloads folder, as well as any attached USB storage it can write to.

It’s likely that both your Ubuntu ISO and the correct USB device will have been detected and set as ‘Source disc image’ and ‘Disk to use’ in the application window. If not, use the ‘Other’ button to locate your ISO file and select the exact USB device you want to use from the list of devices.

Click Make Startup Disk to start the process.

5. Confirm USB device

Before making any permanent changes, you will be asked to confirm the USB device you’ve chosen is correct. This is important because any data currently stored on this device will be destroyed.

After confirming, the write process will start and a progress bar appears.

6. Installation complete

That’s it! You now have Ubuntu on a USB stick, bootable and ready to go.

If you want to install Ubuntu, take a look at our install Ubuntu desktop tutorial.

Make a bootable flash drive from an ISO image

We all know that installing an operating system from a USB drive is much faster than installing from DVD. In this article we will look at several ways to create a bootable USB drive.

Before describing how to create a bootable USB drive read the article How to correctly format the USB stick in Linux Mint. In some cases described below, it is desirable to have already formatted the USB flash drive in FAT32 format.

1. LinuxLive USB Creator (only for Windows users)
If you are a user of the Windows operating system and want to make a bootable USB flash drive with a Linux distribution – this program is for you.
It is very simple, select the USB flash drive, please specify the iso image will be copied, turn on the option to format the USB stick and click on the lightning.
You can download the program on the official developer’s website http://www.linuxliveusb.com/en/download.

Rufus is a utility that helps format and create bootable Flash/Pen/Key drives, memory cards, etc.
Rufus will be especially useful in cases where:
-you need to create a bootable USB disk from a bootable ISO image (Windows, Linux, UEFI, and others)
-need to work on systems that have no OS installed
-you need to flash a BIOS or other firmware from DOS
-you need to run a low-level utility
-Despite its small size, Rufus knows how to do everything!

3. UNetbootin (for Linux, Windows, Mac users)

A very common program. The principle of operation is the same as the previous program. Select the image, select the flash drive, and click OK. For details, see the screenshots below.

Installation latest version into Linux Mint 14/15/16/17/17.1:

5. Either – program to burn the iso image with the distro on a USB flash drive or micro SD card (Windows, MacOS and Linux) read article Either – program to record the iso image on a USB flash drive

6. YUMI – Multiboot USB Creator (for Linux, Windows users)

YUMI (Your Universal Multiboot Integrator), is the successor to our MultibootISOs. It can be used to create a Multiboot USB Flash Drive containing multiple operating systems, antivirus utilities, disc cloning, diagnostic tools, and more. Contrary to MultiBootISOs which used grub to boot ISO files directly from USB, YUMI uses syslinux to boot extracted distributions stored on the USB device, and reverts to using grub toBoot Multiple ISO files from USB, if necessary.

Important Note : YUMI was intended to be used to try to run various “LIVE Linux” Operating Systems from USB. Installing Linux from the YUMI created USB Drive to a Hard Drive is not officially supported. If the installer portion of any Live Linux distro does work, consider it a bonus.

Installation latest version into Linux Mint 14/15/16/17/17.1:

Download DEB package “YUMI for Ubuntu Linux” from website

7. USB image writer (for Linux users)

Linux Mint have default utility USB image writer. One time I used this program, but personally I have not always made a bootable USB flash drive.

Locate menu, the program will run. Select the image, select the USB drive and click Write.

Multiboot USB flash drive designed for loading and installing operating systems Windows/Linux and restoration-resuscitation tools directly from the USB drive.

9. WinUSB – Create Windows Usb stick
is a simple tool that allows you to create your own Windows installation on USB stick from an ISO image or DVD disk in Linux Mint.

10. Using the terminal (in my opinion the best 100% of the way)

As is known, the terminal is installed in any Linux distribution by default, so install additional software is not required.

The terminal command to write the iso image, the distribution is as follows:

Where instead of /home/USER/linuxmint.iso you need to specify the path to the iso file. sdb in the end, it’s a stick on which is written the way.

To determine your flash drive, run in terminal:

And if you stick decided differently, change in the command.

To be entered correctly in the command path to the file, open the folder with the file, open next to the terminal and drag the file into the terminal:

Now we are ready to start. I got the command:

The cursor of the terminal is blinking and it seems that nothing happens, but actually being recorded. Wait for the image capture and at the end you should see in the terminal like this:

How to create a bootable Ubuntu USB flash drive from terminal?

Is there any way to create a bootable Ubuntu USB flash drive from the terminal without using any third-party applications like YUMI, Unetbootin, Startup Disk Creator, etc.

I tried to create a bootable Ubuntu flash drive with dd method,

It creates files on the USB disk, but when I try to boot the USB disk it shows an Operating System Not Found error.

8 Answers 8

It will look something like

I would dismount sdb1.

Then, next (this is a destructive command and wipes the entire USB drive with the contents of the iso, so be careful):

where input.iso is the input file, and /dev/sd is the USB device you’re writing to (run lsblk to see all drives to find out what is for your USB).

This method is fast and has never failed me.

EDIT: for those on a Mac ending up here, use lowercase for bs=4m :

where sdX is your usb device (this can be verified with lsblk ).

The sync bit is important as dd can return before the write operation finishes.

Creating a bootable Ubuntu USB flash drive from terminal

Place the ubuntu.iso file in any hard disk partition.

Then mount the ubuntu.iso file with the below commands in terminal:

Copy all files from /media/iso/ to your mounted USB flash drive by running the below command (make sure to include the dot):

Next, you need the ldlinux.sys file in your USB flash drive to make the USB bootable. My USB partition is /dev/sdd1 ; enter lsblk to see what’s yours. Run the below commands:

Reboot your PC and change the boot order in BIOS to allow booting from a USB drive. Now your Ubuntu USB flash drive will boot and you can install it.

This method will work for any Linux distribution, not only Ubuntu. You don’t need to install any third party software to make a Linux USB flash drive.

You have two choices.

If you desire a graphical interface, use usb-creator (it is in the ubuntu repos)

If you want a command line tool, use dd

Just be sure /dev/sdX is the flash drive you wish to use (it will destroy the data on the flash drive).

First, unmount the USB device and then use lsblk to verify the device.

Sometimes (usually older iso files) dd is not sufficient and the pendrive will not boot. In this case, you may need to install syslinux:

and then run the following commands:

Then, proceed with the following commands:

or, to see progress of image write:

Rememeber to issue sync command to flush write cache

If by «third-party» you mean «GUI», I suggest a lightweight script named bootiso after Avinash Raj answer, because dd does not always work. The big plus is it’s very secure (performs many security checks not to mess up with the system), easy to install and portable.

Also, bootiso will inspect the ISO file to choose from two modes: «image-copy» ( dd ) when the ISO file is hybrid (implies: USB boot friendly). And «mount-rsync» mode when ISO file is non-hybrid, in which case a SYSLINUX bootloader will be automatically installed if supported [more details about install modes].

How to use it

First option, just provide the ISO as first argument and you’ll be prompted to select a drive amongst a list extracted from lsblk :

Or provide explicitly the USB device:

Quick install

See it in action

Don’t use the path to bit.

Wait until the console output looks something like this:

Boot from the usb.

Note: Make sure you write to the correct device a usb will not always be mounted at: dev/sdX where X can be any letter.

Title

How to create a bootable Ubuntu USB flash drive from terminal?

There are built-in text mode tools, that you can run from a text screen or a terminal window. dd or cp or cat can be used, but they are not safe because they do what you tell them to do without any question, and a minor typing error is enough to overwrite a drive with valuable data.

Fortunately there are also safer text mode tools, but you have to install them.

Installing this way will add not only mkusb but also some program packages that mkusb depends on.

It should be rather easy to see what the shellscript is doing simply by reading it in a text editor.

xorriso-dd-target is a new tool, intended to be uploaded to a Debian repository. The purpose is to make it very safe to create boot drives (USB pendrives or memory cards). A special feature is the plug-in method to identify the target device. The man page is available here. In January 2020 there is not yet any installer, but you can copy and paste from the links above and install the shellscript and man page manually.

Finally I want to mention bootiso which is described by its developer in another answer.

Question

Is there any way to create a bootable Ubuntu USB flash drive from the terminal without using any third-party applications like YUMI, Unetbootin, Startup Disk Creator, etc.

If we must look for text mode tools that are already installed in Ubuntu, I am afraid that there are no safe tools available. So in this case I can only suggest that you use dd or cp or cat according to many of the other answers here. But please check and double-check that you are really pointing to the intended target device before pressing the Enter key.

(By the way, the Ubuntu Startup Disk Creator belongs to Ubuntu (is not third party), but it needs a graphical desktop environment or at least a graphical window manager.)

5 tools to create bootable usb from iso linux command line and gui

Table of Contents

I personally use Rufus to create bootable USB from ISO on a Windows environment. But currently Rufus can be installed only on Windows environment and not on Linux nodes. So we must find some alternatives to Rufus to create bootable USB from ISO Linux command line or GUI. In this article I will share 5 different tools which you can use to burn ISO to USB drive with examples.

Create bootable USB from ISO Linux Command Line or GUI

Method 1: Unetbootin

UNetbootin allows you to create bootable USB from ISO linux for Ubuntu and other Linux distributions without burning a CD. The best part is that you don’t need to install this software although you may need to handle few dependencies based on your environment. But Unetbootin is used in binary form to burn ISO to USB..

Now I had faced few dependency errors on my RHEL/CentOS 8 node while installing Unetbootin. If you also get the same then you can install these rpms manually.

You will need EPEL release repo to handle some of the dependencies.

Next you can install p7zip and p7zip-plugins using dnf or yum

We are all done with the dependencies, now you can download unetbootin binary from their official page using wget

Next provide execute permission to the downloaded binary

You can use vnc server to connect to the graphical console of your Linux node and execute the binary to convert ISO to bootable USB.

This will open a new window where you must provide below information

Click on «OK» to start the process to burn ISO to USB. The second stage will take some time depending upon your system’s resources and ISO size

Once you have ISO to bootable USB ready click on Exit.

Next you can verify the bootable USB.

Method 2: balenaEtcher

balenaEtcher is a free and open-source image burner with support for Windows, OS X and GNU/Linux to convert ISO to bootable USB. It makes USB and SD card image burning as simple and fast as possible.

You can download balenaEtcher based on your Linux distribution from the official page

Since I am using RHEL/CentOS 7, I will use yum to install balenaEtcher from the official github page

Install balenaEtcher rpm using yum command

You can use vnc server to connect to the graphical console of your Linux node and execute » balena-etcher-electron » binary which is available » /usr/local/bin/balena-etcher-electron «. This will open a new window, next follow the screenshots.

Click on Flash to convert ISO to bootable USB.

Once the tool burn ISO to USB, it will show below screen with success message.

Now you can use this bootable USB to boot your node.

Method 3: SuSE Studio Imagewriter

SuSE Studio is another tool to create bootable usb from iso linux using graphical interface. This tool is by default available with SuSE distribution but for other distribution you can download the respective rpm from the official page

Since we are using RHEL/CentOS 7 node, we will download the compatible imagewriter rpm from the official source using wget

Once downloaded, you can install the imagewriter rpm as shown below:

You can also check the content of imagewriter rpm

You can use vnc server to connect to the graphical console of your Linux node and execute » /usr/bin/imagewriter » binary which will open a new window as shown below. Follow the screenshots.

Here I have placed my ISO Image and USB drive to convert ISO to bootable USB. Click on Write to start the conversion.

Now you won’t get any screen which shows completed but you will return to the above screen post successful conversion. Next you can use this bootable USB to boot your server. For example I have got the below gparted boot menu from the USB so we know the steps worked.

Method 4: Rosa Imagewriter

ROSA ImageWriter is a program for writing ROSA installation image to a flash disk to burn ISO to USB drive. The good thing here again is that you don’t need to install any tool on your Linux environment, you can just download the binary and start using it.

We will download Rosa Imagewriter from the official Rosa Imagewriter page using wget

Use tar command to extract the archive. This will create a directory RosaImageWriter and extract all the content under this directory

You can use vnc server to connect to the graphical console of your Linux node and navigate inside RosaImageWriter directory

Next execute » RosaImageWriter » binary which will open a new window as shown below.

Next follow the screenshots. Add the ISO Image and USB device location as shown below:

Click on Write to start the conversion from ISO to bootable USB drive. Next you can see the conversion has started to burn ISO to USB Drive.

Once the operation is successful, you will see the below image:

Method 5: Use dd ISO to USB

Using dd ISO to USB command you can create bootable USB from ISO linux command line without download any third party tools. You do not need graphical environment to use dd ISO to USB command for creating bootable USB drives.

Now you can execute dd command using the source location with if=» /source/path/iso » and of=» /destination/path «. This command may take some time depending upon the size of the ISO and system resources

Once completed you will have a bootable USB drive using dd iso to usb.

Lastly I hope the steps from the article to create bootable USB from ISO Linux COmmand Line or GUI on Linux was helpful. So, let me know your suggestions and feedback using the comment section.

Related Searches: dd iso to usb. linux iso to usb tool. iso to bootable usb. burn iso to usb.

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3 thoughts on “5 tools to create bootable usb from iso linux command line and gui”

Great Post! Thank you so much for sharing this valuable post on 5 tools to create bootable usb from iso linux command line and gui. And I am pretty impressed with the in-depth article you have provided in the post. And it really worked for me. Keep sharing such posts…

Hi, Thanks for this great article. I have a different problem related to my bootable stick, and if there is anything you could suggest I would appreciate it.

I have been trying to install RHEL 7.9 using a bootable USB stick. At the boot menu, modifying the kernel to redirect to the network ks.cfg file to automate the installation.

The problem is this method has been working on most workstations except on Lenovo think station p340T.

As soon as I am redirecting the kernel path it gives the Dracut error message of

Very much appreciate your time,
Thanks

Tools To Create A Bootable Linux USB Drive

Last modified on February 20th, 2022 at 04:19 pm

Insight: Tools To Create A Bootable Linux USB Drive

One of the easiest and the efficient way to install a Linux is via Bootable USB drive. In this post, we have mentioned some of the free tools to create a bootable Linux USB drive.

Tools To Create A Bootable Linux USB Drive

1. Unetbootin

Uneetbootin is a cross-platform, open-source and free to use tool to make your USB bootable.

For Ubuntu Users:

Run the following command to install.

2. Etcher – USB and SD Card Writer

Etcher is an open-source and cross-platform image writing tool. Etcher is developed using technologies like JS, HTML, node.js and GitHub’s Electron framework.

3. Gnome Multi-Writer

Gnome Multi-Write is a tool developed by the official Gnome project team. It can be used to write an ISO file to multiple USB devices at once.

4. Rufus

Rufus is lightweight, small and easy to use the software. It is a portable USB, bootable maker. It is available on Windows-based platform.

5. Ubuntu Startup Disk Creator

The Ubuntu Startup Disk Creator is a tool by Ubuntu which helps you to write the ISO image to your USB drive and make it bootable.

6. XBOOT

XBoot is an easy-to-use software to create Multiboot USB/ISO. One interesting feature is that you can compile multiple files like Linux, Antivirus rescue CDs, etc. into one Multiboot ISO file.

7. Universal USB Installer

Universal USB Installer is another easy to use Live Linux Bootable USB Creator. It is available for a Windows-based platform.

8. Linux Live USB Creator

LinuxLive USB Creator is an open-source free to use software which is only available for Windows. It can be used to create portable, bootable and virtualized USB disk running Linux.