6

Using WinUSB I get this error. I would appreciate any help as I'm trying to put Windows back on computer to please th' wifey, then dual boot so i can still use Ubuntu.

Installation failed !
Exit code: 512
Log:
Formating device...
Mounting...
mount: block device /home/lighthouse/Downloads/Windows 8.1 Update 1 Pro X64 PreActivated/Windows 8.1 Update 1 Pro X64 PreActivated.iso is write-protected, mounting read-only
Copying...
Installing grub...
Installing for x86_64-efi platform.
grub-install: error: /media/winusb_target_1412439366_7311 doesn't look like an EFI partition.
.
Error occured !
Syncing...
/usr/bin/winusb: line 78: 15592 Terminated              while true; do
    sleep 0.05; echo 'pulse';
done
Cleaning...
/usr/bin/winusb: line 78: 15971 Terminated              while true; do
    sleep 0.05; echo 'pulse';
done
Umounting and removing '/media/winusb_iso_1412439366_7311'...
Umounting and removing '/media/winusb_target_1412439366_7311'...
4
  • "grub-install: error: /media/winusb_target_1412439366_7311 doesn't look like an EFI partition." That is a windows problem: looks like you need an EFI partition.
    – Rinzwind
    Oct 4, 2014 at 16:54
  • Maybe related (very similar error): Trouble installing Windows 7 via USB Oct 4, 2014 at 16:56
  • how would i create an efi partition, there is an efi folder on th' drive too...
    – white deer
    Oct 4, 2014 at 17:03
  • You would need to report this bug to whomever makes this "winusb" program, which does not appear to be part of Ubuntu.
    – psusi
    Nov 10, 2014 at 20:08

3 Answers 3

4

If what you want is to create a bootable usb to install Windows 8, you must use the dd command in Ubuntu:

Open a terminal.

Run it:

dd if=/path/to/file.iso of=/dev/sdb

Note: Carefully check that the usb-stick is /dev/sdb

2
  • output for this command is dd: failed to open ‘/path/to/file.iso’: No such file or directory
    – white deer
    Oct 4, 2014 at 18:08
  • 3
    You're supposed to replace the path with the path to your ISO and /dev/sdb with the location of your USB drive.
    – Seth
    Oct 21, 2014 at 14:55
3

That really depends on what type of bootable USB you want to make. If you want to make a classic MBR, BIOS bootable Windows USB try this solution.

If you want to make a USB to install Windows in UEFI mode, things are different:

  1. Apply a GPT partition table to the USB drive and format it as FAT32 using GParted
  2. Copy Windows files from DVD/ISO to USB using the file manager
  3. Look for a bootx64.efi file in efi/boot folder in USB drive. If it doesn't exist extract it from the Windows ISO, sources/install.wim file by opening it with 7z unarchiver. You can find a bootmgfw.efi file in ./1/Windows/Boot/EFI. Extract it, rename it to bootx64.efi and place it on USB in efi/boot folder.

Now the USB drive is UEFI bootable (but not BIOS) and can be used to install Windows in EFI mode. The complete guide is available on my website both for BIOS and UEFI.

0

In my case, toggling the boot flag via parted fixed the problem

parted /dev/sda set 2 boot on

Choose disk and partition id accoriding to your system's configuration

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