Windows 10: Using an SD card to install?

Discus and support Using an SD card to install? in Windows 10 Installation and Upgrade to solve the problem; OK I just made a bootable SD card with Windows 10 Enterprise TP. I made it in the USB card reader on my desktop PC. My laptop will boot from it just... Discussion in 'Windows 10 Installation and Upgrade' started by SuiGeneris, Nov 6, 2014.

  1. Using an SD card to install?


    OK I just made a bootable SD card with Windows 10 Enterprise TP. I made it in the USB card reader on my desktop PC. My laptop will boot from it just like a bootable thumb drive. If I take the SD card out and put it in my laptops built in card reader, nada. It's not listed as a bootable device in the quick boot menu. Being a laptop there isn't much in the way of boot options. Not like you'd see on a desktop PC.
     
    alphanumeric, Nov 13, 2014
    #16
  2. Wynona Win User

    No not yet. I may just to prove to myself that the SD card is bootable. Doing it that way defeats the purpose. At least that's the way I see it. If I have to put the card in a USB card reader I may as well just use a USB thumb drive. I currently do all my installs from thumb drives. I have just recently bought a couple of USB SD card readers. I bought them so I can prepare SD cards for my Raspberry PI on my desktop PC that doesn't have a card reader. That's my plan anyway. I haven't actually tried one of them yet, it might be time to give it a go though. Sure, it may defeat your purpose, but it might give someone else an option they wouldn't have otherwise. In fact, I'm not sure but I think the OP said he doesn't have a flash drive large enough.

    And here I am with so many flash drives, I had several I could donate to a very poor school district for underprivileged kids. They needed them with 4 to 8 GB and I was able to pass a few on.
     
    Wynona, Nov 13, 2014
    #17
  3. Wynona Win User
    Yay! That's great, Alpha!

    So now, the OP can mark this one solved and you can write up the 'structions for the Tutorial section. *Smile Aren't you glad I know how to delegate? *Dinesh
     
    Wynona, Nov 13, 2014
    #18
  4. Using an SD card to install?

    No not yet. I may just to prove to myself that the SD card is bootable. Doing it that way defeats the purpose. At least that's the way I see it. If I have to put the card in a USB card reader I may as well just use a USB thumb drive. I currently do all my installs from thumb drives. I have just recently bought a couple of USB SD card readers. I bought them so I can prepare SD cards for my Raspberry PI on my desktop PC that doesn't have a card reader. That's my plan anyway. I haven't actually tried one of them yet, it might be time to give it a go though. Sure, it may defeat your purpose, but it might give someone else an option they wouldn't have otherwise. In fact, I'm not sure but I think the OP said he doesn't have a flash drive large enough.

    And here I am with so many flash drives, I had several I could donate to a very poor school district for underprivileged kids. They needed them with 4 to 8 GB and I was able to pass a few on. Yes, well put, I lost sight of the original question.
    lol, I've got 24 or so thumb drives kicking around here. 1's, 2's, 4's, 8's, 16's, 32's and one 64 gig. I've given a few away over the years too.
     
    alphanumeric, Nov 13, 2014
    #19
  5. Yay! That's great, Alpha!

    So now, the OP can mark this one solved and you can write up the 'structions for the Tutorial section. *Smile Aren't you glad I know how to delegate? *Dinesh I used diskpart, and followed the same method you use to make a bootable thumb drive. Option two here, UEFI Bootable USB Flash Drive - Create in Windows The other methods will likely work but I have the diskpart commands pretty well memorized so that's what I use. My wife's ACER laptop is fussy about how the drive is prepared for a UEFI install.
     
    alphanumeric, Nov 13, 2014
    #20
  6. One thing I noticed is the install from the flash card seemed to be very slow compared to one from a thumb drive. It was a long time before the first selection screen came up. My flash card is a Sandisk Ultra 30 MB/S SD card. USB 2 is good for 35 MB/s so I'm not sure why it seemed so slow. I didn't do a full install though, I only went far enough to verify it was bootable and bailed out. The USB SD card reader says its USB 2.0. That's what's silkscreened on it anyway. They were very inexpensive so maybe they aren't? This is what I bought, SD-MMC Card Reader
     
    alphanumeric, Nov 13, 2014
    #21
  7. Wynona Win User
    USB 2.0 is the "old" technology. I have a couple of USB 3.0 slots on this desktop, but both laptops only have USB 2.0 slots. Even with a USB 3.0 card/reader/flash drive, if the machine you're installing on has only a USB 2.0 slot, USB 3.0 will drop back to USB 2.0. Whew, what a keyboard full of USB!

    Which all this means is that no matter how new some of the technology is, using it with old technology will slow everything down.
     
    Wynona, Nov 13, 2014
    #22
  8. Using an SD card to install?

    True, but USB 2.0 is rated for 35 MB/s and my flash card is rated for 30B/s. It shouldn't be all that slower than a USB 2 thumb drive. My guess is the USB card reader is the weak link. It's USB 2 compatible. I haven't used these SD cards all that much so its hard to say without benchmarking how fast or slow they are. My gut feeling was it was slower than a thumb drive. For reads anyway.
    I have 2 USB 3 ports on my laptop, but that's about it. Its USB 2 only on my older desktop PC's. I have one USB 3 thumb drive, a 64 gig Kingston Hyper X. I had intended to use that for a Windows to Go setup but its not a certified drive. That's for another thread though, don't want to drag this one off topic.
     
    alphanumeric, Nov 13, 2014
    #23
  9. AddRAM Win User
    I don't have a problem with what the OP is trying to say. He's a junior member which may or may not mean he's not as experienced as you or I.

    We're here to help, not to pick apart the questions. I`m here to help to, so the question still stands, Does the OP want to use the SD card to install windows on a system (which I have tested and done) or does he want to install windows on the SD card to boot and run the operationg sysytem from ?
     
    AddRAM, Nov 13, 2014
    #24
  10. AddRAM Win User
    He said boot drive, but my interpretation is he meant bootable drive, like a bootable thumb drive. For installation purposes.

    I've tried it on my laptop but the internal card reader does not show up in the boot selection list. That`s what I was thinking to, according to his title, but I didn`t want to assume anything. Yes we had a lengthy thread about this already and yes it can be done, I made Windows 7 SD install cards a long time ago that work perfectly.
     
    AddRAM, Nov 13, 2014
    #25
  11. jimbo45 Win User
    Hi there

    Confirming it works just fine if you use a separate USB==>micro SDHC adapter -- the PNY one works just fine -- my BIOS finds it as "Generic USB==>Micro SDHC" and it's just as fast if not faster than a "Classic" Flash drive.

    Note though the adapter is tiny - about the size of those micro wireless mice receivers. !!! So you can lose it easily if not kept in the computer.

    In UK costs around 4GBP (Inc VAT so if you don't pay UK VAT deduct 20%). The bottom image is just the cover when you remove the adapter (ist image). The Micro sdhc card slides into the Grey part. I use this too for watching some movies - Decent BD rips are about 1.8GB even at 1080p so I can store a few movies on these micro SDHC cards and play them either on a Laptop or Tablet or Phone !!!!.

    Great for travelling and watching a few movies without lugging around extra HDD's !!!! or when using company laptops where you can't store / download movies on the laptop's HDD / SSD..


    Using an SD card to install? [​IMG]


    I have a Linux SUSE KDE system on an 8GB Micro SDHC card which boots just fine too using this PNY adapter.

    32 GB micro SDHC card works fine -- also for WINDOWS TO GO system - but for this you are better using an external SSD IMO.

    If your BIOS doesn't recognize the device - then NO BOOT. Internal card readers usually aren't recognized by the BIOS but USB devices are and the PNY device obviously has it's own firmware in the device so the BIOS just sees it as a standard USB device which works just fine.

    Cheers
    jimbo
     
    jimbo45, Nov 18, 2014
    #26
  12. CountMike New Member
    Just yesterday I installed Win 8.1 on Lenovo, low end laptop using just SD card thru it's slot. It worked just fine, showed up in BIOS as SD-HDD as a boot option.
     
    CountMike, Nov 28, 2014
    #27
  13. Using an SD card to install?

    i was wondering if was possible to turn a micro SD card into a bootable drive to be able to boot kali linux from windows and is it possible to partition a micro sd card
     
    LilRodney456, Aug 25, 2016
    #28
  14. CountMike New Member
    Don't know about Kali but Mint did work. You can partition SD cards but no guarantee all would be seen.
     
    CountMike, Aug 25, 2016
    #29
  15. so if i was to partition my sd card and make that partition bootable via usb would that work?
     
    LilRodney456, Aug 25, 2016
    #30
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