What is it ?

USBoot is a package that helps in the preparation of Windows 2000 / XP / 2003 for booting from USB storage devices by providing extensive support for automated installation and configuration of drivers especially of setup class USB.

Unfortunately this functionality isn't offered under Windows by default, though the basics are already integrated in the system. Having a closer look it seems as if Microsoft simply 'forgot' to implement the few missing parts. Though it would be preferrable to have an officially supported integration which would be obviously less error prone, actually the only possibility to make booting from USB happen is to do it yourself.

Why was it developed ?

Anyway the publication of USB booting capabilities of Windows XP by Dietmar Stölting
http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?showtopic=14181
was the inital milestone in the recent the USB booting experiments and developments which almost all have their roots in his findings (though he might not be the first who knew how to boot XP from USB as there are some indications that Slobodan Brcin
http://www.freshpatents.com/Adaptive-booting-from-mass-storage-device-dt20060420...
had already achieved the same and sold his knowledge to m-systems). http://www.sandisk.com

I was amazed, when in January '06 the german computer magazine c't reported about some guys being successful in booting Windows from USB. But their tutorial was really tricky and involved a lot of error-prone work in the registry. Moreover certain parts of this editings were to be repeated on and on under certain conditions. In their article they also stated that they hadn't been able to find a solution to avoid this. That was when I took the challenge to find out how much automation could be provided.

And here's the (preliminary) result ...


So if you want to have a try, you may proceed to

Download
http://www.usboot.org/tiki-index.php?page=Download