Be Excellent To Each Other

Edit: tossrStu came up with a better solution, I just ordered myself a big pen drive and I will use that.

I've been trying to get win7 installed on my netbook, and tried like a billion different ways without a DVD drive, and have just hit brick wall after brick wall.

Anyone got a USB DVD drive I could borrow, I'll pay postage both ways.

I only need it for this one thing.

Alternatively, if someone has a 8gb+ pen drive, and knows how to make it a bootable installer for win7, that would also be cool.

Word of advice, but surely you need a DVD drive. Since Windows 7 comes on a DVD.

I have a external Blu-Ray, but its big, expensive, heavy and I use it to burn Blu-Rays most days now. Soz.

Oh, good point. Hastily edited to reflect that,

Ooooh, I could possibly help if my USB dvd drive still works. Are you in London at the moment? If so you could pick it up. Otherwise, due to my stupid commute times, I won't be able to get tot the post office for at least three weekends time.

I'm in Manchester, but I could speak to a friend of mine that owes me a favour, and he could possibly grab it from you. Much appreciated, but I'll also see if anyone has one that they could post sooner.

Lewie, do you have an internal drive around anywhere? I've got some cables that can make that into an external one which will cost you a lot less postage wise.

I've installed Win7 on a netbool from a USB thumbdrive without a DVD in sight. It can be done. I'll dig up the instructions I used later. It can be dependent on the BIOS in the device, not all of them will boot from USB mass storage.

There's a straightforward-looking guide to creating a bootable USB drive installer here -- and it states you only need a 4GB drive, which you can get from eg. mymemory.co.uk for a fiver, so that might be cheaper than paying postage on a DVD drive?

That is a very good point.

I think I shall do that.

Ah yes, those instructions are what I did.

Ah, thats easier all round, good show.

Now I can go back to leaving my usb DVD writer in a pile or rubbish and still not checking if it works. I bought it back when I had an iBook having wanted one for years. I must have burnt maybe 10 DVDs in my life.

Dead tech.