16GB ISO (image file) won't fit on a 64GB flash ("thumb") drive; also how to RESTORE from an iso on a thumb?

Question

I backed up my C drive (basically my computer) as an ISO single image file. It's 16GB. I wanted to put it on a large enough thumb drive so that, let's say since I'm new to this (ISO backups), if my computer ever crashed, I could take it in, along with my 64GB thumb drive which would have my 16GB restoration file. "However", I have 2 probs I'm hoping you can provide solutions for:

1. When I dragged my 16GB image file over to the new thumb drive, it always says, "The disk in the destination drive is full." Obviously, 64 >> 16, so you'd think it would fit...and of course, checked and there are no other files on that drive. Box appeared to be unopened etc. So what's the solution and how can I get that file over to that drive? I'm sure the prob is something like "the thumb drive can only accept files no larger than X". So looking for a good solution, because it turns out I am going to have to use that ISO file asap.

2. IF you can help me find a way to get that ISO file onto that flash drive, since I'm going to be using it to RESTORE a crashed computer, how do I setup the thumb, (or what kindof files eg MBR or Boot.ini files do I have to put on the thumb drive to make it "bootable"? Thanks for details on that one.

Kind regards.

Answer 1

Ditto-you probably need to reformat the drive into NTFS or exFAT to put a single file large that 4 GB onto the drive. Right click on the drive in My Computer and select format. Getting a bootable flash drive is tricky - you would have to expand the ISO onto the drive (not just copy the ISO file onto it), and make it bootable. It would be easier to just reinstall windows, put the ISO back on your comptuer from the flash drive, then open it and put the files you need back where they were.

Answer 2

Because flash drives are formatted with the FAT file system, there is a 4 GB-per-file size limitation. Since flash drives are PHYSICALLY optimized for the FAT format, reformatting them as NTFS or Ext3 (Linux) filesystems is not practical--it will cause early failure.



It IS possible to break up the file into 4 GB chunks, then recombine them when needed. 7-Zip can do this--or Google "file-splitting software". More on 7-Zip:

http://favesoft.blogspot.com/2008/09/more-on-7-zip.html



~~ ScienceMikey

Answer 3

The flash drive is probably formatted in FAT32. This restricts file sizes to about 4GB. Re-format to either NTFS or exFAT. You probably won't be able to boot from a straight backup.

Answer 4

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Answer 5

1. Sounds like you need to format your flash drive. Plug it in, right click it and select format. Chose whatever options suit your needs.



2. I can't really help you with this. But keep in mind you would also need to tell your motherboard to boot from that specific USB port.