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Best USB Drive for Recovery?

TheVoidTheVoid Posts: 3,086
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in PC & Mac Hardware and Software #1
Hi, I need to buy a 16GB USB stick to make a factory recovery drive for my netbook. It says I need a drive with 16GB (so I presume a 16GB drive is ok?).

Will any cheap one do? The Lexar ones on ebuyer look ok for £4 but not sure if they're bootable?

Thanks

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    mac2708mac2708 Posts: 3,349
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    #2
    TheVoid wrote: »
    Hi, I need to buy a 16GB USB stick to make a factory recovery drive for my netbook. It says I need a drive with 16GB (so I presume a 16GB drive is ok?).

    Will any cheap one do? The Lexar ones on ebuyer look ok for £4 but not sure if they're bootable?

    Thanks

    This may /may not help http://usb.userbenchmark.com/

    TBH prices are low at the moment and Lexar is a well known make.
    As far as being 'bootable' this depends on the PC/laptop/netbook and yours will have the option for booting from USB

    This should explain as does the Acer site and video
    http://pcsupport.about.com/od/tipstricks/ht/bootusbflash.htm
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OcxIZqO4JrY
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    alan1302alan1302 Posts: 6,336
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    #3
    TheVoid wrote: »
    It says I need a drive with 16GB (so I presume a 16GB drive is ok?).

    Er, yes :confused::D
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    TheVoidTheVoid Posts: 3,086
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    #4
    alan1302 wrote: »
    Er, yes :confused::D

    lol, well it says 16GB but on a usb stick you only get around 14.9GB.
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    mac2708mac2708 Posts: 3,349
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    #5
    TheVoid wrote: »
    lol, well it says 16GB but on a usb stick you only get around 14.9GB.

    Well play safe then and get 32GB from £6.99
    http://www.ebuyer.com/store/Storage/cat/USB-Flash-Drives?186=32GB

    It's confusing but this video clearly states
    "the drive must be able to hold at least 16GB..":confused:
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    TheVoidTheVoid Posts: 3,086
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    #6
    mac2708 wrote: »
    Well play safe then and get 32GB from £6.99
    http://www.ebuyer.com/store/Storage/cat/USB-Flash-Drives?186=32GB

    It's confusing but this video clearly states
    "the drive must be able to hold at least 16GB..":confused:

    I'm presuming a 16GB drive will be sufficient then. If not, the message on screen should say a 32GB device is needed. I've now bought a 16GB USB drive.
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    alan1302alan1302 Posts: 6,336
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    #7
    TheVoid wrote: »
    I'm presuming a 16GB drive will be sufficient then. If not, the message on screen should say a 32GB device is needed. I've now bought a 16GB USB drive.

    Yeah, it will be fine on 16GB stick.
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    oilmanoilman Posts: 4,529
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    #8
    Several years ago or so, PC recovery software only gave choice of using a disk. However, most PCs could boot via usb if bios settings were appropriately selected,

    Then you had to create a DVD, then manually configure a usb using diskpart or similar to be bootable, and then copy files from dvd to usb. A bit of a hassle but worked.

    However most modern software now allows usb creation directly, and does all the necessary configuration for you.

    So basically any 16 gb usb drive should be fine (avoid any that are sourced from China - these are often fakes). Lexar should be fine.

    There is no need to go for a more expensive high speed usb drive (class 10).
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    gds1972gds1972 Posts: 6,613
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    #9
    I found with my Sony laptop that when I bought a USB drive to make recovery disk it would not allow me to use my USB as it did not show as a removable disk.

    OP be careful that you don't fall into the same trap as me.
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    jsmith99jsmith99 Posts: 20,382
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    #10
    I've had a couple of external USB drives which I've used for many years. Having got rid of my Toshiba laptop, I deleted all the backup sets relating to it. I now use one for File History (in a separate folder) as well as for the recovery set (which goes on at root level, I don't think I had a choice).
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    oilmanoilman Posts: 4,529
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    #11
    gds1972 wrote: »
    I found with my Sony laptop that when I bought a USB drive to make recovery disk it would not allow me to use my USB as it did not show as a removable disk.

    OP be careful that you don't fall into the same trap as me.

    Interesting, USBs that show as a hard drive rather than a removable drive are quite rare. On a standard USB, windows will only accept a single partition. With those that show as a hard drive, you can create multiple partitions, and create "a windows to go" usb if you have enough capacity i.e. a working windows OS that runs off the usb.
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    gds1972gds1972 Posts: 6,613
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    #12
    oilman wrote: »
    Interesting, USBs that show as a hard drive rather than a removable drive are quite rare. On a standard USB, windows will only accept a single partition. With those that show as a hard drive, you can create multiple partitions, and create "a windows to go" usb if you have enough capacity i.e. a working windows OS that runs off the usb.

    When I looked into it when I first got the USB stick it turned out it was some requirement to do with Windows 8. I have now looked into it again and it looks like MS changed this requirement since I bought my USB stick.
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