Corsair Blog

Let's face it. Floppy drives are so 1992 and CDs and DVDs don't conveniently fit into most people's pockets. USB flash drives are the ultimate in pocket sized storage and the possibilities for using them are virtually limitless. However, creating a flash drive that is a convenient and bootable tool is not as easy as making a bootable floppy or bootable optical disk. That is, until now.

The Corsair Flash Survivor™ GTR is already an outstanding drive with superior durability and performance.  

Corsair has provided an easy to use utility that will convert your USB flash drive into a versatile bootable tool. Developed by Pendrivelinux.com, the simple installation makes the drive bootable allowing the user to boot directly to Memtest or to a FreeDOS prompt. The drive is also still fully usable as a standard USB flash drive.

Download the Ultimate Bootable USB Flash Drive Tool  

The License Agreement

Once you have downloaded the tool, unzip it and run the application. If you accept the agreement and wish to use the utility to create the tool, select the I Agree option and move to the next step.  

Select the Drive and Format

Next, select the USB flash drive from the dropdown menu. We recommend formatting the USB drive using this utility to ensure best results. You cannot use NTFS with this tool if you decide to manually format. Select Create and the utility will run.  

The Installation is Complete

This is typically a very short procedure but the time taken can vary depending upon your drive size and speed.  

Select Finish

Select Finish and the process is complete. The next steps illustrate how to boot to the drive and to select the utility you wish to use.  

To use the utilities on your drive, you will need to boot your system with this USB drive as opposed to booting to your system's hard drive. There are 2 ways to do this:

• Option 1 below shows how you would manually select the boot menu and select the drive to which you want to boot. Refer to your manual as the key for this varies across different motherboards.
• Option 2 shows you how to set the USB flash drive as the first item in your boot order as shown below.

Either method works equally well:

Option 1, Manually Select the Boot Device

Option 2, Set the USB Flash Drive as the First Boot Device

Select the Utility you Wish to Use

Once you boot to your USB flash drive, you will see the boot menu as shown above. Select the utility you wish to use and it will be loaded. The versatility of this tool is apparent once you begin to use it. The two default utilities, Memtest86+ and FreeDOS, are invaluable during system builds and trouble shooting.  

Your flash drive can become a virtual toolbox of utilities that you can carry in your pocket as opposed to carrying archaic floppy disks or bulky CDs and DVDs. You also have the option of far greater storage capacity when using a USB flash drive. Your USB flash drive will still be fully functional as a removable storage drive. This is a great tool for testing memory or running programs from a DOS prompt such as firmware or BIOS updaters. The only real limits are the drive size and your creativity.