Gradual Panic!

Ever since the dawn of the netbook and more recently Apple’s departure from physical media I’ve got used to not relying on a CD/DVD to restore my dodgy systems. So how do you reinstall an OS on a computer that won’t let you violate it with a spinning disc? With a USB stick of course.

Previous methods of making a bootable disc (especially for XP) where a tad cumbersome and time consuming. Obviously there are the more nerdy approaches such as creating bootable media using DiskPart but that’s not great for everyone. Well now there is WinToFlash, probably the easiest boot media creator out there.

(more…)

Now this might sound like a odd utility to be harping on about but in the last few days it’s been sooo useful. If you’re anything like me you’re always messing around with USB memory sticks and trying to get them to do different things (yes they are something more than somewhere to store those guilty pictures). For example I’ve been trying to install various operating systems on my daughters netbook with one but if you go for a Linux distribution such as Ubuntu or in one extreme case Android you can end up crapping out your stick altogether. So how to restore it. With the HP USB Storage Format Tool of course. Even though it’s from HP it works on all sticks. So if you find you’ve corrupted the hell out of your little fella run the utility and it’ll be as good as new. Boring but useful.