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Thread: Will a External USB Optial Drive Show in Bios and Boot Windows?

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    Will a External USB Optial Drive Show in Bios and Boot Windows?

    Will a External USB Optical Drive Show in BIOS and Boot Windows?
    Or is it only usable in Windows (or Linux or Mac OS X)

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    Senior Member oolon's Avatar
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    Re: Will a External USB Optial Drive Show in Bios and Boot Windows?

    It depends, if your computer is new it should have boot from USB and should work, in the same way as you can boot from a USB key. Your need to plug it in first and go into the BIOS to enable it.
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    Re: Will a External USB Optial Drive Show in Bios and Boot Windows?

    Quote Originally Posted by oolon View Post
    It depends, if your computer is new it should have boot from USB and should work, in the same way as you can boot from a USB key. Your need to plug it in first and go into the BIOS to enable it.
    Cool.

    I have an OLD dell which i want to format, and no drives work on it.
    So i thought maybe USB.

    I tried to Boot from a USB Flash Drive but it wouldn't boot from it even though there is an option.
    So i thought i might try a USB CD drive.

    But if a USB Flash Drive or a USB CD drive are the same thing for a BIOS then maybe the USB Drive wont work too.

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    Re: Will a External USB Optial Drive Show in Bios and Boot Windows?

    Do you have a boot block installed on your USB key? If you don't it just ignores it. P4 or above should be ok to boot from USB, some P3s have it.
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    Re: Will a External USB Optial Drive Show in Bios and Boot Windows?

    Bash F12 at the bios screen, should give you a boot menu on the Dell

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    Re: Will a External USB Optial Drive Show in Bios and Boot Windows?

    Just have a good look around your BIOS, if it's really old then I don't fancy your chances

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    Re: Will a External USB Optial Drive Show in Bios and Boot Windows?

    My most recent experience is, my Asus X58 board will boot from USB DVDROM (install windows) but a DFI X58 board will not.
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