Can't install WTG on my external SSD

[Cforrester1981]

I have a Lenovo laptop that unfortunately only came with a 32GB onboard NAND flash drive which is HOPELESSLY too small for Windows 10 and MS Office. It also has no SATA port on the motherboard so I have resorted to getting a 120gb Western Digital SSD drive and putting it into a USB3 external drive enclosure and I want to install Windows to it.

I have created a a single NTFS partition on the drive, formatted it and assigned a drive letter. I then tried to run the WinToUSB using my Windows.iso file created yesterday using the Microsoft Media Creation Tool. However, when I click Proceed, it tell me to install a USB drive and hit Refresh.

I don't know what I'm doing wrong.

I've successfully managed to do a WTG installation on my 32GB USB flash drive but this SSD won't work.

Any help would be appreciated.

[Cforrester1981]

I have no idea what I did but it's working now.

The only thing I can think of is that I created a 100% sized partition on the drive the first time around and this time instead I created a 95% one and now all of a sudden it works. I'll leave the topic up for those who might have the same issue.

[admin]

I have a Lenovo laptop that unfortunately only came with a 32GB onboard NAND flash drive which is HOPELESSLY too small for Windows 10 and MS Office. It also has no SATA port on the motherboard so I have resorted to getting a 120gb Western Digital SSD drive and putting it into a USB3 external drive enclosure and I want to install Windows to it.

I have created a a single NTFS partition on the drive, formatted it and assigned a drive letter. I then tried to run the WinToUSB using my Windows.iso file created yesterday using the Microsoft Media Creation Tool. However, when I click Proceed, it tell me to install a USB drive and hit Refresh.

I don't know what I'm doing wrong.

I've successfully managed to do a WTG installation on my 32GB USB flash drive but this SSD won't work.

Any help would be appreciated.

Yo said 'However, when I click Proceed, it tell me to install a USB drive and hit Refresh.'. I'm sorry, I don’t quite understand what you said. Could you explain it? 
Thanks.

[Cforrester1981]

Apologies, I had been trying every piece of software I could find to get this right and I copied and pasted the same text from the ticket of the other software. Let me rephrase the end of the ticket. When I selected the system and boot partition and the type of installation, the Next button was not available to click.

[admin]

Apologies, I had been trying every piece of software I could find to get this right and I copied and pasted the same text from the ticket of the other software. Let me rephrase the end of the ticket. When I selected the system and boot partition and the type of installation, the Next button was not available to click.

Could you take a screenshot and send it to us? And please send the user.log file to us (via e-mail at: [email protected]), the log file is located in the bin folder under the installation directory, and we will resolve it as soon as possible.

Thanks.

[Cforrester1981]

I couldn't get my new installation to boot so I deleted all the partitions and created a new EFI partition using the Microsoft DISKPART tool. I created a 512MB EFI System Partition. There is evidence of that in the first screenshot of my Disk Manager. I then created a primary partition on the drive to install Windows to (also seen in the first screenshot).

I then tried to run WinToUSB and I am back to my original problem. The Next button cannot be selected (as seen in the second screenshot). I think that is because I have not been able to select an EFI System Partition (ESP). But I don't understand why because I have one. It is even visible in WinToUSB but can't be selected.

What could the problem be?

[admin]

The problem is that you did not format the ESP partition as FAT32 format.

We recommend that you convert the external hard drive to MBR partition scheme and create two or more patitions (one small FAT32 partition for the system partition, one NTFS partition for the boot partition, and other partitions for data partition), then use WinToUSB to create Windows To Go following the guide below:
http://www.easyuefi.com/wintousb/faq/en_...ToUSB.html

The best partition layout is as follow:
Partition 1 FAT32   100M         System partition
Partition 2 NTFS     ...G             Boot partition
Partition 3 ...          ...G            Other partition
...                                           Other partition


In particular, both the system partition and boot partition must be primary partition, and we recommend using built-in Disk Management int Windows to partition and format the disk. This type of Windows To Go drive can boot both BIOS-based and UEFI-based computers.

Reference:
What are system partitions and boot partitions:
http://www.easyuefi.com/wintousb/faq/en_...tions.html

Best regards,