Fast E2B USB 3.0 drives - which is best? (GTX v. SSD v. M.2)

When booting from an E2B USB drive, the speed will depend on the speed of the USB drive and also on the BIOS USB driver.

I decided to test out three of the fastest Fixed disk-type USB 3 drives I have using my Asus Z87-A PC. Any of these three USB drives will comfortable run WindowsToGo or full Linux:

E2B and MPI Tool Pack has been updated

The latest version of E2B is now v1.B0p and  MPI Tool Pack is v0.093v14. There has been a small bugfix to SWITCH_E2B too.

I have spent many weeks writing an eBook on UEFI payloads for E2B (complete with Exercises) and I am just tidying it up. It should be ready in a few weeks. If anyone wants to obtain an early copy then give me your email address, but you must agree to provide feedback on at least 50% of the eBook and work though at least some of the Exercises and test the E2B drive on at least three different PCs/Notebooks! I will limit this to the first 20 requests only (just in case I get 100's of requests!). Email me at steve  (at)  easy2boot (dot) com or use the Contact Me page.

I have removed the trial WinPE downloads now. They are no longer available.

I have built a WinPE download file that includes WinPE32 and WinPE64 .wim files and also includes a SWPEFAT32  partition image file which also includes these two WinPEs.

Details of how to obtain this download and how to make the E2B drive, will all be in the eBook.

This means if you make a FAT32 2nd partition on your E2B drive (replace the existing one) containing the files in the download, it should UEFI-boot on any system to WinPE.

Also, you can choose which extension to use for your .imgPTN files:

Ubuntu.imgptn23    - the FAT32 partition is kept

 --- OR ---

Ubuntu.imgptnX4SWPEFAT32 - the SWPEFAT32 partition image file is inserted as Ptn4

If you wanted to keep your 2nd partition as NTFS, you would have to use the X4 file extension.

The download also includes MemTest86 which you can run if you include rEFInd in your .imgPTN files and you can also MBR-boot to WinPE32\64 if you really want to.

If you do add a second FAT32 partition containing these files, there are some disadvantages however (such as some systems will not allow you to MBR-boot from the E2B USB drive!). These issues + workarounds are discussed in the eBook too.

UEFI-booting is easier if you add rEFInd when you make your .imgPTN image files, but this will 'break' Secure Boot, so adding rEFInd is a choice you will need to make.

E2B v1.B0m Beta available

Changes in latest E2B v1.B0m Beta are:
1. Update Portuguese language file (thanks to Jeider)
2. Fix bug if running a .imgptnX4 file and X4 filename is longer than 14 characters.
3. Fix bug if '3GB', '4GB', '32' or '64' found in X4 filename it could prevent file from being listed in menu.

UEFI-multiboot for E2B now supports UEFI 32-bit and 64-bit

I have made a dual WinPE partition image for use with Easy2Boot X4 files.
This allows you to select and boot from a variety of UEFI payloads on an E2B USB drive without the need to Legacy\CSM-boot or find another Windows system to run SWITCH_E2B.exe.

Here is how to do it...

Latest versions update

Latest versions are here.

• Easy2Boot v1.B0l
• MPI Tool Kit 093v11
• SWITCHPE_russian_mini_v4
• SWITCH_E2B v1.1.20 

SWITCH_E2B and Easy2Boot will now first look for any second auxiliary image file in the \_ISO file on the second E2B partition. This gets around the problem of having to re-order the two files.


e.g. So both these arrangement of files will now work...

Ptn1: \_ISO\LINUX\Ubuntu64.imgptn  (this image is set as Ptn1 when switched in)
Ptn1: \_ISO\LINUX\Ubuntu64         (this image is set as Ptn3 when switched in - file must follow the first one on the disk or it will not UEFI-boot on some systems)

New:
Ptn1: \_ISO\LINUX\Ubuntu64.imgptn  (this image is set as Ptn1 when switched in)
Ptn2: \_ISO\Ubuntu64               (this image is set as Ptn3 when switched in)

In the second case, the second file will always follow the first one because it is on the second partition.

Latest news and updates for E2B + rEFInd

I have been testing various combinations of partition types on different systems and also had some feedback from users.

The latest version of E2B and SWITCH_E2B.exe has a few changes and bug fixes.

The X4 file can now also be placed on the 2nd partition of your E2B USB drive. This solves the problem of having to re-order the two files if they are not in the correct order for UEFI-booting.

e.g.
Ptn1: \_ISO\MAINMENU\Ubuntux64.imgptnX4SwitchPE   (FAT32 .imgPTN file with rEFInd)
Ptn2: \_ISO\SwitchPE                              (partition image containing WinPE)

The latest versions at the time of writing are:

Add Notfall 13 2019 ISO to E2B

Here is how to add the German Notfall 13 2019 ISO to E2B.

You can simply add the ISO to one of the E2B menu folders.

If you want to change the menu system configuration files or want a 'flat file' installation so it can store updates (?), etc. and UEFI-boot you may want to create a .imgPTN file for it.

These instructions stems from a thread on reboot.pro here.

Note that to test it under VirtualBox, you need to pick one of the Safe Mode (old PC) options or else it will crash!

Create 'flat file' .imgPTN image

MPI Tool Kit v0.093 Beta with rEFInd (UEFI-multibooting of different .imgptn files is now possible)

New Betas for UEFI-multiboot support without needing to MBR-boot!

E2B v1.B0i Beta and MPI Tool Pack v0.093v7 Beta will allow you to select any UEFI-bootable .imgPTN file without needing to CSM boot or needing to run SWITCH_E2B on a different Windows system.

Each .imgPTN file must include rEFInd so that when it UEFI-boots, the rEFInd manager is loaded.

You can then choose to boot to the UEFI payload (linux, KonBoot, Windows Installer, etc.) OR boot to WinPE and run SWITCH_E2B.exe where you can choose to load a different .imgPTN file.

The new MakePartImage only fully supports adding a 64-bit WinPE UEFI, but you can add both 32-bit and 64-bit WinPEs using the X4 method or the second partition method (see below). Since pure 32-bit UEFI systems are quite rare, I have not catered for them in MakePartImage.

Outline of new changes:

E2B v1.B0h available

This version v1.B0h has a few very small tweaks to the Make_E2B.exe GUI but I also have removed nircmd.exe from the SDI_CHOCO folder because this was causing some AV software problems when downloading or extracting E2B.

nircmd.exe is still used by SDI_CHOCO and it still speaks to you as the installation proceeds, because it extracts the file during the Specialize pass.

Add 'SuperinSecureUEFI-Boot' to your E2B USB drive

There are two projects on GitHub which are of interest to USB-booters.
This was mentioned on reboot.pro recently and also pointed out to me by Alex G.

The first project (by thias) is a multiboot menu system based on grub2 called 'glim'. It automatically detects .iso files and builds a menu each time it boots (does it sound familiar?). It supports UEFI and MBR booting.

The second project (by ValdikSS) includes 'glim' and is a UEFI+MBR multiboot project which allows you to UEFI Secure Boot, UEFI-boot or MBR-boot and then run secure or unsecure payloads from the grub2 menu system.

The downside is that for Secure Boot, you have to register the bespoke grub2 efi file using a certificate that is provided. This adds the certificate into the NVRAM of the system UEFI firmware and so it 'changes' the target system.

Set the timeout so it autoboots if you like!

Use the GRUB Live ISO Multiboot menu entry...

I only added one ISO...

Comparison between UEFIinSecureBoot and E2B grub2 menu system v10

• E2B grub2 allows Secure Boot without using MokManager and so does not change the target system.
• Both systems can Secure Boot (using MokManager for insecureBoot) and run both secure and insecure ISOs and other non-EFI payloads.
• UEFIinSecureBoot should Secure Boot and run non-secure EFI payloads ??? (not tested).
• UEFIinSecureBoot can Secure Boot and access files on an NTFS partition, when Secure booted however, E2B grub2 can only access a FAT partition.
• Both systems can be expanded by adding more menu files.
• UEFISecureBoot uses a graphical grub2 theme menu, this type of menu runs very slowly on some systems (E2B grub2 menu system does not use a theme for this reason).

If you want to try this you can download the ready-made .imgPTN23 file here.

Instructions