Goal: run Spinrite on new Dell Inspiron 15 7000 Series (sata hd) using usb flash drive.
Make bootable usb flash drive using sandisk adapter with a memory card.
Get HP USB Disk Format Tool (from extremeoverclocking.com, see links at end), run SP27608.exe, extracts HPUSBF.EXE and HPUSBFW.EXE to a dir.
Run HPUSBFW.EXE, select i:, FAT32, check Quick Format, check Create a DOS startup disk,
Also downloaded and extracted win98boot.zip, feed it that dir
Start
error: Device media is write-protected.
This drive is really old anyway, find a newer one for better compatibility all around.
Got a recent usb stick (16gb, usb2). Repeat as above,
error: Device media is write-protected.
Uncheck Quick, same.
Uncheck startup, same.
Use Windows Explorer to format, Quick. Several seconds, format complete, disk looks ok.
Try HP Util again. This time it seems to be working. Oops - forgot to check Quick, its doing a slow format. Afraid to interrupt, don't want to brick the drive, takes an hour.
Trying again, with quick and startup files, goes much faster.
Copy over spinrite.exe.
Insert in Dell, have to change UEFI to Legacy, it boots, can run spinrite, but it has a problem fully seeing the disk through UEFI. stop.
at least it seems like the bootable usb worked.
later, tried it on a Dell XPS 15 L502X, ok.
tried it on Dell XPS 720..., ok.
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https://www.grc.com/sr/faq.htm
http://www.windowscentral.com/how-create-windows-10-usb-installation
http://files.extremeoverclocking.com/file.php?f=197
