How to install Windows 8 from an ISO image
Are you looking for ways to install Windows 8 developer preview version from an ISO image? In this post, I will discuss various options to install Windows 8 from an ISO image.
The long wait is over and Windows 8 is now available for download. Microsoft has started distributing Windows 8 developer preview edition today.
As of now, Windows 8 developer preview is available only as .ISO images. An ISo image is a single file that represent a CD or DVD. You can use special software to extra the files from an ISO image and burn in to a DVD. Most DVD writer software are capable of extracting the ISO image during the DVD burn process without any extra steps.How to install Windows 8 from ISO image file?
If you downloaded the ISO files from Microsoft Windows 8 website, you have couple of options to install it on your PC or laptop:
1. Burn a DVD from your ISO image and install Windows 8 from the DVD
2. Mount the ISO image as a drive to your PC or laptop and then follow the normal installation process to install from the DVD drive. When you mount an ISO image file as a DVD drive, your computer will consider it as a normal DVD drive. You can even browse all the files within the ISO image through the mounted drive.
3. Make a USB drive from the ISO image and install Windows 8 from the USB drive. Learn how to install Windows 8 from a USB drive
4. Attach the ISO image to one of the virtualization software like Windows Virtual PC, VMWare Player, VMWare Workstation and Oracle VirtualBox.
I tried all of the virtualization software mentioned in option# 4 above, but I could successfully install Windows 8 only on a VMWare Workstation 8.0, the latest release announced last night. Looks like VMWare guys were very quick to offer a new release that works with Windows 8 developer preview installer.
Since the current build is a trial build meant only for developers and may not be stable enough for normal users, it is a good idea to leave your work computer or home PC alone and install it on a Virtual machine. You can find step by step instructions to install Windows 8 in my previous post.
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