Sep 17, 2018 - Rufus is a small utility, which can format and create bootable USB flash drives, such as USB keys or pen drives, and memory sticks. Rufus is a small-sized app that enables users to format USB flash disks and create bootable drives rapidly. It provides standard and advanced options alike, to suit the preferences of all skill.
Rufus to make a bootable USB drive from Windows and use it to install Ubuntu 18.04 LTS on your computer. Let’s get started.
Downloading the Ubuntu 18.04 LTS ISO Image
Go to the official website of Ubuntu at https://www.ubuntu.com/ from any Web Browser. You should see the following window.
Now click on Desktop as marked in the screenshot below.
Now click on Download Ubuntu button as marked in the screenshot below.
Now click on the Download button of Ubuntu 18.04 LTS as marked in the screenshot below.
You should see the following page.
Scroll down a little bit and click on Not now, take me to the download as marked in the screenshot below.
Now click on Save as marked in the screenshot below. You download should start.
Downloading Rufus
You can download Rufus from the official website of Rufus at https://rufus.akeo.ie/
Go to the official website of Rufus from any web browser and you should see the following window.
Now scroll down a little bit to the Download section. Click on Rufus or Rufus Portable link as marked in the screenshot below. I prefer Rufus Portable.
Now click on Save.
Now click on Run.
Click on No.
Rufus should start.
Creating an Ubuntu 18.04 LTS Bootable USB with Rufus
NOTE: Rufus will remove everything from your USB device. If you have any important data, please move it somewhere safe before you go through this process.
While Rufus is open, insert your USB drive that you wish to make Ubuntu bootable. It should be detected by Rufus as you can see in the screenshot below.
Now click on the CDROM icon as marked in the screenshot below.
A File Explorer window should show up. Now select the Ubuntu 18.04 LTS iso image that you’ve just downloaded and click on Open as marked in the screenshot below.
Now click on Start.
You should see the following window. Now click on Yes.
You should see the following window. Leave the defaults and click on OK.
You should see a warning message. If you don’t have any important data on your USB drive, click on OK.
Rufus should start making your USB drive Ubuntu bootable. It should take a few minutes.
Once it’s done, you should see READY status as marked in the screenshot below. Now close Rufus and your USB drive is ready.
Booting from the USB drive and Installing Ubuntu 18.04 LTS
Now you have to boot from the USB drive. How you do it depends on the motherboard you have. You want to go to the BIOS of your motherboard and select the USB drive you just made Ubuntu bootable with Rufus. On some motherboards, you press <F2> just after you pressed the power button of your computer. That’s a hint.
Once you select your USB drive from your BIOS, you should see the following window. Select Try Ubuntu without installing
Now click on Live session user.
Ubuntu 18.04 LTS live session should start. Now double click on Install Ubuntu 18.04 LTS icon as marked in the screenshot below.
Ubuntu 18.04 LTS installer should start. Now click on Continue.
Now select your desired Keyboard layout and click on Continue.
Select either Normal installation or Minimal installation and click on Continue.
If you want to install Ubuntu on a brand new hard drive, then select Erase disk and install Ubuntu, otherwise select Something else and click on Continue.
Make sure your hard drive is selected.
If your hard drive is new and you selected Something else in the earlier section, your hard drive won’t have any partition table. In that case, click on New Partition Table… button.
Click on Continue.
Select free space and click on the + icon as marked in the screenshot below.
First create an EFI System Partition of 512 MB of disk space with the following settings as marked in the screenshot below and click on OK.
Now create a /boot partition of 512 MB of disk space with the following settings as marked in the screenshot below and click on OK.
Now create a / (root) partition and give it the rest of the free disk space. Make sure it has the following settings as marked in the screenshot below and click on OK.
Finally, it should look something like this. Click on Install Now.
Click on Continue.
Select your Location from the map or by typing on the text box as marked in the screenshot below. Once you’ve selected the correct location, click on Continue.
Now fill in the details as marked in the screenshot below and click on Continue.
Your installation should start as you can see in the screenshot below.
It should take a few minutes for the installation to complete. Once it’s completed, you should see the following window. Click on Restart Now button.
Your computer should restart and you should now be able to boot into your new Ubuntu 18.04 LTS system.
Once you boot into your new Ubuntu 18.04 LTS system, a login window should appear as shown in the screenshot below. Type in your password and click on Sign In.
You should be logged in to your new Ubuntu 18.04 LTS system.
That’s how you use Rufus to make a bootable Ubuntu 18.04 LTS installer USB and install Ubuntu 18.04 LTS with it. Thanks for reading this article.
Create bootable USB drives from ISOs with an operating system of your choice, with various options, including to enhance compatibility with old BIOS versions
What's new in Rufus 3.5:
Fix Win7 x64 EFI bootloader not being extracted in dual BIOS+UEFI mode (Alt
Read the full changelog
Installing an operating system from a USB drive is much more convenient than from a disc, and a bootable drive even enables you to work from a system that does not have an OS installed. Rufus is a small-sized app that enables users to format USB flash disks and create bootable drives rapidly. It provides standard and advanced options alike, to suit the preferences of all skill levels.
Format to the desired file system
The tool is wrapped in a user-friendly interface that resembles the Format panel found in Windows built-in features. You can select a device, partition scheme and target system type, file system type (FAT32, NTFS, UDF, exFAT), cluster size, and new volume label.
Connected devices are detected and selected from a drop-down menu. Be sure to save all important data, because the USB drive is formatted and everything is removed in the process.
Compatibility options for old BIOS
Basic formatting options enable you to check the device for bad blocks and select the algorithm type (from 1 to 4 passes). Plus, you can set the quick format mode, create an extended label and icon files, as well as create a bootable disk using an ISO or various other disc image types.
Advanced tweaks can make Rufus list fixed (non-flash) or unpartitioned USB flash disks, add fixes for old BIOS (e.g. extra partition), and you may use Rufus MBR with a selected BIOS ID.
To conclude
The program records all activity to a separate panel, and it can be saved to a LOG file. It carries out a formatting task rapidly and error-free, using low system resources. We have not come across any issues during our tests since the utility did not cause Windows to hang or crash. To sum it up, Rufus is a straightforward solution to formatting and creating bootable USB drive, providing users with a series of useful features.
Rufus Video Guide
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Rufus was reviewed by Elena Opris
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Rufus 3.5
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portable version
A portable version of this application is available: Rufus Portable
file size:
1 MB
filename:
rufus-3.5.exe
runs on:
Windows 10 32/64 bit Windows 8 32/64 bit Windows 7 32/64 bit Windows Vista 32/64 bit Windows XP 32/64 bit