Introduction#
As the title suggests, I have been using this solution for over half a year and now I am sharing it with my friends. It can be divided into two parts: hardware (USB drive) and software (system and applications).
USB Drive Selection#
The requirements are actually quite simple: fast, large enough, and portable. I'm not very knowledgeable about this, so take it as a reference. I chose this model from SanDisk: the 256GB version.
USB Drive Icon#
Create an autorun.inf file in the root directory with the following content, and move the icon .ico file to the root directory.
[autorun]
icon=.\logo.ico
Right-click on both files and set them to hidden.
Ventoy Boot#
Ventoy is an open-source tool for creating bootable USB drives. It can boot multiple ISO image files on a USB drive without the need to reformat the drive.
Simply download it from the official website, extract it, open the Ventoy2Disk program, and the default configuration should be sufficient. Click "Install" (Note: this will format your USB drive, so please backup your data).
Ventoy Theme & Settings#
Ventoy has many ready-made themes (please search for them yourself), and you can also configure it according to the official documentation. I am using the Ella theme from Ventoy Beautification Theme V2.0 - Chr_小屋.
Installation is simple. Create a \ventoy folder in the root directory and drag the theme folder into it.
Ventoy has many customizable options, which are saved in the \ventoy\ventoy.json file. Open the VentoyPlugson program in the extracted Ventoy installation package folder, and a configuration webpage will open. You can set plugins, themes, languages, passwords, etc. The official documentation is very detailed, so please refer to it.
System Images & PE#
After that, you can boot from the image file placed in the USB drive.
For easy categorization, it is recommended to create an ISO folder in the root directory and further categorize it by system type.
As for the images, I have stored several commonly used Windows versions and Linux distributions' installation images. They may not be necessary, but having them is considered versatile.
There is also WinPE, and I chose FirPE, which supports networking and allows pre-installed software using the Edgeless plugin, as well as custom wallpapers. After downloading and installing the program, click "Create ISO File" and move it to the folder mentioned above. You can also refer to the documentation to create a /FirPE folder in the root directory for more detailed configuration, but I won't go into detail here.
In fact, most Live CDs of Linux distributions can be used as PE
Or use Linux distributions specifically designed for USB drives, such as veket linux
PortableApps Launcher#
PortableApps is a platform for managing portable programs (also known as portable software) on a USB drive. Simply download and install the program, and there is no need to format the drive during this process.
The main menu is similar to the Windows Start menu (it comes with many themes, and this is the one I personally find more visually appealing).
After installation, the following two folders and the Start.exe program for launching PortableApps will be created in the root directory.
- The Documents folder and its subdirectories Music, Pictures, and Videos are the default document folders. Although they may not be very useful, they can still be used for categorization if you prefer a clean root directory. The PortableApps main menu has shortcuts to open them.
- The PortableApps folder is used to store the PortableApps software itself and other portable software.
Installing Software#
PortableApps has its own app store, which offers a wide range of software. However, it is mainly targeted at foreign users and lacks localization. Also, the download speed is slow whether or not you use a proxy, so I do not recommend using it.
For users in China, it is recommended to search for portable software on third-party websites. Chinese internet users should be familiar with this process.
After downloading the portable software, simply drag the extracted software folder to the /PortableApps folder.
Go to the main menu -> App Management -> Refresh App Icons, and it will automatically scan the application programs in the software directory and add them to the menu.
Right-click on the program to group, rename, hide, etc.
Note:
Only EXE files in the first-level directory of the software folder can be scanned. Subdirectories beyond the second level cannot be recognized.
For example, \PortableApps\7-Zip\7-zip.exe can be recognized, but \PortableApps\7-Zip\bin\7-zip.exe cannot be recognized.
Use Cases#
- Use Ventoy to boot into different system images for installation, maintenance, or testing.
- Use PortableApps to have the same software environment in PE or different Windows platforms.