How to Convert USB Flash Drive to Local Disk

It is known that flash drive or USB drive is used as a removable disk in the computer. It is mainly used to transfer data between two computer devices. Sometimes it is required to use your USB drive as a local disk to install an operating system or you are running out of memory. If it is a removable disk then one cannot install OS on it, so one must convert it into local disk. There are a number of ways to convert USB flash drive as the local disk; here I am listing one of the best methods for USB drive conversion:

Method to Convert USB flash drive to Local Disk:

• Insert the flash drive into the USB port of Windows (Windows 10, Windows 8, 8.1, Windows 7, Vista, XP, Windows Server 2003 and 2008) computer. If you have not connected this type of drives into your system before then you may need to wait until the drivers are installed. Sometimes you may need to format the drive to avoid not formatting errors. However, formatting this flash drive deletes entire data saved on it, in such situation you can use an appropriate card recovery software. Such tools help in recovering data from formatted cards.
• Then you must download the USB_LocalDisk.zip and extract
• From the USB LocalDisk folder right click on inf and open it using Notepad or Notepad ++  or text editor
• Then go to line 26 of inf file

Note: We are going to edit the section named “device_instance_id_goes_here”. It is better to keep this file open because we will be using it for about 40 seconds

• From the desktop, click Start > Run and then type msc and press OK
• Find your USB stick under Disk drives and right-click then select Properties
• Then open the Details tab and select the item listed (Take help of Ctrl + C key combination to copy this driver to your USB stick.)
• Go again to and open inf file and insert the drive code that you copied and update file.
• Locate the text which says “device_instance_id_goes_here” should be around line 26. Then paste the drive code you have using paste option or by Ctrl + V
• Hit Save button (So now we have created an updated driver for the device, so it will now read as a Local Disk. Now we just need to update the driver itself)
• Go to Start > Run > type msc and find your USB drive again
• Just right click and select “Update Driver” option

In the Wizard one must need to follow specific directions to manually update the driver to convert USB drive to Local Disk. For that,

• Then select “Install from a list or specific location” and click Next
• Next select, “Don’t search. I will choose the driver to install” and hit Next
• Then click “Have Disk”
• Browse to your recently edited inf and click Open then OK
• Ignore the prompt saying “This driver is not digitally signed!”
• Then press Next > Yes > Finish

With these steps, you can easily convert your flash drive into local disk. Before performing these steps make sure you have backup of your flash drive data else, you may lose your files. In case if that happens, immediately stop using the drive and recover lost files from flash drive using Remo Recover Software. However, once you are done with above steps, you can install the operating system on this USB and it will also help you when your system is running out memory. Make sure your USB has sufficient memory before performing these options.