Molotov project

Create a bootable media from a Windows® 10 iso image.

The Molotov project aims to make it easy to create a bootable flash drive for Windows 10 installation.

Check the website for useless information: https://cizordj.github.io/molotov/

How to install

It is recommended to use the versions available in the releases page, these versions are stable enough for normal usage. Do not pick the binary directly from this repository as it contains bugs and is not well tested.

Debian Dependencies:

dash mount util-linux fdisk ntfs-3g dosfstools grub2-common grub-efi-amd64-bin grub-pc-bin

How to use

It is simple, just run the script with the necessary arguments:

./molotov -i <ISO_IMAGE> -d <DEVICE>

How it works

It is simple too, the molotov formats the block device, puts the iso contents in there and finally installs a boot-loader capable of booting Windows depeding on what type of boot you have selected. Remember, molotov is a non-interactive program, so be extremely careful when passing the block device. It won't ask any questions.

Known limitations

The molotov is still not capable of creating bootable drives from arm64 images and the reason is because the grub-efi-arm64-bin package is not installable on 64 bits versions of Debian. This is a problem that could be solved in just one line of code if that package was available.

Troubleshooting

Some common problems that people find when they use Molotov

Black screen with a blinking cursor

After using molotov to create the flash drive and booting from there, the Windows logo shows up and then disappear leaving you with a black screen and a blinking underscore on the left. It means that Windows is still booting in the background and it will take from 5 to 10 minutes to show the installation screen. This is mostly a hardware problem and is not something that molotov can fix, if you have a worn flash drive be aware that the transfer speed will be slow and Windows may take forever to boot. That is why I recommend you to use a 3.0 usb drive because the Windows will boot up faster.