How to Create a Mac OS USB Boot Drive on Windows

This tutorial will help you create a bootable USB flash drive for your Mac on a Windows computer using Transmac.

In order for this to work, you need a USB flash drive. The one I used in my tutorial was 16GB in size, but it should work with any flash drive that is 8GB in size or higher.

Open command prompt as an administrator and enter the following commands to convert your USB drive from MBR to GPT format:

diskpart

list disk

select disk X (where X is the number of your USB flash drive)

clean

convert GPT

create partition primary

The application costs a one-off fee of £59, however, you can use Transmac without any restrictions for 15 days. That's more than enough time to do what you need to do.

The DMG file for Mac OS X can now be downloaded free of charge from Apple.

Once you have your USB boot drive, you can boot up from the drive by inserting the USB drive into your Mac and then pressing the option (⌥) key as soon as your computer loads. This will allow you to select which drive you boot from.

If you see the no/prohibited/forbidden symbol after selecting your USB drive to boot (it's like a circle with a line through it i.e. ø), try and go back into the recovery area by pressing command and R when your Mac is loading and unmounting the drive.

I'd love to hear your thoughts on this so please leave a comment below. As always, if you enjoyed the video, please click like, share, and subscribe :)

Thanks guys.

Kevin

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#macbootdrive #osxbootdrive #applebootdrive #macrecovery

[KevinMuldoon]

The DMG file for Mac OS X can now be downloaded free of charge from Apple.

[THiggins]

Just sold my iMac on eBay & went to do a simple reset. Made an absolute howler of a job & I'm hoping your video helps. First & last Mac I'll ever have.

[chrisboyer]

Thanks the only person I could understand that was doing it on a Windows computer

[nomebear]

This was a huge time saving for me. An elderly lady had issues with her iMac and I didn't know how to rescue the iMac without a disk. Thank you so much for your most informative video.

[MatSpeedle]

Thanks Kev, even for an IT minded person like myself having these steps nice and simply laid out just saves a lot of time and is much appreciated.

[originaldanman]

I didn't search for this solution because I didn't think it was possible. I've been trying to do this through OSX and vmware for 3 days to upgrade an older macbook . Your solution helped me figured out in 10 mins. This is why Windows is still the best OS. Thanks much

[dmbrookfield]

Quality walk through, I spent hours wasting my time looking at other howtos all of them missed out soem important step. Great use of DiskPart BTW

[helly]

Thank you sir, I've been struggling with creating a macOS boot USB without having a MacOS device

[handdaniel]

So many guides never mention converting to GPT. Thank you so much, I've been pulling my hair out trying to figure out why transmac was giving me an error. 🙏🏼

[totallyworksperfectly]

7 years in the future, thanks so much!!! You legend!!!

[joshgilbert]

Watched this video 3 days ago i since then i keep randomly saying "Transmac" in a strong Scottish accent for no reason lol

[instrudude]

Thanks a ton, FYI for who's in similar situation. Once it's installed in USB, insert the USB and restart Mac, hold the alt button key, select USB option and then install in Hard Drive.

[varaprasaderapu]

Its very nice. Make video for how to run that bootable USB stick.

[swordpeak]

Hi, thanks for the tutorial. But my macbook doesn't recongnize the bootable usb. Not sure why??

[RanchBlueSprings]

I cant believe how niche this answer is. you saved my ass

[Rustyrustyspoons]

4 Year old video helped me out lol. Cheers mate :D from Australia!

[lyricssy_]

THANK YOU!!
I erased my hard drive and now I’m left at my screen saying that App Store is temporarily unavailable
Hope this flash guide works! :)

[Salty_Knuckles]

Kevin, this is a great video. I'm a PC guy and no one makes it more clear how to get to the point that you've done with this video. Great work.

[s.dh]

Can I just say you came at the right time like God. I installed Mojave on my unsupported mac and all hell went loose, kept booting into recovery mode. You helped me out from selling my iMac. I just want to say a really big THANK YOU!

[voodizzle]

For everyone having issues with the USB not appearing, you need to make sure you have used a 2.0 USB and not a 3.0. You also want to make sure that the OS version you are installing is the one that your computer came with as factory new.