How to Create a bootable Windows 2012 R2 USB Disk? (applies to Windows 8.1 also)

Pre-requisites: 7-Zip software (Download it from here: http://7-zip.org/), Windows 2012 (R2) ISO (or Windows 8.1 ISO), 8GB or more USB disk

• Open Command Prompt in elevated mode (Run as Administrator)
• Type diskpart and press Enter
• Type list disk and press Enter. Note the list of existing disks.
• Insert the USB Disk
• Type list disk and press enter again. Note the new disk showed up which is our USB disk. I assume the new disk is 2 for example purpose.
• Type select disk X where X is your USB disk. E.g., select disk 2. Press Enter.
• Type clean and press enter.
• Type create partition primary and press enter to create primary partition 1.
• Type select partition 1 and press enter.
• Type active and press enter to make the partition 1 active
• Type format fs=ntfs and press enter. This will format the partition 1 as NTFS volume.
• Type assign and press enter to assign the USB disk to a drive letter.

• Now right click on Windows Server 2012 R2 or Windows 8.1 ISO file, select 7-Zip –> Extract Files…
• Select your USB disk to extract the ISO contents to the USB disk

That’s all. Boot the server or computer using the bootable USB disk.