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am in a situation where my Windows 10 partition got corrupt, and I only have an access to a Windows machine, and I need to rebuild my Windows Installer on USB - for which I could probably use something like Ventoy, for which I need an ISO file. Unfortunately, I can confirm that old advice, like in this other Super User question.

  1. PC link: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10
  2. Mobile link: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10ISO

... Change useragent in the box saying Custom User Agent, Type useragent randomly (e.g. abc), ...

But that does not work anymore: When I visit these links from a Firefox browser on Ubuntu, I get :

Windows 10 2022 Update | Version 22H2

The Update Assistant can help you update to the latest version of Windows 10. To get started, click Update now.

Create Windows 10 installation media

To get started, you will first need to have a license to install Windows 10. You can then download and run the media creation tool. For more information on how to use the tool, see the instructions below.

  • Using the tool to upgrade this PC to Windows 10 (click to show more or less information)
  • Using the tool to create installation media (USB flash drive, DVD, or ISO file) to install Windows 10 on a different PC (click to show more or less information)

More download options

  • Sign in to the Microsoft 365 admin center to download Enterprise editions.
  • Sign in to your subscription on the Visual Studio Subscriptions portal for available downloads.
  • Visit the Windows Insider site to download Insider Preview builds

That is, there is no download link for an ISO for Windows 10; there is an ISO download offered for Windows 11 on https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows11 - but that does not help me.

(I just hate that these "business" people do not write "ISO file download not available anymore through this webpage", would have saved a lot of time and frustration. Then again, they are not there to assist you in any way, just to take your money)

So, what options do I have now, to download a Windows 10 ISO, so I can use it to create a bootable USB on Linux? From my research, I've seen:

  • https://tb.rg-adguard.net/public.php - "This project will no longer be updated. New project: https://files.rg-adguard.net" where "To download the image, you need to get an authorization key (it can be purchased on the website: https://forum.rg-adguard.net/account/upgrades) and after that, you will be able to download all the files of this project."; although the old page version does give access to a few Windows 10 ISOs - but you have to download them via torrent (and I have a hard time trusting that page, especially since the Windows 10 ISOs being removed from MS website, means that their MD5 hashes are removed as well, and nothing can be confirmed)
  • https://rufus.ie/en/ / https://github.com/pbatard/rufus has some sort of code to download Windows ISOs, but apparently it is only built for Windows, so I cannot really use it
  • https://github.com/ElliotKillick/Mido is a bash script downloader for Windows ISOs, but it does not work anymore;

So, do I still have any options in obtaining a Windows 10 ISO, preferably from an MS site?

Giacomo1968
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sdbbs
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1 Answers1

4

This answer is summarized below.

  • The Firefox application included with Ubuntu can download the Windows 10 ISO file from Microsoft.
  • In this case, no settings changes or extensions are needed when using Firefox to download from Microsoft.
  • Instructions are given for creating an UEFI bootable Windows 10 installation USB flash drive from the ISO file downloaded from Microsoft.

How to download a Windows 10 ISO file from Microsoft

I have Ubuntu 24.04.2 LTS installed. From Firefox, I entered the URL given below.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10ISO

Below is an image taken from this website.

not Microsoft

From the website, I can download a Windows 10 ISO file. In my case, I chose 64-bit English (United States), which resulted in the following file being downloaded to my Downloads folder.

Win10_22H2_English_x64v1.iso

I can recreate the situation described in your question by going to the website below and adding the User-Agent Switcher extension.

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/uaswitcher/

Now, if I go to the Microsoft website given above and use the extension to change from the "Default" to "Windows / Firefox 136" and reload the current page, then I am redirected to the following URL.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10

Here, I get the same as given in your question, as shown below.

Microsoft

You no not need to do this. You should use the Firefox default to download the Widows 10 ISO file.

How to create UEFI bootable USB Flash Drive Windows 10 Installer

  1. Format a 16 GB or larger USB flash drive.

    Enter the lsblk command in a Terminal application window. Use the output to determine device associated with the flash drive. In this answer, the device will be identified by sdX. Make the appropriate substitutions when you enter your commands. Next, enter the following commands to create an approximately 8 GB FAT32 partition labeled MYFAT32.

    sudo umount /dev/sdX?*
sudo parted /dev/sdX mklabel msdos
sudo parted /dev/sdX mkpart primary fat32 1MB 8GB
sudo mkfs.vfat -F 32 -n MYFAT32 /dev/sdX1

  2. Copy all files smaller than 4 GB from the ISO to the flash drive.

    Use the Files application to mount the Windows ISO file. Note the label given to the mounted ISO file. In my case this was CCCOMA_X64FRE_EN-US_DV9. If your label is different, then make the appropriate substitutions when you enter your commands. From the Dock, mount the MYFAT32 volume. Enter the commands below to copy the files to the flash drive.

    cd /media/$USER/CCCOMA_X64FRE_EN-US_DV9
find . -type d -exec mkdir -p ../MYFAT32/{} \;
find . -size -4G -type f -exec cp {} ../MYFAT32/{} \;

  3. Split the install.wim file into an install.swm file and an install2.swm file.

    The install.wim file, stored on the ISO, is larger than 4 GiB and therefore needs to be split, when copying to the FAT32 volume on the flash drive. Below are two methods which can be used to split this file. Choose one of the two.

    • Method 1: Use third a party tool

      This method requires the use of the wimsplit command, which I needed to install by entering the commands below.

      sudo apt update
sudo apt install wimtools

      Enter the command below to split the install.wim file.

      wimsplit sources/install.wim ../MYFAT32/sources/install.swm 3800

      Close all Files application and Terminal application windows, then use the dock to eject the flash drive.

    • Method 2: Use Microsoft's tool

      Microsoft has a dism command which can split the install.wim file. First, enter the commands below to create a NTFS volume labeled MyNTFS on the flash drive.

      sudo parted /dev/sdX -- mkpart primary ntfs 8GB -1s
sudo mkfs.ntfs -L MyNTFS -Q /dev/sdX2

      From the Dock, mount the MyNTFS volume. Enter the commands below to copy the install.wim file to the flash drive.

      cd /media/$USER/CCCOMA_X64FRE_EN-US_DV9
cp sources/install.wim ../MyNTFS
chmod 644 ../MyNTFS/install.wim

      Close all Files application and Terminal application windows, then use the dock to eject the flash drive. Using the computer where Windows is to be installed, UEFI boot from the flash drive. You should get a window similar to the one shown below.

      Windows 10 first display

      Execute step 4 from this answer. Note that you will need to substitute MyNTFS for MyExFAT. When finished, click on the following: Next > Repair your computer > Turn off your PC.

David Anderson
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