Windows To Go
| A component of Microsoft Windows | |
|---|---|
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| Details | |
| Type | Live USB |
| Included with | Windows 8 Enterprise, Windows 8.1 Enterprise, Windows 10 Enterprise, Windows 10 Education |
Windows To Go is a feature in Windows 8.1 Enterprise, Windows 8 Enterprise, Windows 10 Enterprise, and Windows 10 Education that allows them to boot and run from certain USB mass storage devices such as USB flash drives and external hard disk drives which have been certified by Microsoft as compatible. It is a fully manageable corporate Windows environment.
It is intended to allow enterprise administrators to provide users with an imaged version of Windows that reflects the corporate desktop. Creation of Windows To Go drives is not officially supported by non-Enterprise (or Education) Windows 8.1 editions, however Enterprise and Education versions of Windows 10 are supported. Some information has been published describing various ways to install Windows To Go using any version of Windows 8.x and 10 and any bootable USB device. Reported restrictions of some unofficial versions include unavailability of Bitlocker protection, no access to the Windows Store, and inability to boot on both BIOS and UEFI machines.
Before Windows 8, only embedded versions of Windows, such as Windows Embedded Standard 7, supported booting from USB storage devices.
In April 2011, after the leak of Windows 8 build 7850, some users noticed that those builds included a program called "Portable Workspace Creator", indicating it was intended to create bootable USB drives of Windows 8.
In September 2011, Microsoft officially announced Windows To Go at the Build Conference, and distributed bootable 32GB USB flash drives with Windows To Go pre-installed.
Windows To Go has several significant differences compared to a standard installation of Windows 8 on a non-removable storage (such as hard disk drives or solid-state drives).
Drive removal detection:
As a safety measure designed to prevent data loss, Windows pauses the entire system if the USB drive is removed, and resumes operation immediately when the drive is inserted within 60 seconds of removal. If the drive is not inserted in that time-frame, the computer shuts down after those 60 seconds to prevent possible confidential or sensitive information being displayed on the screen or stored in RAM. It is also possible to encrypt a Windows To Go drive using BitLocker.
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