Yesterday through the Issue tracker I reported to Rufus developer "Pete Batard" the incompatibility between Rufus 3.x and Rufus 4.x.

Basically the USB images created by Rufus 3.x are incompatible with the new 4.x versions (they generate error at the end of writing), now I don't know if it is a Bug or an evolution of the program.

As I had mentioned the new AROS One USB Images will be produced with the new 4.x version of Rufus, this is because Windows users with Win10 and Win11 are all using the newer 4.x version.

The 3.x versions were the last to work on WinXP and Win7, but they work perfectly on Win10 as well.


Today discussing with Pete Batard developer of Rufus on issue tracker to try to understand the icompatibility between Rufus v3.x and Rufus v4.x, which according to him should not be there, however he is analyzing the various logs to try to understand why Rufus v4.x does not write images created by Rufus 3.x correctly

The discussion was interesting, Pete advised me not to create the USB Images in the VHD format and especially not to compress them to ZIP, where corruptions could occur on the Image, although no error will be shown during writing.

Pete instead strongly advised me to use the VHDX format, although then once tested it gave me error in writing, this error however is a Bug that Pete knows and is fixing, it will probably be fixed for the next 4.5 version


Some info on the VHDX Image format:

One of the biggest advantages of VHDX over the old VHD format is the storage capacity of the virtual disk. Prior to Windows Server 2012, the limit for Hyper-V virtual hard drives was 2 TB. VHDX files have a capacity of 64 TB.

VHDX are designed to work with today's modern hardware and have logical sector sizes of 4 KB, which improves performance over VHD files.

VHDX also provides protection against file corruption related to power supply failures by continuously keeping track of metadata updates, a feature not available with the VHD format. Larger block sizes for dynamic disks that differ, as well as the ability to store custom metadata, also provide the new format with superiority in the comparison between VHD and VHDX

Released the new Rufs Beta version 4.5 for Windows 8 or higher 64Bit, this new version corrects the incompatibility with old images created with Rufus 3.x.

Now all old and new AROS One images can be burned with the new Rufs 4.5.

Come consigliato HERE by the developer "Pete Batard" the new AROS One USB images will be generated with the new VHDX format, which can be compressed without any problems.

Furthermore, VHDX is also designed to work with modern hardware, has logical sector sizes of 4 KB which improves performance compared to VHD files.

Tested the new version by Rufus 4.5 beta, the request error is now gone, the "Burning" of the Pendrive image is now done correctly.

But be careful, with Rufus 4.5 beta the images created in the "VHDX" format, if you then try to burn, a request warns that the image is not supported by Rufus.

If instead with Rufus 4.5 I create a VHD Image, the "Live Pendrive" boots, shows the Grub, but then the partition is not detected (it stops at the AROS "Cat Eyes" logo)

If I use Rufus 3.2 the VHD Image created by Rufus 4.5 also works fine, the Live Pendrive boots correctly and shows the Operating System.