How Can I Install Linux Mint Without a Flash Drive?

You can also see if your computer can boot from an SD card, or you might want to try booting from a network, but that requires a bit of setup. Creating a small partition on your hard drive for booting could work too, but it’s pretty complicated and risky. I would just grab a USB drive.

You can try using an external HDD instead of a flash drive, or if you have an old DVD drive, burning the ISO might work, although some modern distros don’t fit on DVDs anymore.

If all else fails, just borrow a flash drive from a friend or neighbor! It’s a quick fix until you can buy one. Plus, they’re usually really cheap anyway.

If you don't have a flash drive right now, one option is to create a virtual machine on your current Windows setup using software like VirtualBox or VMware. You can load the Mint ISO file in the virtual environment to check it out until you can get a USB for the full installation. If you have an old CD lying around, you could also burn the ISO to that and install from there, although it might not work for all distributions nowadays.

Honestly, it might be best to wait and get a USB drive; they’re super cheap and very handy. I recommend having at least two drives—one for a Windows installer and the other for your Linux installer. It’ll save you a lot of headaches in the future if something goes wrong.