Applying Windows 7 ONTO External Drive

[Assistive]

My primary hard drive cannot be read due to a broken cable. I really don't want to have to hunt down a new cable because of the mere fact that I have an older laptop. So my plan "B" was to install a copy of Windows 7 ONTO the external drive and run Windows from that.

Is there any way that I can preform this task? All of the videos and info that I have read up on have only showed me how to place a copy of Windows on the drive and install it to the primary drive.

If you need any more info please just let me know.

[Nachos]

It's easy with Linux, but I have never done it with Win7

I guess you should be able to use 'Virtual Box' to install Win7 to your USB if you have a Win7 ISO file. If not you can just find one, they are not illegal since they are just copies of installation disks with a 30 day trial.