boot cd -> boot cd content from HDD?.. possible?

[jolancer]

Odd question please Help if possible...

even a point in the right direction would be usefull... I dont even know if what im asking is possible or not...
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what im trying to do is....

i have this 'Image drive 7 boot cd' for booting to Imaged Drive 7's recovery environment and restoring any Image Backup that was previously created.

and what im trying to do is, copy the contents of the CD over to the HDD so it can boot the Recovery Environment right from the HDD so no CD is required. (like how you can run the Recovery Console from the HDD)

what iv tryed so far is... i extracted the entire contents of the CD to a folder on the C:\ directory..... Then i edited boot.ini and added a line under [operating systems] that looked like this.... C:\ImageDrive\I386\something.bin="Restore"

I dont remember what the bin was named exactly... once i restart and select "Restore" from the boot menue... all i get is a blinking cursor... most of all the other files i tryed as the root directory just gives me an error some file(a dll) is missing or corrupt.

Is there anyway to make this do what im thinking of??
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I only tryed it on the C: drive thuse far because thats the dirve thats currently marked as active for boot.

I actually didnt try it on any other Partition/Disk also partly because... once you mark a partition or disk as 'Active' ,how do you revert it back to un-active? without reformatting?

 

[Osiris]

Not sure if this will help but try installing the recovery console, once that is finished, go to the boot.ini and see what it reads and see if you can match the entries up with what you need. I know what you are trying to do but I cant tell you exactly how to do it

 

[jolancer]

Thx Warez Monster for your reply... no one else has yet to reply to this question at different boards... If you know of a good place i should post this question let me know.
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I Have tryed that..... After i installed the Recovery console and looked at the boot.ini file = that was when i actually got the idea...

One of the problems though is i dont know witch file i should be pointing the boot.ini to... example... the RecoveryConsole has a .DAT file witch is used as the boot directory... the ImageDrive CD has no .DAT file, so i guessed maybe the .BIN would load it.... i try other files aswell but no luck...

Someone probably knows what file types are booted from CD probably right? that could inform me...

the other thing i was thinking that it might not be possible at all, if the Boot loader is coded to look for the boot files only on the CDrom drive and not the specified boot directory? .... if even that was the case, that should beable to be modified? no?

EDIT - Just a Note: Incase you didnt already know... you can disable the boot screen for the listed Boot options that let you select either Windows or RecoveryConsole... without uninstalling the RecoveryConsole.

If you use msconfig , it always Defaults the boot 'Timeout' to 3 sec.... but just use the command... > bootcfg /timeout 0

and the boot select screen will not show at all.

 

[Osiris]

That program you are using might be just for booting off a cd, not the HDD. You might want to try Norton Ghost. It might be easier for what you are trying to do.

 

[jolancer]

Can Norton Ghoste boot off a HDD and Restore a Drive without useing the Norton Ghoste CD?

Iv never used it befor.

 

[Osiris]

It sure can. Thats what I use. I get my os the way I want it, start ghost, make the backup or image, whichever you want to call it, save it to my HDD and I'm done. When I need to restore, I just click it and let it go. It will reboot into the ghost setup and take maybe 15 minutes to 1 hour, depending on how big the backup it. But I dont have my boot.ini file editied for this. I should probably look into it, just incase I cant boot into my previous OS. Would do any good to have it on my spare hdd if I can get to it.

 

[jolancer]

restoring the drive from inside windows is totally different... that doesnt nesessarily mean you can boot to Ghost, unless it has that option in the Installation?
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Check it out and then post back....

cause what im looking for is not a way to just restore from windows... but to beable to restore from another partition even if the OS partition is erased.

 

[Osiris]

I have installed a ghost image from across a network before, but I will see what I can do with this

 

[EricB]

once you mark a partition or disk as 'Active' ,how do you revert it back to un-active? without reformatting?

there a utility on the drive image cd that will let you do it. a partition magic boot disk will too

drive image can restore your drive within windows and over networks too

but I like your idea. can't you make a virtual drive that dos can recognize?