This is a neat little project for those of you that could be asked to help fix a PC at any moment in your life - the end result is a flash drive which when booted lets you pick from:

SystemRescueCD - http://www.sysresccd.org/Main_Page
An amazing Linux live environment which has a large array of rescue tools

Windows PE 2.0 - http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/windows...a/aa905120.aspx
A live Windows environment (I have this so I have a portable CHKDSK)

Darik's Boot and Nuke - http://dban.sf.net
For wiping disks

ntpasswd - http://home.eunet.no/pnordahl/ntpasswd/
Recover Windows systems from forgotten passwords

Memtest86+ - http://www.memtest.org/
Check for broken RAM

Step 1: Collect together everything you are going to need

You'll need to download a bunch of tools to do this, I'll list everything here so you have it all before we start:

PeToUSB - http://gocoding.com/page.php?al=petousb
GRUB4DOS installer grubinst - https://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.p...lease_id=474675
SystemRescueCD - http://www.sysresccd.org/Main_Page
Windows AIK - http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details...;displaylang=en

Step 2: Prepare the USB drive

The first thing to do is plug your USB drive into your machine, and start PeToUSB.exe (Run as Administrator under Vista). Tick the boxes:
Enable Disk Format
Quick Format (OK this is optional)
Force Volume Dismount

Now hit Start and wait for the process to finish.

If your drive is larger than 2GB you will encounter an error here. This is because PeToUSB tries to format the drive to FAT, which has a maximum of 2GB. The error is not a problem because the drive has been made bootable regardless. Simply head over to Windows Explorer and format it to FAT32 as normal.

Next, we're on to grubinst_gui.exe. Again, run this as Administrator if you're using Vista. Select the Disk option, then pick your flash drive from the list. You will have to make an educated guess as to which one it is as all your disks will be listed. If you've only got one flash drive connected it will normally be the bottom one. Leave everything else untouched and hit the install button.

Now, copy the grldr file from your GRUB4DOS folder onto the root of the flash drive. That's the disk ready to go.

Step 3: Installing SystemRescueCD and the floppy images

DBAN, ntpasswd and Memtest86+ are all included with the SystemRescueCD package. Extract the contents of your SystemRescueCD ISO to a folder on your PC, then copy the following files to the root of your flash drive:

dban.img
initram.igz
memdisk
memtestp.img
ntpass.img
rescuecd
sysrcd.dat

That's as hard as it gets to install those.

Step 4: Create a Windows PE 2.0 installation and copy it to the flash drive

Follow this guide, using the WAIK you already downloaded, up to the point where you have your ISO file ready to burn to CD: http://apcmag.com/3894/windows_pe_2_0_a_ti...tem_maintenance

Now you have your ISO, simply extract the following from it onto the root of your flash drive (including subfolders):

boot
EFI
sources
bootmgr

Step 5: Configure GRUB and we're done

You now need to create a menu.lst file in the root of your flash drive with a text editor (like notepad), and paste in the following text:


You should now be able to reboot, select the flash drive as your boot device in your BIOS, and be ready to go!

Please report back if there are any problems with this, I've written it from memory after an evening of figuring it out. I have this setup running on an Integral 16GB drive with FAT32 so it does at least work for me!

i had used window PE but through CD but this time i am going to try on flash drive.

I DOWNLOADED NTPASSWD AND USED FOR FIRST TIME IT RUN FINE.
THANKX A LOT FOR SUCH A NICE HELP.




PLEASE HELP IN MAKING PE ON CD.
PLEASE TEACH ME STEP BY STEP.
THANKX A LOT

Hi imis - if you follow the guide I posted - http://apcmag.com/3894/windows_pe_2_0_a_ti...tem_maintenance - you will end up with an ISO file, which you can burn to a CD using a program like ImgBurn or Nero. Then its just a case of booting your computer from the CD.

nice guide, i'll give it a try sometime

isnt usb booting dependant on the motherboard though?

It is, but any mb from the last 3 years should be able to do it (at least in my experience)

thankx a lot today i made my pe cd.
thankx for guideline and help.

Thanks so much for this handy guide! I have been looking all over the net to find a guide suitable for an 8 gb memory stick. I had gotten the petousb error in my previous attempts but never realized i could finish the job using fat 32 and the built in vista format tool! In addition to expressing my gratitude, I also wanted to ask a question if I might.

Do you know if there's a way to add Bart PE to the list of software? I am trying to find a means of adding it with grub4dos but not having much luck. Hopefully one day it will be possible to use .iso files directly off the USB flash, maybe in the not too distant future?

Thanks again!

wow cheers mate

Great guide

With a 32GB USB key, would this possible to be able to boot into XP, and various Linux distros by using the last step?

Glad you found it useful.

I don't see why you couldn't use bartpe in the same way as stock Windows PE, just by pointing GRUB at the correct boot file (/ntldr?).


Sure you just have to give GRUB the correct filenames and boot parameters. With Linux distros you can usually find out the correct ones by looking at the syslinux.cfg files on their livecds.

Thanks man, nice guide.

Bookmarked. This is a great guide!

Yes...I've tried that and for some reason, I get an image loading error on BartPE. Once it's booted, I can't access all the volumes (hard drives) on the computer, only the USB, the X: drive, etc. There's no listing for the main hard drive. I must be missing something...I'll poke around some more.

Random question, but firstly, can we still use the USB stick to save normal files onto etc.

What does a bootable flash drive enable one to do?

Yes, but it would be a good idea to create a 'data' folder or similar on it for your files, as there will be a lot of system files for all the operating systems loaded onto it.

It's kind of like having multiple livecds in one place, allowing you to rescue broken systems etc. Check out Knoppix and Bart's PE for more info on the kinds of things you can do with them.

Oo I have used knoppix. Thanks for posting this. So to create a data folder, just create two main folders such as data, and system files, and then everything should be fine?

Thanks for the help.

How about Ultimate Boot Disc for Windows which includes lots of tools?

i can't seem to get it to book
i'm getting Missing MBR-Helper message

i'm using a 4gig usb key
when i used the utility to format the key, it didn't give an error when trying to format it as FAT...

i then tried everything again but this time i formatted it with the utility and then again with windows explorer as FAT32 but i still can't get it to boot

any ideas?

update

it seemed to be the computer i was using. the USB key booted up fine on my laptop and another desktop in the office
not sure what's so special about the first computer i used....

good idea.

Both my manager and I have been trying to get this to work for ages! I couldnt believe it when this actually worked!

Thank you so much! Bookmarked!

If anyone is interested, since using this thread to create a bootable USB drive, i have played around with grub4dos and syslinux and developped a way to boot a version of knoppix using the grub4dos boot loader. This means i can still use the same menu, but hook to the syslinux bootloader to start linux.

I dont know about anyone else, but getting linux to boot from grub4dos is not as easy as it seems, as it comes up with random errors etc.

This is just great. Thank you.

Perfect to play with on these long hours after everybody have left and i sit her alone waiting to go home.

Is there any way for me to make this work with XP?

Care to alaborate as to what you mean by "make this work with XP?" Do you mean you want to install XP from it, or you want to install XP TO it?

Guys, Please remember that Hirens Boot CD is considered to be warez.

Sorry. I wasnt sure as there is a boot cd that changes the admin password mentioned in the tutorial by Si.

Thanks for the guide, created a USB "Rescue/Fix/Ghost" drive and it works like a charm.

I also got a shell working on PE 2.0. Its called blackbox and it works pretty good.

Let me know if you have questions about it.

Click to view attachment

Click to view attachment

Here is a screenshot of what it looks like.

Wow, I can't say I'd even considered putting a shell on PE. I have been using the A43 file manager and some small tools from the command line. Nice work

Thanks.

I needed to create a way to boot and use Ghost at the company where I work, so I figured I put in a shell so it would be a little easier to work with.

Also all of the Portable Apps work just fine in the PE 2.0 environment.

Again, thanks for the guide.

very good guide

Wow, Im shocked how easy this guide is...but I still need some help. I have to admit my knowledge of Grub or any linux distro is limited. I have tried to add a few more options to my flash boot, bartPE, Hirems, Even knoppix with no avail, could someone help me out with the steps to add to this setup?

thankyou. the guide is great.

Can you paste the contents of your menu.lst file please.

Right now it just has the things listed in this tutorials list. Nothing more. As things didnt work, I removed entries that I had been attempting.

You need to list what you have and what you are trying to use. Without this we cannot say for sure what you are doing wrong.

Also any error messages you recieve when you try to load the environments would be good.

We basically need as much info as possible to help you out and at the moment we have nothing to work with from you.

You should also know that i have knoppix, Hirems and BartPE booting from my USB, so if you post your menu.lst, i should be able to compair and tell you where you are going wrong quickly.

well here is the deal, Im not sure how to make a img file of the live CDs, I tried to make a Img file like the floppy files included in the tutorial and when I inserted the commands in my menu.lst like this

title knoppix
kernel /memdisk
initrd /knoppix

it would not work,,,,, i booted the usb drive and it wouldnt even show up as a item to select in the menu....so I just figured I was doing it completely wrong. I kinda hate to say thats what I tried cause I know its completely wrong odviously....please dont laugh too hard.

I see. You dont need to make an img file. That does not work for all systems.

For knoppix, i just coppied the live CD to a folder called KNOPPIX in the root. Then i made my menu.lst look like this:

title 8. Knoppix
chainloader +1
rootnoverify

For barts PE i did this:

title 3. Barts PE
find --set-root /minint/setupldr.bin
chainloader /minint/setupldr.bin

And for system rescue CD i did this:

title 2. System Rescue CD
kernel /rescuecd initrd=initram.igz video=ofonly vga=0 scandelay=5
initrd /initram.igz

Hopefully this will give you a bit more guidance.

Let us know how it goes. If it still does not work, we can try other things mate.

Im giving that a try as we speak, but how is that knoppix entry actually linking to the knoppix folder in any way? Not to mention that knoppix disk I have seems to have a Knoppix folder already in the root of the CD. Im going after a new one now

I have several others to put on here including a winxp live CD. so it would seem to each entry to the .lst file, I dont understand how it works so I can proceed by myself.

Im trying to get Hirens, knoppix, winxp live, and nimbleX on one flash, thats my goal here. and maybe a maxblast or something along the way. total repair disk all in all

could u explain what "chainloader +1 and rootverify actually do? or even point me to a direction of good reading, Im not afraid to do my own digging,,

another question, I see how all these OS's are getting installed in the root of the disk, does that not make things a bit confusing. is there a way to have each reside in a seperate folder, or will it just not work like that

Im downloading newer version of knoppix and nimblex now... i will post results later, thanks again

All good questions mate. However some i cant answer.

I believe the chainloader and rootverify look for a loader called linux, which is in the root of the USB stick. This in turn loads Knoppix.

I too wanted to put everything in seperate folders. With the .img files you can literally put them where you like and chainload to them, then all the files are called from within the .img and it seems the img as an actual drive.

However, if you are running knoppix and bartPE, it relies on folders and files being in a certain location on the disk. Where i chainload to /minint/setupldr.bin, i could chainload to that setupldr.bin file anywhere on the disk, however, when that file is loaded the setupldr.bin looks for other files and folders within a folder called minint. I managed to hex edit the setupldr.bin file to point it to a different folder, which worked to a point, but other files that it calls on later look in minint also, so it would take forever to hex edit all the files.

Short answer is, no, you cant have them on seperate folders.

Now, i am sure it is possible somehow to actually partition some USB sticks. What you could do is create a partition for each system and use grub4dos on each partition. This would make it cleaner and easier to identify each OS etc. However, i was unable to find a way to do this myself, so if you go with this and are successful, i would be pleased to know how!

For knoppix, you need to copy everything from the CD to the USB, without putting them in a sub folder. Then if you do what i put in my menu.lst, that should be enough to get knoppix booting.

Something to note about /memdisk, is that it has a limit to the size of .img/ima files it can open. I think even if you could put a whole linx distro in to a 700meg img file, it owuld not be able to open it ok.

Sorry i could be any more help mate. I spent a lot of time searching for answers to get my USB the way i wanted it and have 8 OS and programs in total running from my disk, including DOS etc.

There are a lot of tutorials and information on the net, but it can be hard to find/ask what you are looking for. It took me a whole weekend of playing around to finally get a working disk, so you will need patience.

The main please to go it http://grub4dos.sourceforge.net/wiki/index.php/Main_Page. It shows you a lot fo the commands and what they do and can be used for. From there you should be able to get more of a concept on what it is you need to look for on the net.

Keep up the work though mate. You seem to know what you are doing to some degree and as you are willing to search yourself, that has to be commended.

Rich

EDIT: Wow... didnt realise i had typed so much! Sorry about that dude!

As already stated above, Hirens contains warez - unauthorized copies of proprietary 'pay-for' software.


chainloader, rootnoverify and all other GNU GRUB options are explained in their documentation: http://www.gnu.org/software/grub/manual/grub.html

Are you sure that is a good place to point him? I believe that grub4dos does not have the same or at least as many of the functions as fully fledged grub...?

I saw him asking about Knoppix and what chainloader did. The GRUB docs seemed to be appropriate.

I may have missed your post a few minutes earlier than mine if I was typing it as you were doing yours. Or maybe because it is the first post at the top of the next page. Either way, yeah, my post is somewhat redundant by 6 minutes.

Lol. Fair enough mate.