[Boot from ISO CD Image Files in a HDD Partition]

[iPraetorian]

Greetings to everyone!

Just would like to ask if anyone here know of a Software or a Technique that will enable us to Boot from an ISO Image File (.iso) in a HDD Partition - either emulates the ISO Image File as a CD/DVD Drive or as a HDD.

I just got tired of keeping 5-7 Bootable CD's with my Laptop just to feel assured that I can recover & fix the machine when ever I bring it. (WinXP SP2, Ultimate Boot CD, Bart's PE, Norton Ghost & Partition Magic, Puppy Linux, Winternals ERD Commander 2005 (Emergency Rescue Disc) Bootable Ghost Back Up DVDs, etc. - you get the point! )

I got this idea because I just recently made my USB Flash Drive (UFD) Bootable using Bart's PE (Preinstalled Environment), a Bootable Live Windows Version in a CD, and found out that it made an ISO Image File in the UFD instead of just copying the files there and writing the Boot Sector. (Download Page of Bart's PE)

When I boot up the UFD, the entire ISO Image File is loaded to RAM and the OS/Environment can be used with ease. I also found out that the same ISO Image File is Bootable and can be Burned into CD. I tried using the first Primary DOS Partition of my HDD instead of the UFD and it seems to work :wink: (using the pe2usb.cmd tool in PEBuilder to write into a HDD Partition instead of a UFD! )

I copied a working ISO Image File of Winternals ERD Commander into the Primary DOS Partition and hoped that renaming it to bartpe.iso will make it Boot from the HDD - of course it didn't!

I also copied the contents of the Winternals ERD Commander into the Primary DOS Partition using various File Systems and different Boot Sectors using MakeBoot but that didn't work.

Now if any of you guys out there know how to Pull this Off, I would very much appreciate any effort or wisdom you can impart to me.

Thanks in advance and more power!

Mark

P.S.:

I've tried to Google Search on Topics like: Boot from ISO CD Image Files in a HDD, etc. but the results fall short of my needs.

But I came across with interesting stuff like MemDisk, which makes a Bootable ISO CD Image File containing many Floppy Disk Image Files that can be selected from at boot time. Bart has instructions and files here. Sadly, the program cannot boot from ISO Image Files and the developers have no plan of doing so because of the complexity involved.

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I'm also not sure if this is the right section to place a question regarding this topic as I can't find a better place and this area seem to be the most related for the topic. Please feel free to move it into a more appropriate category if there is one or a new one is made for this subject.

Edited February 16, 2007 by iPraetorian

[jaclaz]

Some info is here:

http://z3.invisionfree.com/Boot_Land/index.php?showtopic=155

http://www.boot-land.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=135

http://www.boot-land.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=808

The problem is which OS is actually inside the .ISO.

jaclaz