thegr8anand

Ok. So is it possible to boot the Bitdefender Rescue CD from harddrive using grub?

I don't want to install any OS. I just want to use the rescue cd (hiren's boot cd or bitdefender rescue cd) to disinfect my pc.

Hi guys, Sorry if this is the wrong forum for my problem. I am trying to boot a rescue cd from hard drive at startup(using grub) since my cd drive doesn't work anymore. I have an old pc which is infested with malware and would like to clean it up without resorting to a clean install of windows. I am not able to run either MSE or MBAM because of the virus and also the pc is slow with only 256mb ram. The bios doesn't support booting from usb either. This is the guide i tried but didn't work, http://thinkweird.info/1688/running-hirens-bootcd-from-hard-drive I followed the steps but when I select the desired option from boot menu, the computer just restarts. What could I be doing wrong?

I did think about what you said but I was not sure if that was the proper way and didn't want to risk my XP installation and other files, so I took this long way. Anyways this will help me if I want to install 7 over XP later using USB pen-drive.

Hey guys... I have figured it out how to do it and have installed Windows 7 from my USB flash drive (4GB). The total time to get to 7 desktop took only 15 mins which I think was very impressive. So I'll tell you how it worked out for me. Since I was using XP and diskpart was not showing my flash-drive in 'list disk' command; I used the Hitachi Micro Driver inf to make it fixed and it solved that problem. Step 1 - I used the guide here: http://www.uwe-sieber.de/usbtrouble_e.html. Go down to "On flash drive only the first partition works" and follow the instructions there to make your flash-drive fixed. Step 2 - Open the command prompt and type the following commands: diskpart list disk select disk # (# is the number which is your flash-drive you see from the 'list disk' command) clean create partition primary select partition 1 active You cannot use the format command in XP's diskpart so I used HP USB Disk Storage Format Tool to format my pen-drive. I used Fat-32 format (as i think my laptop can't boot from NTFS USB) and didn't use quick format. It just takes less then a minute. Then go back to command prompt and type: assign exit (to exit diskpart but not the command prompt) Now you can mount the Windows 7 ISO using Daemon tools(or similar) and extract all files to your flash-drive. The go back to command prompt and move to the boot folder of Windows 7 ISO(and not the boot folder in the pen-drive). For example I used Daemon tools so for me it was simply I:\boot Type this command: bootsect /nt60 <drive-letter> For me it looked like: I:\boot> bootsect /nt60 k: (k was my flash-drive) Step 3 - Now you are all set to restart and boot from your USB(don't forget to write down your Windows 7 key if you haven't ). As the comp starts you can either go to boot options and select USB Storage Device or change the boot order in BIOS to boot from USB first. Then it should boot to Windows 7 setup and do its work. Since I was dual-booting I chose custom install and installed it on a separate partition. After it says it need to restart, you have to boot from the hard-drive and not from usb. So change the boot order back to your HDD if you need to. Then it will do the rest of the setup and you are done. Now whenever you start you get the option to start Windows 7 or earlier version of windows. Well this worked out for me and hope it does too for any who is in a similar situation. I am going to explore Windows 7 for now.

Ya i know it would have been a lot easier, its just that my dvd-drive isn't working and don't want to get a new one right now for my laptop.

Well I am trying to install 7 from my USB pen-drive(4gb). I am currently using XP and I have googled on how to install it from usb; but the problem is most of them are using the diskpart method and one particular command is giving the problem(list disk) as in XP my removable disk is not shown, so I am not able to select it. Here is the link to the guide I saw: http://garyshortblog.wordpress.com/2009/01...re-one-netbook/ The rest are almost the same so I haven't got anything to work for me. So I just want to get windows 7 setup started from my pen-drive and I want to install it on a separate partition(dual-boot with XP). My laptop can boot from USB so that's not a problem. Thanks for any help.

Ya thanks. I got it working. So I am using XP now.

Hey there, I decided to scrap the idea of installing XP on my external Sata HD. So instead of dual-booting I am installing XP on my internal HD only and removing my Vista installation. I go to the first part and it shows me the partitions of my internal HD. Since it is a Dell I got 4 partitions shown(instead of the the 3 i had been using C,D,E). I think this is some reserved partition of only 55mb size. So XP installation assigns this C and my actual C drive where i want to install is given D. So I install on D and first part completes. Now when i select the second part i am getting missing hal.dll error. I can find $winnt$.inf and hal.dll from Grubdos on (hd1,1) but the second part keeps giving the error. Is this a problem because in WinSetupUSB i gave the bootini settings disk:0,partition:1 since i thought that would be my C drive. but in first part of XP setup there was that extra partition which was assigned C. This is my boot.ini on my USB. From the FAQ it says to amend it but i dont know how as grub says hal.dll is in (hd1,1). [Boot Loader] Timeout=5 Default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS [Operating Systems] multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(1)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Second part of XP Professional setup from hd 0 part 1" /FASTDETECT

Hmmm. Stuck. Dont know what to do... Just one thing, The second part of XP setup in Grub, where is the file NTLDR loaded from? Doesnt it have to be loaded from USB drive which has it? So why does it matter if Grub can't see my sata drive as like first part setupldr.bin from USB did the rest...

My laptop is Dell XPS M1710. IT doesnt have an esata port but i am using an ExpressCard which provides me sata connections. I think my internal hard drive is 160GB SATA 150. Well I have USB 2 connection with my HD as well so i can use that somehow if this doesnt work??? EDIT: Hey ilko, I found these posts from the link you gave me where they have got it working. can you please help me understand that. http://www.boot-land.net/forums/index.php?...ost&p=40707 http://www.boot-land.net/forums/index.php?...ost&p=46779

Ok i tired your suggestions. Root ( TAB gives me: hd0, hd1, rd find /windows/system32/$winnt$.inf says: file not found. find /ntldr gives me: (hd0,0), (hd1,1),(hd1,2) I guess it's not seeing the external HD now, even though the first part of setup completed successfully where i chose my external HD partition 2. Also, yes this drive was partitioned in Vista. But it worked in first part and not in second part... When i try chainloader /ntldr in the grub command window it says: Will boot NTLDR from drive=0x80, partition=0x0(hidden sectors=0x3f) This is what Boot.ini says: [Boot Loader] Timeout=15 Default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(2)partition(2)\WINDOWS [Operating Systems] multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(2)partition(2)\WINDOWS="Second part of XP Professional setup + Start Windows from hd 1 part 2" /FASTDETECT

I think I am right track then. At first it started GrubDos and I had to select 1st part of Setup or Second part, i selected first. Then i had to choose where to install XP i selected the target drive H which was detected. I quick formatted it and now it is copying files. SO i guess after this i will move to the GUI part. Also ilko i didnot try your suggestion of grubdos_gui.exe as that time i was running your program after formatting the usb to FAT32. Then i tried to boot from USB and it ran. So i am pretty sure it was because of NTFS file system. EDIT: Have a problem now. When i first selected 'First part of Windows XP Pro Setup from partition 0' in Grub4Dos, i selected the partition and it copied some files. Now after it restarted and i boot from USB again and select 'Second part of Xp Pro Setup + Start 1st time from partition 0', I am getting an error. It says: "Windows couldnot start because of a computer disk hardware configuration problem. Couldnot read from the selected boot disk. Check boot path and disk hardware." So am stuck with this error and dont know how to proceed. Just a guess but shouldn't it be Start 1st time from partition 2 or something?

Ok. It is working right now. Actually the problem was NTFS file system. I guess my comp had a problem with it. I changed it to FAT32 and ran your program again and now it is working. I am on my other PC and it is installing right now. Seems slow though from USB. At first setup it gave me 2 options: First part of Windows XP Setup or Second part Of XP setup. I didnt know what to choose so i went with the first one. I dont know if it should have asked that. Also i am not sure if it will install all the extra apps and drivers that were on the CD and the tweaks and removals that were put using nlite.

Hmmm. When i select USB boot, it says there is some configuration problem and it cannot continue. EDIT: The file system i used for my USB was NTFS, is this why it gave me thi error? And yes i do have extra files(setups) in the OEM folder. Can i try your 0.2 version. If it fixes all this then it can be good for testing. Also here is my presetup.cmd if it matters. My actual USB drive letter right now in Vista is "I". So i dont know if it makes any difference when i run from USB. REM +==========================================================================+ REM | | REM | This presetup.cmd file was dynamically generated by the DriverPacks | REM | BASE, to work with the DriverPacks without any further editing. | REM | However, if you would like to add some custom functionality, you can | REM | edit this file without any problems. Just take into record that this | REM | file will be erased if you run the DriverPacks BASE on these Windows | REM | installation files again! | REM | | REM | With special thanks to: | REM | -Pyron, a06lp and iLE for their help with this method; | REM | -schalti for the optional 'Keep the Drivers' system and Pyron (again) | REM | for turning it into an executable. | REM | -SuperTibaldoKart for creating un7zip.exe | REM | | REM +==========================================================================+ REM +==========================================================================+ REM | Finding CD/DVD driveletter. | REM |--------------------------------------------------------------------------| SET TAGFILE=\OEM FOR %%i IN (C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y) DO IF EXIST "%%i:%TAGFILE%" SET CDDRIVE=%%i: REM +==========================================================================+ REM | Decompressing the DriverPacks to the harddisk - using un7zip.exe. | REM |--------------------------------------------------------------------------| %CDDRIVE%\OEM\bin\un7zip.exe %CDDRIVE%\OEM\DRIVER.7z %SystemDrive%\ REM +==========================================================================+ REM | Copying/decompressing the files to finish the installation. | REM |--------------------------------------------------------------------------| %CDDRIVE%\OEM\bin\un7zip.exe %CDDRIVE%\OEM\bin\*.7z %SystemDrive%\ COPY /Y %CDDRIVE%\OEM\bin\DPsFnshr.ini %SystemDrive%\ IF EXIST %CDDRIVE%\OEM\*.ins COPY /Y %CDDRIVE%\OEM\*.ins %SystemDrive%\ REM +==========================================================================+ REM | Scanning for driverdirectories. | REM |--------------------------------------------------------------------------| %CDDRIVE%\OEM\bin\DevPath.exe %SystemDrive%\D REM +==========================================================================+ REM | Disable Driver Signing Policy and keep it disabled. | REM |--------------------------------------------------------------------------| START %SystemDrive%\DSPdsblr.exe REM ===========Added by WinSetupFromUSB============ IF EXIST %systemroot%\system32\setupold.exe DEL /F %systemroot%\system32\setupold.exe IF EXIST %CDDRIVE%\$WIN_NT$.~LS\$OEM$\$1\nul xcopy %CDDRIVE%\$WIN_NT$.~LS\$OEM$\$1\*.* %systemdrive%\ /i /k /e /r /y /h IF EXIST %CDDRIVE%\$WIN_NT$.~LS\$OEM$\$$\nul xcopy %CDDRIVE%\$WIN_NT$.~LS\$OEM$\$$\*.* %systemroot%\ /i /k /e /r /y /h type %systemroot%\system32\tempunat.inf >> %systemroot%\system32\$winnt$.inf REM ====================END======================= EXIT