Most of the CDs containing operating systems like Windows XP are bootable, which means you can insert them into your machine, restart your computer and the OS will start installing or ask you what to do. This is very convenient and crucial if the system has no other OS installed or it is corrupted and needs to be reinstalled.

For some reason some of the CDs I have used over time are not bootable. They still contain all of the installation files but the PC will not boot off them. This is a simple method to turn a non-bootable WinXP cd into a bootable WinXP cd.

Please note: There are methods for creating an installation disk "from scratch" if your system did not come with one, but this is not the scope of this little tutorial. In this case we assume we already have a Windows XP (may work with other versions) CD.

You will need to get the boot sector files, which you can get from here http://www.nu2.nu/download.php?sFile=wxp10.zip Open the zip and browse to cds\winxppro\files (or cds\winxphome\files), copy w2ksect.bin to C:\ (you can copy to another location but in that case you will need to adjust some parameter).

Copy all the files on your non-bootable CD to one folder, for example C:\winxpinst (if you have more than one cd/dvd drive you don't need to do this, you can copy straight from the second cd drive).

Download and install ImgBurn (http://www.imgburn.com/) which is a free utility to burn files/images to CD. We will now create a script to be imported in ImgBurn, to do so open a text editor (e.g. Notepad) and paste the following

CODE
IBB

[START_BACKUP_OPTIONS]
BuildMode=1
Destination=0
TestMode=0
Verify=1
WriteSpeed=0
Copies=0
FileSystem=1
PreserveFullPathnames=0
RecurseSubdirectories=1
IncludeHiddenFiles=1
IncludeSystemFiles=1
IncludeArchiveFilesOnly=0
AddToWriteQueueWhenDone=0
ClearArchiveAttribute=0
VolumeLabel_ISO9660=VRMHOEM_EN
VolumeLabel_Joliet=
VolumeLabel_UDF=
Identifier_System=
Identifier_VolumeSet=
Identifier_Publisher=
Identifier_Preparer=
Identifier_Application=
Dates_FolderFileType=0
Restrictions_ISO9660_InterchangeLevel=0
Restrictions_ISO9660_AllowMoreThan8DirectoryLevels=1
Restrictions_ISO9660_AllowMoreThan255CharactersInPath=1
Restrictions_ISO9660_AllowFilesWithoutExtensions=1
Restrictions_ISO9660_AllowFullASCIICharacterSet=1
Restrictions_ISO9660_DontAddVersionNumberToFiles=1
Restrictions_Joliet_InterchangeLevel=1
Restrictions_Joliet_AllowFilesWithoutExtensions=1
Restrictions_Joliet_AddVersionNumberToFiles=0
BootableDisc_MakeImageBootable=1
BootableDisc_MediaEmulationType=0
BootableDisc_BootImageFile=C:\w2ksect.bin
BootableDisc_DeveloperIdentifier=
BootableDisc_LoadSegment=07C0
BootableDisc_LoadSectorCount=4
[END_BACKUP_OPTIONS]

[START_BACKUP_LIST]
C:\winxpinst
[END_BACKUP_LIST]


Be sure to change
CODE
BootableDisc_BootImageFile=C:\w2ksect.bin
and
CODE
[START_BACKUP_LIST]
C:\winxpinst


to the locations where you copied the w2ksect.bin file and you stored the Windows installation files (can be the cd drive letter if you are using two cd drives). Then save the file as some-name.ibb (important, make sure windows does not add a txt extension to the file name).

If you have installed ImgBurn you can double-click this file and the program will open with the right configuration. At this point you only have to hit "Burn" or similar command in the program and the bootable cd will be created. The installation files will also be copied to the cd.

 

 

 


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