Windows Emergency Restore Disk - Part I

[DBlack]

How to Create an Automated Emergency Restore Disk.


Part I – Gathering Software.
Ok, let’s get started.

1.Get Software

It will be assumed that you already know how to install applications, so this tutorial will not cover that. Ok, first thing we have to do is gather all of the software in order to make this happen. Here is what we need:
UltraISO
You can download this off the net from a torrent site or you can buy it for 29 bucks. UltraISO is a must have for anyone that needs to manipulate CD contents before burning. This software needs to be installed.

WinPE
Stands for Windows Pre-Execution Environment. I’m not going to get into too much technical detail because I want to make this lengthy tutorial as easy to follow as possible. If you’ve ever installed Windows 9x, XP or server, you will have noticed the plain looking blue screen that loads during install. This is a mini 32bit environment that windows uses to use a reduced subset of hardware and applications for the purpose of running a utility or mini apps such as a setup routine, antivirus or media restore routine. In other words, it makes it easier for us to get a non-windows system up and running.

32Bit Ghost executable.
You need one file ghost32.exe. For this tutorial, I’m using the 8.3 version. As long as it’s 8.3 or later, you can find this on the torrent sites, search Google “Ghost32.exe download” or you can buy a copy of Ghost and grab the file off the installed instance. We will use this one file in our customized WinPE environment to run Ghost.

DVD/CD Writer
Once we have prepared the disk image, we will burn it to a DVD or CD writer. The media we choose will depend on the size of the created image. Make sure you have some extra blanks in case we have errors with the burned copy.

You will also need DVD/CD writer software capable of burining iso images. Most popular writer software is capable of this. UltraISO has the ability to do this, but for this tutorial, we are going to use Nero, an extremely popular and intuitive application. You will need to install this software.

[afrocentric]

don't mean to be off topic.....but, u mentioned nero. i have nero. i installed it the other day because i wanted to download some music. but i might have made a mistake because now i have a pop up that says "low space". what does that mean. i am computer ILLiterate.

[DBlack]

That you have insufficient hard disk space available.