Boot Live CD using windows boot loader

vivinuthappa · 06-12-2005, 11:29 PM

Hi everybody :-D,

Here is an experiment I am trying...

I am running SimplyMEPIS 3.3 Live CD on my PC. Usually when anybody says boot from CD. The first thing that comes to mind is to press F2 key at start up to tell the computer to boot from the CD ROM. One can also change the boot order in the system BIOS.

Now I have also Windows XP installed on my system. The BIOS that I have for my PC does not provide the F2 key option at startup. So to boot from the CD, i have to always change the boot order in the BIOS.

Now, there is boot.ini file (hidden) in the Windows XP partition (C:\ drive). What I am searching for is a method to have an option to boot from the CD drive (Live CD) in the windows boot loader menu.

I have tried the following technique already, but it did not work (shows blank screen):

1. Run "dd if=/dev/hdb of=/bootsect.lnx bs=512 count=1" (/dev/hdb is the CD rom).
2. Copy bootsect.lnx to C:\bootsect.lnx.
3. Edit c:\boot.ini and append the following line: c:\bootsect.lnx="Linux".

The boot menu did show me the "Linux" option. But On selecting it the screen went blank with the cursor blinking in the upper left screen :-(.

Does anybody have any more ideas???

How abt creating a boot floppy first and then running the dd command on that to create bootsect.lnx ???

Thanks in advance 4 help,

MikeZila · 06-13-2005, 12:27 AM

Just leave the CDROM as the first thing to boot from. It doesn't have to have a bootable disk in it, if it fails to boot from disk it'll just move on.

Why can't you just leave it as such? Are there special considerations?

vivinuthappa · 06-13-2005, 03:27 AM

Hi,

First of all, thanks for responding ;-)

Secondly, this is just meant to be an experiment. I am not in any kind of trouble (yet).

MikeZila wrote:
"Just leave the CDROM as the first thing to boot from. It doesn't have to have a bootable disk in it, if it fails to boot from disk it'll just move on."

Yeah, I do know that would work. The thing here is that i have 2 optical drives with me. I intend to leave the MEPIS live cd in one of them all the time. That way i would have a free optical drive to work with.

Any more ideas ???

MikeZila · 06-13-2005, 05:03 AM

Nah. As far as I can tell by trying to work on it, the NT bootloader is a total joke. I haven't ever had it boot anything except the OS it came with. If all you're doing is experimenting, I don't know if there's any way to get it to work.

Sorry to put a snapper in the works, but I don't think you'll have any luck getting Microsoft's bootloader to boot Linux instead of Windows.

gd2shoe · 06-13-2005, 03:53 PM

FYI, the boot sector is NOT at the beginning of the disk when you are talking about CDs. CDs were not originally designed to be bootable, therefore the designers did not set aside this space for a boot sector. A group later developed the "el torito" boot standard which has been implemented in most bios motherboards since. The boot sector could lie about anywhere else on the disk. I don't know if this is the "boot catalog" mentioned in isoinfo or just related to it.

If anyone does know how to boot a generic ISO from boot.ini or from grub/lilo I would be interested in knowing.

counsel · 06-13-2005, 04:48 PM

Lo:

there are a number of boot os options out there...

http://www.frozentech.com/?p=5

just as an example...

C

gd2shoe · 06-19-2005, 10:02 PM

A good list but... it doesn't address the problem.

The problem here is that CD's don't behave the same as hard or floppy disks when it comes to booting. There is a totally separate standard to follow when booting a CD. All the normal rules get thrown out the window. Bios providers know this and take it into account.

The question is, is there a boot loader which will boot a CD? Is there one which supports the El Torito boot standard? I'm not knocking your list, but the page doesn't address the question at all. Moreover, I can' t find anything on these boot loaders to suggest that it can be done (I haven't done extensive research, though).

chscag · 06-20-2005, 09:15 PM

Here's a boot manager that will do what you're asking:

Bootit Next Generation

Download from www.terabyteunlimited.com

It's shareware, fully functional for 30 days and fits on a single floppy disk. Can be run from the floppy disk or installed to the HDD. I currently use it to dual boot MEPIS and WinXP Pro on separate hard drives. It can boot a live CD or any bootable CD, floppy disk, etc. I use this program rather than the WinXP boot manager. Grub must be installed to the Root rather than the MBR for it to work. There are also several free bootloader programs that can be used if you do not wish to purchase Bootit Next Generation.