Create RescueBoot CD
After you have successfully created and completed a successfully test of a RescueBoot hard disk directory, the RescueBoot Wizard will provide you with an option to burn a bootable RescueBoot CDROM disc or create an ISO CDROM or hard disk image file that can be used to create a bootable RescueBoot CDROM using your own third party burning CDROM software. Creating a RescueBoot CD ensures that you will be able to access your valuable data on your hard disk in the event that a Windows boot loader file becomes damaged or infected with a software virus and Windows is prevented from starting from your hard disk.
To create RescueBoot CD or image file, start the RescueBoot software as previously described in "Starting the RescueBoot Wizard" and then select the option "Create a RescueBoot CD or RescueBoot image file." as shown in the image below.
Create RescueBoot CD
Click on the "Next" button after selecting the correct option and then you will be presented with a list of options that allow you to choose to burn a bootable RescueBoot with your computer's CD burner CDROM, create a RescueBoot ISO CDROM image file or create a RescueBoot hard disk image file. If your computer does not have a CD burner installed that is recognized by Windows XP you will on have the options of creating an ISO CDROM image file or hard disk image file.
Select the operation you would like to perform and then click on the "Next" button in the selection dialog to begin the process of creating the RescueBoot CDROM or image file.
Options For Creating A CDROM or Image File
If you selected the option to "Create and burn a bootable RescueBoot CD" you will then be presented with a list of the available CD burners on your computer. Select the CD burner you wish to use and then click on the "Next" button in the burner selection dialog to begin the process of burning a RescueBoot CD.
CD Burner Selection
The wizard will now ask to to insert a blank CDR or CD=RW disc into the burner you selected. After inserting a disc you can click on the "Next" button and wizard will validate the disc that you inserted. If you inserted a CD-RW disc that already has files burned onto it the wizard will ask for your permission to erase the CD-RW disc and then proceed to erase the CD-RW disc. If there are errors detected when erasing a CD-RW disc or if you insert a CDR disc already containing files the wizard report the error and ask you again to insert a disc.
Insert Blank Disc
After the wizard has validated that a usable blank disc is in the burner it will create an image file containing the necessary files from the RescueBoot hard disk directory and then burn the image onto your blank CDR or CD-RW disc.
Creating CD
As the wizard is creating the image file and burning it onto your disc you will notice various individual progress dialogs that are displayed as the wizard copies files into the RescueBoot CD image file, burns the image file onto your blank CD media, closes the session on the CD media and finally reads back all of the information burned to the disc to generate an SHA-1 hash value that is compared with a similar the hash value that was generated when the image file was burned onto the disc.
CD Burning Progress Dialog
After the wizard successfully burns the RescueBoot image file onto your blank CD media and validates the contents of the newly created CD, it present a message telling you that the CD was successfully created and asking you to test the CD by rebooting your computer with the newly created CD inserted into your CD drive.
RescueBoot CD Burning Complete Dialog
If want to burn an additional RescueBoot CDs you can start the RescueBoot software again and selection the option and burn a disc. Burning a additional discs will be faster because the wizard will not need to generate a RescueBoot Cd image file. The wizard will continue to use the existing RescueBoot CD image file until the next time you boot into the RescueBoot hard disk directory. If the wizard detects that you have booted from the RescueBoot hard disk directory at a time later that when the RescueBoot CD image file was created it will delete the existing RescueBoot CD image file and create a new file to ensure that any changes you have made to the RescueBoot hard disk directory will be included in the newly created RescueBoot CD.
Remember to always test your newly created RescueBoot CDs by rebooting your computer with the RescueBoot CD so that you can be sure there were no undetected burning errors that might prevent the disc from working properly at a later time.
If you selected one of the options to create an ISO CDROM image file or hard disk image file RescueBoot will perform the first four steps shown in the "Creating CD" image above then then display a dialog that specifies the name and location of the image file that was created. ISO CDROM image files will always be named "RescueBoot.iso" and the image file will contain a complete RescueBoot ISO CDROM disc image that can be used to burn a bootable RescueBoot CDROM. Hard disk image files will always be named "RescueBoot.bin" and these files will contain a hard disk file that can be used to burn a bootable El Torito bootable CDROM. You will need to follow the instructions that came with your CD burning software to determine how to burn CDROMs using the RescueBoot image files.
The wizard will continue to use the existing RescueBoot image files until the next time you boot into the RescueBoot hard disk directory. If the wizard detects that you have booted from the RescueBoot hard disk directory at a time later that when the RescueBoot image file was created it will delete the existing RescueBoot image file and create a new file to ensure that any changes you have made to the RescueBoot hard disk directory will be included in a newly created image.
Successfully Completed Creating An Image File
If RescueBoot encounters an error writing to your blank disc or verifying a completed CD it will inform you about the error and then allow you to insert another blank disc. It is not uncommon for Windows to sometimes fail to create a usable CD if you are using a low quality blank media. If you encounter this type of error when you are using CD-RW media you can try using the same disc again.
If RescueBoot encounters any unexpected errors it will display a dialog with details about the error and a request for you to gather and send the RescueBoot log-files to Res-Q-ware LLC for investigation. If you see this dialog it means there was an unrecoverable error that prevented RescueBoot from completing the creation of a RescueBoot CD or image file. For additional information on how to report unrecoverable errors when using RescueBoot please refer to the section titled "How do I file a a problem report?" in the section titled "Frequently Asked Questions - FAQ"
Unrecoverable Error Dialog
Copyright 2006 John Alan Hensley. All rights reserved.