While a bootable floppy disk can be used to help recover a failing hard disk,[4] one major limitation on using a floppy disk that booted a standalone copy of MS-DOS was that "DOS can't handle NTFS hard-drive partitions."
BartPE is a reasonable first choice for Windows users: it's free, and it's #2 in a list of alternatives; #1 is Linux-oriented.[4] While it can be used for running demos, it can also be used "to bring a dead PC back to life."[5]
PE Builder
PE Builder (also known as Bart PE Builder) is the software used to create the BartPE system images.
Description
As with Windows Preinstallation Environment, BartPE operates by loading system registry files into RAM, and not writing any registry changes back to boot media. Thus, neither operating system requires an operational hard drive or network access. This also allows them to be run from non-writable media such as a CD-ROM.[5]
Since each instance of BartPE is a new installation, the BartPE "boot" disk needs original Windows Setup files in order to operate. The Bart PE Builder application interprets and condenses files from a Windows setup CD to create the BartPE installation. It can built from a Windows XP Pro or Home Edition CD, or from a preinstalled Windows XP version (without a CD).[6]
Additional applications can be included in the BartPE setup through the use of "plugins". A plugin contains setup information for a specific application, so that it can be included on the media and installed along with Windows at each BartPE boot. Currently there are a few hundred plugins available in addition to the dozen-odd that are included by default with BartPE. Since BartPE represents a totally independent operating environment, the most obvious application examples involve backup, restoration, diagnosis and error-correction of systems with malfunctioning primary storage drives. Plugin programs can nominally be added to the capacity of the BartPE media.
BartPE is known to have certain incompatibilities with the Windows XP CDs shipped with most Dell PCs. The Dell versions include changes to the Windows setup files that can cause the BartPE build process to fail. Two patches are currently available to correct the known problems, one to replace SETUPREG.HIV and the other to load a standard iastor.sys.[7][8][9]
This article uses material from the Wikipedia article BartPE, and is written by contributors.
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