Question:
I have installed Windows 2000 on my laptop. I would like to create an emergency start disk akin to Windows 98. My current partition is FAT32. I created a floppy as per instructions using the backup utility. When I use the disk to boot I get NTLDR is missing.
I would like to blow away my Win98 install, but am afraid to if I should need to emergeny boot. What should I do to create an emergency disk.
Answer:
As you have discovered, the Win2K ERD disk is much different from the “classic” ERD. In fact, the Win2K ERD only contains 3 files, not of which include the files used to boot NT or registry information. In fact, the new Win2K Recovery Console can eliminate the need for boot floppies.
To recover using the Win2K ERD, you would:
- Inset the appropriate Win2K CD in the drive (Pro, Server, etc.).
- Boot from either the Win2K boot floppies or the CD (if your hardware supports booting from CD).
- At the Welcome To Setup screen, select R to repair.
- At the next screen, select M for Manual repair.
- Note that for the 3 options for repair, only “Verify Windows 2000System Files” uses the data on the ERD disk.
That said, if you are still paranoid (which is understandable, considering the time it takes to reinstall NT and all your apps), it is trivial to create a boot disk?in fact, it works the same as NT 4.0:
- Format a floppy disk.
- Copy NTDETECT.COM and NTLDR to the floppy (non machine-specific).
- Copy Boot.ini to the floppy (machine-specific).
Make sure (in CMOS) that floppy boot is enabled before HD boot, and test the floppy.
