Live Windows Bootable CDs for Sysadmins

WhoDaresWins writes "Ever wonder how to make a Knoppix-like live Windows bootable CD (or DVD)? Well its now possible using Bart's Preinstalled Environment (BartPE) bootable live windows CD/DVD. It's basically an expansion of the Microsoft's own Windows PE (Preinstallation Environment) idea which is a minimal Windows (XP/2K3) based bootable live CD with a command prompt and the ability to run some basic Windows GUI. Bart's PE allows anyone to make a bootable CD using their own Windows XP/2K3 media with Bart's PE Builder. What's more many people have contributed quite a few plugins that allow you to use the BartPE discs as quite a nifty system administration tool and with some work an almost usable quick system."

Comments

Re:fascinating reading...

[Anonymous Coward]

>how are the guys at Redmond going to respond?

Truthfully, I couldn't fucking care less. And XP is my primary OS. (Yeah, boo, hiss, whatever, fanboy.)

I built an XP boot CD 2 years ago, with Office, Visual Studio, Photoshop, Pagemaker, Mozilla and Eudora. I used Norton Ghost and stripped out quite a bit of crap that MS thinks needs to be in XP, and heavily (really heavily) modded the registry (once you change everything such that ALL personal/program info is on a different partition from the OS, 90% of the shit in the registry is unneeded). Persistence and continuity are provided by keychain USB.

I've made 2 other versions of this disk, one for gaming, one for 3D modelling.

I own every piece of software on those CDs, and they can go fuck themselves if they think there's anything wrong with that. (Of course, unlike Bart I didn't tempt them by publicly releasing my stuff). Refactoring the OS and the software let me fit everything I need on one disk, which is with me always, so I am never without the tools I need to do what I want to do.

And if by chance this country does get more fascist and somehow MS sues me: great. I haven't had a job since Bush fucked the economy, and I hear they get cable and free dental in prison. Bring it on. Until then, fuck the bozos.

Re:You don't work on computers much, do you?

[t0ny]

Yes, Ive been supporting Windows since Win95. If you cant get Windows to run stable, the problem lies between the chair and the keyboard.

I've seen it happen, Ive done it myself: Windows CAN run without crashing!!! If you work in IT, than you should probably quit and go sell shoes; you arent cut out for this job.