Creating Win 2000 Boot Disk

[Howard Kaikow]

I followed a source that stated that I could format a floppy and include the
following files on the floppy to make a Win 2000 boot disk:

boot.ini
bootsect.dos
ntbootdd.sys
ntdetect.com
ntldr

Well, I did that and when I tried to boot, I got a message that the floppy
was not a system disk.

I then found MSFT KB article 301680 which stated that the floppy should be
formatted "using the Windows NT format utility" and cited the example of
using format a: at the command prompt.

When I did that, and copied the files to the floppy, I was then able to boot
using the floppy.

Is there a difference between the format achieved using the format command
and that achieved by, say, right-clicking on the floppy in My Computer and
choosing Format?

Seems like there is a difference.

What's the correct way to create a Win 2000 boot floppy?

 

[Dan Seur]

Only an NT/W2k/XP floppy format will create the necessary boot sector
structure allowing that floppy, with the necessary files on it, to boot
an NT-class system. A DOS or other OS floppy format will fail to boot an
NT-class system regardless of the files on the floppy.

Any old NT format will do, as far as I know.

 

[Howard Kaikow]

Only an NT/W2k/XP floppy format will create the necessary boot sector
structure allowing that floppy, with the necessary files on it, to boot
an NT-class system. A DOS or other OS floppy format will fail to boot an
NT-class system regardless of the files on the floppy.

Any old NT format will do, as far as I know.

That's what I thought too, but it only worked if I formatted at a command
prompt, not via My Computer.

 

[Roedy Green]

That's what I thought too, but it only worked if I formatted at a command
prompt, not via My Computer.

there is a distinction in DOS between regular format and format /S
which puts a bootable image on the disk. Presumably there is in NT as
well. You don't want the boot image for data disks because it takes
up room.

In DOS there is the SYS command to add the bootable image afterwards.
Perhaps there is something equivalent in NT.

 

[Dan Seur]

There is no such switch in NT.

 

[Tritium]

Roedy Green wrote:

there is a distinction in DOS between regular format and format /S
which puts a bootable image on the disk. Presumably there is in NT as
well. You don't want the boot image for data disks because it takes
up room.

In DOS there is the SYS command to add the bootable image afterwards.
Perhaps there is something equivalent in NT.

The NT/2000/XP boot disk works by a completely different way than a
MS-DOS/Win9X boot disk. There is no /s switch for the NT-class systems.
The reason is that NT cannot start from with command.com, ms-dos.sys and
io.sys alone. The 4 or 5 files comprising the NT-class boot disk contains the
boot-strap loader for the NT OS, all of which is located in the \winnt folder in
the hard drive. For these "loader" files to work, the floppy diskette must first be
formatted by a NT system (see Dan Seur's reply above).

 

[Dave Patrick]

For the floppy to successfully boot Windows NT/2000 the disk must contain
the "NT" boot sector. Format a diskette (on an NT machine, not a DOS/Win9x,
so the NT boot sector gets written to the floppy), then copy ntldr,
ntdetect.com, and boot.ini to it; and possibly ntbootdd.sys. Edit the
boot.ini to give it a correct ARC path for the machine you wish to boot.