Will XPe boot from removable media (CF) ?

[DJ]

I would like to boot a CF card (removable, sick of setting to fixed
disk) from the secondary IDE.

Question: Is it possable?

With my setup the bios see's the CF but doesn't think it's bootable.
The CF is Fat32 formatted so I don't have to use bootprep.

 

[Slobodan Brcin \(eMVP\)]

The CF is Fat32 formatted so I don't have to use bootprep.

You must format if from DOS on your target computer.
Also for any FAT you must use bootprep :-(

Regards,
Slobodan

 

[DJ]

You must format if from DOS on your target computer.
Also for any FAT you must use bootprep :-(

Regards,
Slobodan

 

[DJ]

Can I use bootprep even if the CF is on the secondary IDE?

 

[Slobodan Brcin \(eMVP\)]

Since bootprep patches PBR I do not see reason why not.

Regards,
Slobodan

 

[DJ]

Just tried it, doesn't like it. Bootprep say's it must be a active
partion. Fdisk say's it can only set partions on drive 1 active.
What a circle of problems.

 

[Slobodan Brcin \(eMVP\)]

Hi DJ,

Fortunately this problem can be easily solved by putting CF temporarily on development machine and setting it active.
It will not change CF geometry already written on disk.

Regards,
Slobodan

 

[Guest]

Hi DJ,
I have an XPe image on 512 MB CF. To prepare CF I do this step:
* Create a bootable MS DOS floppy disk (or you can use Win 98 start up
floppy disk);
* Copy fdisk.exe, format.exe and bootprep.exe on floppy;
* Insert floppy and CF on your pc or development machine;
* Run bios setup and autodetect IDE, save options and exit from bios;
* Boot on A:\, run fdisk, delete all partition in the CF and restart PC;
* Boot on A:\ , run fdisk, create a primary dos partition and restart PC;
* Boot on A:\, format CF partition like "A:\format c:" then copy
bootprep.exe in CF partition, move to it and run bootprep.exe.
* Remove CF and put it in TD machine;
* Run CMD command and execute CONVERT <CF DRIVE>: /fs:ntfs
* Copy your XPE image in CF and enjoy it on device

 

[DJ]

Your procedure works!
Thanks for taking the time. I was really starting to get desperate.