Inexperienced PC users are usually interested in something when a computer problem occurs. If you need to reinstall the system, or if there are some problems with the hard disk, you need to look for a solution. Today we will learn how to use Bootice, what this tool is for and whether it is difficult to work with it.

Purpose of the Bootice utility

It should be noted right away that Bootice is nothing more than a program that helps to make a bootable one from a regular flash drive. Immediately it must be said for what it is needed. Nowadays, many people use laptops or computers without a disk drive. The discs are slowly leaving in the past. Their use is not always convenient, and besides, if you write something to a disc, then it is not always possible to delete this information or burn the disc again.

The era of software for these media is also passing away. Nowadays, many people install even operating systems from flash drives. To do this, they just need to convert the drive into a bootable one. Therefore, many people are trying to figure out how to use Bootice.

What is a bootable flash drive and what is it for?

So, a bootable flash drive is the drive that is prepared with the help of a special program for loading the operating system. Of course, you can use other external storage devices for these purposes, but a flash drive is a more convenient option.

In addition to the fact that this way you can install a new version of the system for yourself, you, thanks to such a flash drive, can also try it out. Let's assume that you have been using the "seven" for a long time and finally decided to change it to "ten". In order not to demolish the entire system at once, you can, thanks to a drive with a bootable OS, test it.

By the way, there are also multiboot flash drives. You can record several programs on them at once using Bootice.exe. How to use this program, we will consider further.

Where to start?

So, if you find an unattended flash drive in your box that has been lying for a long time and is not needed by anyone, you can try to make a bootable one from it. Perhaps you will never even need it. But you never know what can happen to a PC. The system often brings us unpleasant surprises. Perhaps even a friend of yours needs to reinstall the operating system on a device that does not have a floppy drive.

In general, it's worth saying right away that there are a lot of ways for this, by the way, as well as programs. You can do this with complex codes and commands. You can use various graphical utilities and packages for file systems. Any of all options will help you create a properly working drive. But if you do not want to spend a lot of time on registering additional commands, it is better to use the Bootice program.

Program

The example of creating a bootable USB flash drive using Bootice is the best way to show how this tool works. Moreover, it is the fastest and most reliable option for such a task.

In order to start working with it, you need to install the software. This is not difficult to do. There are many sites from which you can safely download the program. There are also additional utilities that have a conditionally built-in Bootice.

If you do not have a floppy drive, but need to install an operating system on a laptop or netbook, download this program and start working with it.

Start

In order for a flash drive to be rightfully called a bootable one, it is necessary to create an MBR master boot record and a PBR boot code on it. The content of these recordings will depend on the destination. That is, from what needs to be started.

We open our program. It is not immediately clear how to use Bootice. By the way, more often than not you will get to the English version of it. But you don’t need to move around the utility menu, just step by step follow all the steps described below.

When the window opens, you will see the Physical Disk tab. In the line below it is necessary from the drop-down list to select the flash drive that you are going to make bootable. Usually several options are presented there. Among these disks can be system ones, so carefully look at the letter in parentheses and compare it with the one indicated in "My Computer".

Below you will need to select the MBR to make the Master Boot Record. This is where you will find the basic information you need to load the operating system. Several MBR types will be offered in the new window. If you do not know how to use Bootice 1.0.4, be especially careful, as you may be wrong here. But usually the second item is chosen, under which GRUB4DOS is located. This type of recording creates a powerful universal downloader.

After you have selected the second item, go to the very bottom of the window and click on "Install / Config". The window will appear again. In general, nothing can be corrected here. Or give a name to the bootloader file. Further we save all changes by clicking on the “Save. to disk "(Save to disk). Everything, the Windows system took its place on the flash drive.

Linux

If you don't know how to use Bootice 1.3.2 when installing a Linux system, no problem. The algorithm of actions is similar. You just need to download the version specifically for this OS. Further from the list you should select not GRUB4DOS, but SYSLINUX. After that we press "Install / Config" again.

Now a new window will open, in which you do not need to click anything. At the bottom, you just need to put a dot opposite version 5.01. Everything, the process is completed, as well as work with the program.

Another variant

Of course, this is not the only way to create a bootable drive. For example, you can download WinSetupFromUSB utility... After you launch it, it will automatically detect all available flash drives. To make one of them bootable, the program provides two ways. And here is one of them, with the already familiar name Bootice, should help us with this.

Next, a window will appear, already familiar to us. In it, some users advise to choose not MBR, but Perform Format. Then, in the additional window, select the third item USB-HDD Mode (Single Partition). Then you have to choose a file system. Most often they use NTFS, because it reads information faster. Further, it remains only to agree with all warnings that the drive will be cleaned, you will lose information on it, etc. After this, the flash drive will become bootable.

conclusions

If you still don't know how to use Bootice, then this article will help you. Of course, there are several options for installing and creating a bootable flash drive. Moreover, the difference is even in the utility itself. It all depends on the purpose of the user and what exactly he is going to load on it.

Allows you to modify, back up and restore virus-damaged Master Boot Record (MBR) and Boot Record partition for local drives or USB flash drives. Also BOOTICE will help in markup and USB formatting hard disks and flash cards, if they were previously formatted with a file system that Windows operating system does not recognize, which usually leads to the fact that the disk becomes invisible in the system or not all partitions are visible. BOOTICE supports boot records Grub4Dos, SysLinux, Plop, Windows NT5 / 6 and others.

• download from mirror

Physical Disk

After starting BOOTICE, select the destination disk (Distination Disk) - the physical disk with which we will work. It can be an HDD or a USB flash drive. The following functions are available for each physical disk:

Refresh(Refresh) - Refresh, that is, read all data again

MBR processing(Process MBR) - Working with MBR (Master Boot Record)

MBR is the main boot record... The MBR boot code is the first program to run on any PC after BIOS. Task standard code MBR determine the active primary partition of this disk and transfer control to the PBR of the active partition. MBR code is universal and does not depend on the type file system and with some stretch we can say that it does not even depend on the type of OS. After selecting MBR processing, you can see the current type of MBR boot code (that is, the MBR code that exists now) on the selected physical disk in the Current MBR Type field.

The following functions are available for working with MBR:

• Installation / Configuration(Install / Config) - Install / Configure MBR

Here you can install the desired MBR boot code to disk. The partition table is not affected by this. In BOOTICE v0.9.2011.0512 it is possible to install the boot code MBR WEE, GRUB4DOS, Ultra USB-HDD +, Ultra USB-ZIP +, Plop Boot Manager, Windows NT 5.x (in BootIt the analogous command Std_MBR in MBR View, in WinXP fixmbr in Recovery Console), Windows NT 6.x (in BootIt there is a similar Win7_MBR command in MBR View, in Win7 bootrec / fixmbr in the Recovery Console). What versions of MBR WEE, GRUB4DOS and Plop your version of BOOTICE works with is written next to each relevant item.

I should note that there are a great many types of MBR boot codes for different services (for example, for encryption / decryption of a disk, rubble, specialized for backup / recovery, OEM manufacturers, etc.). BUT. 98% of PCs have standard boot code from XP / 2003 or Vista / 7/2008. And Windows ALWAYS overwrites the MBR boot code during its installation.

• Save MBR(Backup MBR) - Archiving MBR as a .bin file (optionally from 1 to 255 sectors).

Standard MBR Windows occupies one sector - 512 bytes. This includes both the MBR boot code and the main partition table. Therefore, a backup of one disk is inapplicable for another disk - they have different partition tables. A custom MBR can be up to 63 sectors.

• Repair MBR(Restore MBR) - Restore MBR from .bin file

PBR processing(Process PBR) - Working with PBR (Partition Boot Record)

PBR (Partition Boot Record) in direct translation from English means partition boot record. In the English-language literature, there is also a similar concept of VBR (Volume Boot Recoed). PBR / VBR in Russian literature is usually called the boot sector. Although this is not entirely correct. Since PBR usually occupies more than one sector. Therefore, in what follows, I will use the term PBR boot code. The PBR boot code gets control after the MBR boot code and is different for different filesystems. The task of the PBR code is to transfer control to the OS loader. Therefore, it is "tied" to the bootloader (although this can be easily changed - shown below). That is, different loaders need different PBRs.

After selecting PBR processing, you must select the desired Distination Partition. And the current type of the PBR boot code will become visible (that is, the PBR code that currently exists for the selected partition) in the Current PBR Type field.

The following functions are available for working with PBR:

• Installation / configuration
• save PBR
• PBR recovery

BOOTICE can install the PBR MS-DOS, GRUB4DOS, NTLDR boot code on any partition (there is an incomplete analogue in WinXP - the fixboot command in the recovery console), BOOTMGR (an incomplete analogue is in Win7 - the bootrec / fixboot command in the recovery console), SYSLINUX. Which PBR versions of GRUB4DOS and SYSLINUX your version of BOOTICE works with is written next to each relevant item.

Partition management(Parts Manage) - Working with disk partitions

Operations available:

• Save Partition Table - backs up the disk partition table to a .dpt file
• Restore Partition Table - restores the disk partition table from a .dpt file
• Hide - hide the partition at the MBR level
• Show (Unhide) - open a partition at the MBR level
• Change ID - allows you to change the identifier of the partition type (file system type of the partition)
• Assign Drive Letter - assign a letter to the partition in the current Windows OS
• Remove Drive Letter - remove a drive letter in the current Windows OS
• Activate - make this section active
• Format this part - format the section
• Re-partition partitions (Reformat USB disk) - reformat USB disk (for flash drives)

You can also notice that here you can see the name of the disk model, the volume and its geometry - the total number of LBA sectors, C / H / S and the sector size. For each partition, you can see the type of the file system, the number of the starting (initial) LBA sector and their number in each partition. Hiding and opening partitions, assigning an activity label to a partition, and changing the partition type identifier are similar to those in BootIt. And BOOTICE allows you to do these operations directly from Windows (sometimes useful, for example, to open hidden section no need to overload into the bottle).

Editing Sectors(View Sector) - View disk sectors

When you left-click on any section in Partition Management, the Edit Sector window will open starting from the sector at the beginning of the section (with PBR).

Disk Image

You must select Image file - image HDD disk in .IMA, .IMG, .VHD, .VHDX or .VMDK format. As well as in Physical disk you can view / change MBR, PBR and view sectors of the disk image (Sector Edit).

BCD Edit

BCD editor Windows Vista / 7/2008. A similar editor with less functionality is available in the BootIt boot.

Utilities

Filling disk sectors(Disk Filling).

Filling disk sectors allows you to fill any partition or an entire disk with 00h, FFh or any arbitrary byte. It is convenient to use when resetting the partition table of a flash drive or HDD.

Menu editor(Start Menu Editor) for GRUB4DOS

The menu editor for GRUB4DOS allows you to edit the internal menus of the GRLDR file (the GRUB4DOS boot loader).

BOOTICE - multifunctional tool for working with hard media, a free manager-editor of boot records and files for flash drives and hard drives... BOOTICE is a portable utility that works without installation (installation) in an environment already loaded and running operating system(OS). The program is used to "partition" and prepare disk space for the installation of one or more operating systems.

License (status): Is free
Operating system (OS): AII Windows (All Windows)
Interface: Russian English
Developer: iPauly
Developer site: http://www.ipauly.com/
Program categories: boot managers

Download BOOTICE:
Russian, from our server: (Downloads: 5813)
English, softportal.com: BOOTICE

BOOTICE can create, edit and view boot files and records located on hard drives. Additionally - format, "cut" and combine the main and logical sections of flash drives and hard drives. The interface of the program is English, but finding Russian versions is not a problem. On the screenshots offered for viewing - this is the Russian version that is depicted.

0. BOOTICE (boot manager). About the program. BOOTICE developer warns - to prevent data loss, please be careful when using BOOTICE!

1. Main menu boot manager BOOTICE

2. Menu for managing disk partitions in the boot manager BOOTICE

3. BOOTICE. Master Boot Record management interface - MBR.

4. BOOTICE. PRB boot record management interface.

5. Viewing boot records of partitions of a storage medium (hard disk or flash drive)

6. View boot records for partitions

7. View boot records for partitions

8. View boot records for partitions

9. Editing the boot configuration file BCD (Boot Configuration Data)

10. Editing the bootable BCD configuration file

11. Editing the bootable BCD configuration file

12. Editing the bootable BCD configuration file

13. Editing the bootable BCD configuration file

14. Editing the bootable BCD configuration file

15. Normal Windows Explorer does not display configuration boot files

16. Almighty FAR ( Far Manager) also writes that the system partition with the boot configuration files is empty.

Basically, the bottom two pictures do not refer to the BOOTICE boot manager. The pictures were taken for the sole purpose of showing that the usual means of file viewing - the boot areas of the hard disk or flash drive are not available. Neither Windows Explorer nor Total Commander nor Far Manager- do not get close to the system files of the boot configuration (BCD) and the boot records of the hard drive (MBR and PBR). All standard custom file managers, unanimously assert that the Boot directory is empty and the bcd file is missing. The operating system knows how to keep its secrets from prying eyes.

• backup copy, restoration and editing of OS boot area records - MBR (Master Boot Record) or PBR (Partition Boot Record)
• formatting and "splitting" a hard disk or flash drive into partitions (only the first one will be available in Windows)
• changing the type of boot record - MBR and PBR. Supported Boot Record Type: Grub4DOS, SysLinux, PLoP Boot Manager, MS NT52 / 60 ...
• renaming the OS bootloader (Grub4DOS boot file from “grldr” to “ggldr”, bootloader “NTLDR” to “SMLDR”)
• installing Grub4DOS (MBR or PBR), NTLDR or BOOTMGR for PBR, SYSLINUX on PBR, MS-DOS record of bootable PBR, etc.

Attention, BOOTICE!

The use of BOOTICE assumes that the user has basic computer concepts and an awareness of the importance of the operations being performed. Danger of losing information on the subject disk space- very large. It's not for nothing that operating systems carefully hide the boot areas. Free use of them is fraught with the loss of access to absolutely the entire file!

BOOTICE opens the entrance to the user in the "restricted area", however - all possible consequences fall on the user who manipulates with hard disk computer.

Working with the bootable areas of storage media requires increased attention and accuracy from the user, and is fraught with unpleasant consequences - after the visit of the "elephant to the crockery store" - the computer stops working. The boot record is corrupted or missing. The operating system won't boot, what should I do? Google gives only two answers to this question.

1. Reinstalling the operating system
with full! By "demolishing" the partitioning of the hard disk. It is a very sad procedure. Loss of access to information on the hard disk - 100%. With such a reinstallation, a high-level formatting of the hard disk is performed. A new MBR boot record is created and a new file structure consisting entirely of empty ones! sections. In one of them, the OS (operating system) is installed. The old MBR is completely deleted, the boot area of ​​a flash drive or hard drive is overwritten. Naturally, access paths to all former files, sections and directories are erased. As a result of such actions, the user receives a pristine HDD with a completely new operating system. 2. Boot data recovery BOOTICE works with the boot data of the operating system. If damaged or wrong setting, the operating system stops loading. The problem can be easily fixed by simply editing the MBR, PBR, or BCD (whichever is damaged).
see Restoring Boot Configuration Data File - BCD
About the use of special technologies to recover information: "Recovering partitions from damaged hard drives", "How to restore Master Boot Record", "How to fix MBR". If the lost information is really valuable, it is better to contact data recovery specialists. With regards to USB flash drives (slang. Flash drives, flash drives, flash drives), it is easier to format them directly to high level and do not fool your head with information recovery.

Creation bootable flash drive- safe procedure,
does not threaten the performance of the computer

Working with BOOTICE, for the wide user masses, basically comes down to creating bootable USB sticks. Such flash drives are in great demand among laptop and netbook owners that only support USB booting. For desktop (desktop) computers, a bootable USB flash drive acts as an alternative to a CD / DVD drive when installing an operating system. Provided, of course, that the BIOS sees the USB port.

Any PC user can make a bootable USB flash drive ( personal computer). It is enough to put the USB flash drive into the computer, start BOOTICE and follow the simple instructions for creating bootable flash drives using BOOTICE.

". This article describes the second way to create grub4dos flash drives, using the program Bootice.

Download BOOTICE can . Link to download page.
And actually the link to the archive itself with the BOOTICE_1.13.rar program.

The contents of the archive BOOTICE_1.04.rar.

Let's move on to the process of processing the BOOTICE flash drive.

The flash drive section must be primary and active. We read about how to make it like this. Or we prepare a USB flash drive as described in the article "Bootable USB-HDD flash drive".

We unpack the archive with the program. We insert the USB flash drive. Launch BOOTICE.exe .
In the window that appears, on the tab Physical Disk , in field Destination Disk select our flash drive and click on the button Process MBR .

A window will appear with a list of boot loaders available for writing MBR, for writing to disk. Naturally, we set the switch to option GRUB4DOS 0.4.5c / 0.4.6a (grldr.mbr) , and click on the button Install / Config .

The GRUB4DOS bootloader configuration window will open.
In chapter Options remove the check marks from all the items, and enter the value 255 in text boxes Preferred boot drive and Preferred partition ... In chapter GRUB4DOS version, the value of the text box File Name (5 max) should be GRLDR and the version 0.4.6a.
Click on the button Save to disk .

In response, we receive a message stating that everything was successfully configured and recorded.

Click on the button OK and close the window Master Boot Record ... This will return us to the main program window. In the main window of the program on the tab Physical Disk , now we press the button Process PBR .

The window for recording the bootable area of ​​the partition will open. In the section Destination Partition we select the main active section of the flash drive, this is provided that the flash drive contains several sections, otherwise we leave everything as it is. In the section Available PBR Types set the switch to position GRUB4DOS 0.4.5c / 0.4.6a (FAT / FAT32 / NTFS / ExFAT) and click on the button Install / Config .

it simple program in Russian for preparation USB stick and create a bootable USB drive from it. Allows you to edit MBR and PBR.

Features of the program

• creation backups local and USB drives;
• creating backups and restoring the MBR boot record and the Boot Record partition;
• complete deletion of all data from hard disk without the possibility of recovery;
• works with boot entries such as SysLinux, Windows, Grub4Dos;
• step-by-step configuration of a future bootable USB flash drive.

Basic tools

• Process MBR - work with MBR (Master Boot Record);
• Parts Manage - work with disk partitions;
• View Sector - viewing disk sectors;
• Install / Config - MBR installation / configuration;
• Backup MBR - archiving MBR as a .bin file;
• Restore MBR - restore MBR from a .bin file;
• Process PBR - work with PBR (Partition Boot Record);
• BCD Edit - Windows BCD editor;
• The Start Menu Editor for GRUB4DOS allows you to edit the internal menu of the GRLDR file (the GRUB4DOS boot loader).

Additional screenshots

How to work with the program: instructions in Russian

Physical Disk
After starting BOOTICE, select Distination Disk - the physical disk with which we will work. It can be an HDD or a USB flash drive.
The following functions are available for each physical disk:
Refresh - Refresh, that is, read all data again
Process MBR - Working with MBR (Master Boot Record)


View Sector - View disk sectors

Process MBR - Working with MBR (Master Boot Record)
MBR is the Master Boot Record. The MBR boot code is the first program to run on any PC after BIOS. The task of the standard MBR code is to determine the active primary partition of this disk and transfer control to the PBR of the active partition. The MBR code is universal and does not depend on the type of file system, and with some stretch we can say that it does not even depend on the type of OS. After selecting Process MBR, you can see the current type of MBR boot code (that is, the MBR code that exists now) on the selected physical disk in the Current MBR Type field. For Process MBR, the Install / Config, Backup MBR and Restore MBR functions are available.

Install / Config - Install / Configure MBR
Here you can install the desired MBR boot code to disk. The partition table is not affected by this. In BOOTICE v0.9.2011.0512 it is possible to install the boot code MBR WEE, GRUB4DOS, Ultra USB-HDD +, Ultra USB-ZIP +, Plop Boot Manager, Windows NT 5.x (in BootIt the analogous command Std_MBR in MBR View, in WinXP fixmbr in Recovery Console), Windows NT 6.x (in BootIt there is a similar Win7_MBR command in MBR View, in Win7 bootrec / fixmbr in the Recovery Console). What versions of MBR WEE, GRUB4DOS and Plop your version of BOOTICE works with is written next to each relevant item.
I should note that there are a great many types of MBR boot codes for different services (for example, for encryption / decryption of a disk, rubble, specialized for backup / recovery, OEM manufacturers, etc.). BUT. 98% of PCs have standard boot code from XP / 2003 or Vista / 7/2008. And Windows ALWAYS overwrites the MBR boot code during its installation.

Backup MBR - Archiving MBR as a .bin file (optionally from 1 to 255 sectors).
The standard Windows MBR occupies one sector - 512 bytes. This includes both the MBR boot code and the main partition table. Therefore, a backup of one disk is inapplicable for another disk - they have different partition tables. A custom MBR can be up to 63 sectors.

Restore MBR - Restore MBR from a .bin file

Process PBR - Working with PBR (Partition Boot Record)
PBR (Partition Boot Record) in direct translation from English means partition boot record. In the English-language literature, there is also a similar concept of VBR (Volume Boot Recoed). PBR / VBR in Russian literature is usually called the boot sector. Although this is not entirely correct. Since PBR usually occupies more than one sector. Therefore, in what follows, I will use the term PBR boot code. The PBR boot code gets control after the MBR boot code and is different for different filesystems. The task of the PBR code is to transfer control to the OS loader. Therefore, it is "tied" to the bootloader (although this can be easily changed - shown below). That is, different loaders need different PBRs.
After selecting Process PBR, you must select the desired Distination Partition. And the current type of the PBR boot code will become visible (that is, the PBR code that currently exists for the selected section) in the Current PBR Type field
Install / Config, Backup PBR and Restore PBR are available for Process PBR.
BOOTICE can install the PBR MS-DOS, GRUB4DOS, NTLDR boot code on any partition (there is an incomplete analogue in WinXP - the fixboot command in the recovery console), BOOTMGR (an incomplete analogue is in Win7 - the bootrec / fixboot command in the recovery console), SYSLINUX. Which PBR versions of GRUB4DOS and SYSLINUX your version of BOOTICE works with is written next to each relevant item.

Parts Manage - Working with disk partitions
Operations available:
Backup Partition Table - Backing up a disk partition table to a .dpt file
Restore Partition Table - Restore a disk partition table from a .dpt file
Hide - Hide a partition at the MBR level
Unhide - Open a partition at the MBR level
Change ID - Allows you to change the identifier of the partition type (file system type of the partition)
Assign Drive Letter - Assign a letter to the partition in the current Windows OS
Remove Drive Letter - Remove drive letter in current Windows OS
Activate - Make this section active
Format this part - Format the section
Reformat USB disk - Reformat USB disk (for flash drives)

You can also notice that in Parts Manage you can see the name of the disk model, the volume and its geometry - the total number of LBA sectors, C / H / S and the sector size. For each partition, you can see the type of the file system, the number of the starting (initial) LBA sector and their number in each partition. Hiding and opening partitions, assigning an activity label to a partition, and changing the partition type identifier are similar to those in BootIt. And BOOTICE allows you to do these operations directly from Windows (sometimes it's useful, for example - to open a hidden partition, you don't need to reload into the boot).

Sector Edit - View disk sectors
By left-clicking 2 times on any section in Parts Manage, the Sector View window will open starting from the sector at the beginning of the section (with PBR).

Disk Image
Select Image file - image of the HDD in .IMA, .IMG, .VHD, .VHDX or .VMDK format. As well as in Physical Disk, you can view / change MBR, PBR and view sectors of the Sector Edit disk image.

BCD Edit
BCD editor Windows Vista / 7/2008. A similar editor with less functionality is available in the BootIt boot.

Start Menu Editor utilities for GRUB4DOS and Disk Filling.

Disk Filling allows you to fill any partition or an entire disk with 00h, FFh or any arbitrary byte. It is convenient to use when resetting the partition table of a flash drive or HDD.
The Start Menu Editor for GRUB4DOS allows you to edit the internal menu of the GRLDR file (the GRUB4DOS boot loader).

Video on working with the program: