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Acronis Startup Recovery Manager on a bootable partition.

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I'd like to install the Startup Recovery Manager on a bootable partition, accessible at boot.
Anyone have a good idea how to do this?

W7 Ultimate, so VHD is an option. Crazy ideas most welcome.

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Mercurio:

My favorite method -- install Grub4Dos to the MBR of your disk. Put its files (grldr and menu.lst) in the Win 7 boot partition. Then copy any of your favorite ISO boot images to the W7 boot partition; for example the ISO images of True Image, Disk Director, VistaPE, PartedMagic, etc. Boot the ISOs directly with Grub4Dos. For convenience I made my W7 boot partition 1 GB. See forum member MudCrab's web site for information about booting from Grub4Dos.

Since the W7 boot partition is normally hidden you will need a way to access it when setting this up. Any boot CD that can access an NTFS partition will work, including the W7 DVD.

Here is a sample menu file from my disk:

# Lenovo X61 Tablet PC
# October 3, 2009  MJW

splashimage /grub/gentleblue.gz
timeout    5
default    0

title Windows 7
root (hd0,0)
chainloader /bootmgr

title    VistaPE
map    (hd0,0)/images/VistaPE.iso (hd32)
map    --hook
chainloader (hd32)

title Linux
root (hd0,4)
configfile /boot/grub/menu.lst

title    Acronis TI and DD 10
map    (hd0,0)/images/ati.iso (hd32)
map    --hook
chainloader (hd32)

title    DD 10 Full
map    (hd0,0)/images/dd10.2160.iso (hd32)
map    --hook
chainloader (hd32)

title PartedMagic
map --mem (hd0,0)/images/pmagic-4.3.iso (hd32)
map --hook
chainloader (hd32)

title    MemTest86+
root    (hd0,0)
kernel    /grub/mt86plus.bin

title    CommandLine
commandline

title    Reboot
reboot

title    Shut Down
halt

If you have another physical drive in the computer, you can setup a Grub4DOS partition on it. That's the way mine is setup. The Windows drive boots normally. If I want to boot to my Grub4DOS menu to boot into any of my ISO files or WinPE files, I use the BIOS boot menu to select the other drive. It's quick, easy and doesn't require changing anything on the Windows drive.

Hey MudCrab... :)

Quick question. I already managed to get a bootable USB stick with Acronis on it, along with several other handy tools:

- Ultimate BootCD
- MemTest86+
- Ubuntu 10.10

However I am having a problem adding both versions of the Windows 7 Recovery Disc's. I need both x64 (64-bit) and x86 (32-bit) versions on my USB stick. However I cannot manage to get them working for some reason. Everything else boots up fine.

Can you provide me some help with this? I run W7 x64, however updating my OCZ SSD requires me to boot the x86 version of the Windows 7 Recovery Disc, their updater doesn't work in x64. :S
And to put images back I need the 64-bit version, since my W7 is x64.

I really hope you can understand what I am trying to say here... I already tried using your tutorial (Grub4dos), but cannot get this to work. But you, with your elite skills, can probably help. :)

Hope to hear back from you soon. Thanks in advance!

//update

Uhmz... Seems I lied; Memtest86+ and other programs on my USB Bootstick don't work properly. When I select a program, for example, Memtest86+ it starts up and the cursor keeps blinking and nothing else happens. Same goes for Ultimate Boot CD. When I select this, I get the menu of UBCD, but after selecting a program I get a blinking cursor. :(
For acronis.iso and ubuntu.iso I get a Error 15; File Not Found. Sigh...