ARCHIVED: In MS-DOS or PC-DOS, how do I make a bootable diskette?
Note: The software discussed here is no longer in common use at IU, and UITS may no longer be able to verify this text's accuracy; additionally, the UITS Support Center may no longer have the materials needed to adequately support this software.
Note: While this method will work with Windows 95, you should use in the . For more information, see the Knowledge Base document ARCHIVED: In Windows 95, 98, or Me, how do I make a startup (system recovery) disk?
If you run Windows 3.1, exit Windows. If you run Windows 95, go to an MS-DOS prompt.
To create a bootable diskette, insert a disk in the floppy drive, and,
at the C:\>
prompt, enter:
format a: /s
Replace a:
with b:
if your floppy drive is the
B:
drive.
To use a floppy disk that is already formatted and contains data, at
the C:\>
prompt, enter:
sys a:
Replace a:
with b:
if your floppy drive is the
B:
drive.
This will not erase any data on the floppy disk. The sys
command
creates a bootable floppy disk by copying the msdos.sys
,
io.sys
, and command.com
files to the floppy
disk.
To create a diskette you can use to boot the computer in case of an
emergency, copy the following files onto the floppy from
c:\dos
(or c:\windows\command
in the case of
Windows 95):
format.exe sys.com fdisk.exe himem.sys emm386.exe edit.com (MS-DOS 6.x) or edit.exe (Windows 95) bootdisk.com
If you have a version of DOS earlier than 6.0, you should also obtain a small text editor and put it on the diskette. Several such editors are available from:
http://www.winsite.com/
On this emergency diskette, create files called
autoexec.bat
and config.sys
with the
following contents:
- autoexec.bat:
echo off prompt $p$g
- config.sys:
device=himem.sys device=emm386.exe /noems dos=high
You should make the emergency disk on the same computer it may be used on. This will avoid any problems caused by booting the computer with a version of DOS different from the version on the hard drive. In addition, you should scan for viruses before creating the diskette.
This is document adav in the Knowledge Base.
Last modified on 2018-01-18 10:40:36.