how can i boot from mounted drive ?

[Lamgoddog]

Hi is there a way to boot from a mounted drive to install windows ?

[Blazkowicz]

You can't boot from virtual drive as virtual drive will initialize in windows.

[MaLing]

Many people have this question too.

Do not get confused: Virtual drives exist only after Windows starts, ie before Windows is loaded, virtual drives do not exist; so there are no virtual drives available for booting Windows.

[MaLing]

Sorry, I did not pay enough attention to your question, I saw the title 'how can i boot from mounted drive ?', but did not notice the content 'Hi is there a way to boot from a mounted drive to install windows'.

The answer should be corrected: While you cannot boot Windows from a vritual drive, it is possible to install Windows from a virtual drive.

Let us say that you are running Windows 98, you install Daemon Tools in it and create a vritual drive, then you create an image of your Windows ME disc, mount the image, then you can install Windows ME from the vritual drive in Windows 98.

[Jito463]

That won't work either, MaLing. Once the computer reboots to continue setup, it still needs the disc in the drive. Since there's no more mounted image at that point, setup is unable to continue. It would probably work for Vista, as Vista uses an image-based setup. But for WinXP and earlier, it is not possible.

[MaLing]

Oh, see... Thanks Jito.

By the way, what is image-based setup? Does it mean that all the files on the CD are copied to the hard disc drive before setting up?

By the way number two, how to edit posts here?

[Jito463]

By "image-based setup", I mean that the installer drops an image of the installation on the HDD, and then setup is run from that. As for your second question, after a set period of time (I believe it's 30 minutes), you can no longer edit a post.

[MaLing]

Thanks again Jito.

So it means that Vista contains invisible virtual drive(s).

[Shack]

Pendatry...

To be absolutely pendantic... you can install Windows or any other operating system with a virtual drive, provided you are installing it on a virtual machine