BootIt Next Generation
Installation and Getting Started Guide
TeraByte Unlimited
Las Vegas, Nevada, USA
http://www.terabyteunlimited.com
Copyright © 1996-2006, 2008 TeraByte, Inc.
Contents
What You Can Do With BootIt Next Generation (BING)...............................................................................4
Installing BootIt NG .......................................................................................................................................5
Limitations.................................................................................................................................................5
System Requirements ..............................................................................................................................5
Before You Begin......................................................................................................................................5
Step 1: Creating the Boot Disk or ISO Image...........................................................................................7
Step 2: Installing BootIt NG on Your Hard Disk........................................................................................9
Uninstalling BootIt NG.................................................................................................................................12
BootIt NG Overview for First-time Users.....................................................................................................13
Using BootIt NG ..........................................................................................................................................14
The Boot Menu .......................................................................................................................................15
The Floppy Boot Menu ...........................................................................................................................20
Working with Partitions ...........................................................................................................................21
Setting Up Users and Options ................................................................................................................28
Backing Up and Restoring......................................................................................................................31
Working with Image Sets........................................................................................................................32
Setting up Colors and Screen Resolution...............................................................................................32
Creating and Using Sound......................................................................................................................33
Creating Icons and Backgrounds............................................................................................................33
Using the Multi-OS Feature.........................................................................................................................34
Setting Up Multi-OS Groups on Different Operating Systems................................................................34
Setting Up a Multi-OS Partition...............................................................................................................36
Installing Operating Systems ......................................................................................................................37
Obtaining Technical Support.......................................................................................................................38
Ordering and Licensing BootIt NG..............................................................................................................39
Trademarks .................................................................................................................................................40
Definition of Shareware...............................................................................................................................40
Ombudsman Statement ..............................................................................................................................40
TeraByte Unlimited (Trial-Use) License Agreement ...................................................................................41
TeraByte Unlimited (Full-Use) License Agreement ....................................................................................44
BootIt NG Order Form.................................................................................................................................48
BootIt™ Next Generation Installation and Getting Started Guide 2
List of Procedures
Create an MS-DOS startup disk ...................................................................................................................6
Create a Windows 95/98/ME startup disk.....................................................................................................6
Create a Windows XP/Vista startup disk ......................................................................................................6
Prepare for a BootIt NG setup.......................................................................................................................6
Review the two-step installation process......................................................................................................7
Step 1: Create the boot disk using the MakeDisk utility (Windows users)....................................................7
Step 1: Create the boot disk or ISO image (DOS users)..............................................................................8
Step 1: Create the boot disk or ISO image (Linux users) .............................................................................9
Step 2: Boot from the floppy disk or CD/DVD...............................................................................................9
Install BootIt NG for the first time ................................................................................................................10
Upgrade from an earlier version of BootIt NG.............................................................................................10
Choose the partition manually.....................................................................................................................10
Upgrade from an earlier BootIt Product ......................................................................................................11
Complete the installation.............................................................................................................................12
Set the correct partition active using the BootIt NG floppy disk..................................................................12
Set up the Normal Boot Menu.....................................................................................................................16
Add or edit a normal boot menu item..........................................................................................................17
Boot an item using the Direct Boot Menu ...................................................................................................19
Create a partition or volume........................................................................................................................22
Delete a partition or volume ........................................................................................................................22
Undelete a partition or volume ....................................................................................................................22
Format a partition or volume .......................................................................................................................23
Resize a partition or volume........................................................................................................................23
Copy a partition or volume ..........................................................................................................................24
Slide a partition or volume...........................................................................................................................24
Create a compressed partition image.........................................................................................................25
Restore a compressed partition image from a file ......................................................................................26
Add a partition group...................................................................................................................................26
Delete a partition group...............................................................................................................................27
Copy a partition group.................................................................................................................................27
View partition properties..............................................................................................................................27
Back up a hard disk’s EMBR information....................................................................................................31
Restore a hard disk’s EMBR information....................................................................................................31
Install a sound file .......................................................................................................................................33
Enable Multi-OS on a partition ....................................................................................................................36
Install an OS in its own single partition—the most common choice ...........................................................37
Create paired partitions or Multi-OS installations........................................................................................37
BootIt™ Next Generation Installation and Getting Started Guide 3
What You Can Do With BootIt Next Generation (BING)
While you can read a detailed description of each BootIt NG feature in Using BootIt NG on page 14, the
following is a brief overview of just some of the many tasks you can accomplish using BootIt NG:
• Create over 200 primary partitions (if desired).
• Configure detailed boot items to fit your needs.
• Boot from any partition or volume on up to eight hard drives.
• Boot multiple operating systems from a single file allocation table (FAT) or FAT32 partition.
• Logically swap the boot hard drive to look like the first.
• Logically swap floppy disk drives.
• Boot from drive A or B on the fly.
• Resize FAT, FAT32, and NTFS file system partitions without data loss.
• Convert between FAT and FAT32 without data loss.
• Format FAT or FAT32 partitions or volumes.
• Create volumes in extended partitions.
• Set up users and passwords.
• Create compressed images of your partitions (includes USB 2.0 and IEEE 1394 support).
• … and Yes, it supports Windows Server Operating Systems for the same price.
BootIt™ Next Generation Installation and Getting Started Guide 4
Installing BootIt NG
Before you install BootIt NG, take a moment to read about BootIt NG’s limitations and system
requirements. Then, complete the procedures in Before You Begin on page 5. Finally, create the boot
disk or ISO image as described on page 7, and then install BootIt NG on your hard disk as described on
page 9.
Limitations
BootIt NG relies on the basic input/output system (BIOS) for processing disk functions. If your computer
BIOS limits access to the hard drive for any reason and no Master Driver Table (MDT) driver is available
to correct the limitation, BootIt NG is also limited. BootIt NG supports BIOS LBA Mode and Interrupt 13h
extensions.
System Requirements
Verify that your system meets the following minimum requirements:
• IBM-compatible personal computer
• i80386-compatible microprocessor
• 16 megabytes (MB) of random access memory (RAM)
• Video graphics adapter (VGA)
• Floppy disk drive, CD/DVD drive, or USB Flash Drive (booting in floppy mode)
• BIOS-accessible hard disk
Before You Begin
TeraByte Unlimited has taken every effort to make BootIt NG as safe as possible; however, it is not
possible to provide a 100-percent guarantee of safety.
It is extremely important that you do not use any partitioning software (such as FDISK) if you are not
limiting the number of primary partitions (Limit Primaries Option). If you ignore this warning, you are taking
a serious risk of data corruption.
Before using BootIt NG on any system for the first time, back up all data on all hard drives. It’s better to
be safe than sorry.
It’s always a good idea to have a system disk—such as an MS-DOS startup disk or Windows 95 startup
disk—that can be used to restart your system should something ever go wrong. You should configure the
disk to give you all the functionality you may need by adding any drivers or utilities as well as configuring
the configuration files. The next page explains how you can create a startup diskette.
BootIt™ Next Generation Installation and Getting Started Guide 5
