I'm trying to provide a easy boot option for customers to boot into a recovery partition where ghost resides to restore the backup/recovery image.
Currently some pc makers have something similar but use a boot manager to set this up. I'm attempting to use the boot.ini file in windows (XP) to boot into partition (2) (recovery partition)
Has anyone had sucess with this, and is it possible?
I created a bootable cd for ghost and copied the contents into this partition. Of course I get a missing hal.. message. I figure if you use boot.ini it is looking for windows system files.

I do have bootitng which does make it own partition and has a boot manager, but it isn't what I am looking for. I want to ensure others can repair/access this partition if needed.

You input is appreciated.

@ Chris Robertson

I've seen threads here discussing a similar Ghost recovery technique but I don't have links.

You can do this with BING and IFD. It is simple to set up and it makes for a one click restore. I have it setup on a few computers.

http://www.terabyteunlimited.com/kb/article.php?id=363

http://www.terabyteunlimited.com/downloads/wp/bing_ifd_auto.zip

Also, you can put IFD on a floppy, CD or USB flash drive and have it auto run a restore. Basically you boot from your flash drive (or CD) and go and have dinner. No menu choices needed. The restore runs. It even works if the image is stored on a networked computer.

Boot.ini is not involved so it works with Vista/Win7 too.

The easiest method takes 1 to 2 minutes to setup. Create an IFD ISO. Edit tbos.str with your restore command line. Burn the ISO to a CD. The CD boots into an automatic restore.

The backup image can be stored in a hidden or visible partition.