DanLicks

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Hmmmm.....a question just for me?

The short answer--the shareware program WinImage allows you to create a bootable image file that it can add to a CD to make it bootable.  The image file can be added to a CD using Nero or Roxio as well, and probably other CD writer programs as well without there ever being a floppy disk involved.  See here:

http://www.winimage.com/

And for the long answer:

You can not use the Norton Ghost Boot Disk Wizard to create a bootable CD.  You can create a bootable CD for Ghost if you're burning an image to the CD writer directly using the Windows interface (but be aware--this method gives you a bootable CD with Ghost, but you will not have Mouse support).  One of the steps asks if you want to make the CD bootable--yes/no.

You can create a bootable CD for Ghost if you're burning an image to the CD writer when using the DOS interface by putting an existing boot floppy in when asked for it.  But you can only use a single boot floppy solution for this--not one of the two disk boot floppys.

There have not been too many questions recently about how to create a bootable CD for Ghost when you do not have a floppy drive since Ghost2003 came out with the above ability to create a bootable CD from the Windows interface.

Creating a bootable CD without a floppy drive is a bit of a problem because most programs like Nero and Roxio want an existing boot floppy to read, or an image file of a bootable floppy, or a boot image of some other format (iso, img, bin, etc.) that the program can copy.

Some programs say you can create boot images (IsoBuster, DeepBurner, MagicISO), but again they seem to require an existing boot floppy to read or boot image to copy.  There is some talk in their help files that you can modify an existing image file so as to customize it, but I have not been able to successfully do that myself.

But, with WinImage, I was able to select the appropriate bootable image file creation option, add the needed files that a normal DOS boot disk would need (system files, autoexec.bat, config.sys, mscdexe, mouse, mouse.ini, Ghost.exe, etc. as needed for what you're planning on booting with), and the program did the rest--creating a boot image file that it added to a CD's boot sector directly, along with the other files I added to burn to the regular part of the CD.

When you make a boot floppy, you have to make sure you transfer the system files to the floppy using the DOS 'sys' copy command.  In Windows, when you use the format command, you check the option to 'add system files' or 'make system disk'.  But WinImage seemed to take care of that step automtically--the system files just had to be there.

DanLicks

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Ultimately, the only limitation is the size of the boot sector.  But in WinImage there is an option to emulate a 2.88 MB floppy in addition to 1.44 MB.  I've not tried that myself, however, so I cant vouch for it.

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I've not seen a list anywhere...creating the floppys to see their structure is what I did.  And, if you use the Windows interface for Ghost, you can look at the Ghost log file and see the boot information used for the process.  And you will also find examples of 'custom' boot disks scattered throughout the various posts and references on this forum.

Here's a couple:

http://radified.com/cgi-bin/YaBB/YaBB.cgi?board=general;action=display;num=10954...

http://radified.com/cgi-bin/YaBB/YaBB.cgi?board=general;action=display;num=11015...

GOD BLESS GHOST!

TWO days ago I finally figured out how to run Ghost over the LAN. YESTERDAY I wanted to load the Creative Soundblaster Live 5.1 software and drivers that have worked FINE on our one (and ONLY!) machine running XP BEFORE I installed the Service Pack 2, and guess what....The whole @*+8734%/&§9xx#04876% system went belly up! Nothing worked! No system recovery, nothing! In 30 minutes I had it up and running again as if nothing had happened, except for the changes I had made within the last couple of days.
YEAH! 8)

NightOwl,
Still no luck with WinImage. I made the disk, even made one on a floopy, but they don't work. Yesterday I used the boot CD I made with NERO by just copying the floopy, and it worked fine. As I said, I'm not a geek, but I'll keep trying. Fun, in a morbid sort of way, trying to figure out how to make these crates work.

OK, here is the latest. I was able to make a bootable CD in NERO, with the first  part of a split image. GHOST.EXE opened, and I found the CD/DVD drive, but not the normal yellow icon of the actual image. When I clicked on "OPEN" I got "This is not the first disk in the set" (roughly translated from the German), but I know it is the first and not a spanned image file. The trick in NERO was to remove all relax restrictions. (WIN 98!) I used a normal boot floppy. I feel I am getting closer, but I'm not there yet. At least I have a load of working GHOST boot CDs!
Dan