HOWTO Boot from any .iso file without needing a working CD-ROM - REALLY USEFUL!

[etienne_lorrain@yahoo.fr]

Hi there,

Just want to add some comments on how to use Gujin, for other seeing this thread to go in the right direction...

The command:
./instboot boot.bin /dev/sda1 --full
do not touch the MBR, as described in the docs.
It is only working if your MBR is a standard MBR and will load the "active" primary partition (see your partitionning tool about making that partition active).

If you have a single hard disk, no floppy drive, no USB thumb drive and no CDROM drive, you can install by typing:
./instboot boot.bin /dev/sda1 --mbr --full
or more simply (downloading the latest Gujin version at gujin.org / sourceforge):
./gujin /dev/sda1 --mbr
but it will erase all data on /dev/sda1 and recreate a FAT filesystem in there, so it is a last resort method.
Then Gujin will be able to start the PC and boot an ISO image (like Ubuntu install CD/DVD) which has been copied to another (big enough) partition like:
cat xubuntu.iso > /dev/sda5
sync ; sync <- to wait that copy is finished before rebooting
After rebooting, you should be able to install Ubuntu without problem.

But in general, to install Gujin if you have Ubuntu installed on your PC, you either install the .deb package (see gujin.org / sourceforge) or (assuming you have a single hard disk and you are root / use sudo), just download the gujin executable (or gujin64 on a 64 bits system) and type:
gujin /boot/gujin.ebios
The Gujin installer will take care of everything, like the MBR.

Etienne.

[john_spiral]

Well, in Grub 1 I was able to boot the Gujin floppy no problems...but when I tried to boot my Windows XP cd iso it said NTLDR not found...

Please, don't ask why I'm trying to install XP. It's a long story, but I need it and have no cd drive. Or USB boot.

Hi, did you write the XP iso to a partition?

[john_spiral]

Hi there,

Just want to add some comments on how to use Gujin, for other seeing this thread to go in the right direction...

The command:
./instboot boot.bin /dev/sda1 --full
do not touch the MBR, as described in the docs.
It is only working if your MBR is a standard MBR and will load the "active" primary partition (see your partitionning tool about making that partition active).

If you have a single hard disk, no floppy drive, no USB thumb drive and no CDROM drive, you can install by typing:
./instboot boot.bin /dev/sda1 --mbr --full
or more simply (downloading the latest Gujin version at gujin.org / sourceforge):
./gujin /dev/sda1 --mbr
but it will erase all data on /dev/sda1 and recreate a FAT filesystem in there, so it is a last resort method.
Then Gujin will be able to start the PC and boot an ISO image (like Ubuntu install CD/DVD) which has been copied to another (big enough) partition like:
cat xubuntu.iso > /dev/sda5
sync ; sync <- to wait that copy is finished before rebooting
After rebooting, you should be able to install Ubuntu without problem.

But in general, to install Gujin if you have Ubuntu installed on your PC, you either install the .deb package (see gujin.org / sourceforge) or (assuming you have a single hard disk and you are root / use sudo), just download the gujin executable (or gujin64 on a 64 bits system) and type:
gujin /boot/gujin.ebios
The Gujin installer will take care of everything, like the MBR.

Etienne.

Hi Etienne, you must be the very 'Etienne Lorrain' who wrote the Gujin PC boot loader?

If yes, great to have you posting on this thread