1. General
----------

This program is used to create Microsoft compatible boot records. It is able
to do the same as Microsoft "fdisk /mbr" to a hard disk. It is also able to
do the same as Microsoft "sys d:" to a floppy or FAT partition except that
it does not copy any system files, only the boot record is written.
Specifications of boot records is taken from
http://www.geocities.com/thestarman3/asm/mbr/MBR_in_detail.htm

The program is useful when using Linux to restore a backup of a reference
Microsoft Windows installation.

Author of this program is Henrik Carlqvist (henca@users.SourceForge.net), it
is available for download from http://ms-sys.sourceforge.net/

2. Installation
---------------

Step 1, unpack the archive:

tar -xzvf ms-sys*.tgz

Step 2, compile:

cd ms-sys
make

Step 3, become root and install

su (and give password)
make install

3. Examples
-----------

Please note that Windows ME is not useful for making standalone bootable
floppies. However, Win9x and DOS works fine with example 1 and example 3.

Example 1, creating a 1.68 MB bootable floppy:
This example assumes that you have your windows installation mounted at /dosc
and also have mtools and fdformat installed.

fdformat /dev/fd0u1680
mformat a:
ms-sys -w /dev/fd0
mcopy /dosc/io.sys a:
mcopy /dosc/msdos.sys a:
mcopy /dosc/command.com a:


Example 2, restoring a backup to a fresh hard disk:

Step 1, use GNU parted to create your FAT32 partition and file system:

parted (then create partition and file system)

Step 2, write the MBR:

ms-sys -w /dev/hda

Step 3, write the FAT32 partition boot record:

ms-sys -w /dev/hda1

Step 4, mount your new filesystem:

mount /dev/hda1 /mnt

Step 5, read your backup

cd /mnt; tar -xzvf /path/to/my_windows_backup_file.tgz


Example 3, creating a bootable 2.8 MB floppy image for use with an el-torito
bootable CD:

dd if=/dev/zero of=floppy288.img bs=1024 count=2880
/sbin/mkdosfs floppy288.img
ms-sys -1 -f floppy288.img
su
mount -o loop floppy288.img /mnt
cp msdos.sys /mnt/
cp io.sys /mnt/
cp command.com /mnt/
(it might also be a good idea to add a config.sys and autoexec.bat with
 CDROM support)
umount /mnt
exit
cp floppy288.img cd-files/eltorito.img
mkisofs -b eltorito.img -c eltorito.cat -o cdimage.iso cd-files
(burn the file cdimage.iso to a CD with cdrecord or another program)

4. Documentation
----------------

There are is a man-page for ms-sys, and you will get some help by typing:

ms-sys --help

5. Known problems
-----------------

The option --keplabel only works with FAT32 partitions, other partitions
allways keep their label.

There have been reports about unbootable FAT32 partitions created with
"mformat -F c:". The recomended workaround is to use gnu parted to create the
partition instead. To debug this problem I will need images of the boot record
at different times. If you get this problem please send me an email to
henca@users.SourceForge.net for instructions on how to send me the boot record.

There have been reports about problems when compiling against uClibc. More
problem reports or suggestions of fixes are welcome!