How to move bootable partition to CD?

[aeneas]

I'm rebuilding a computer which was originally operated using Windows Vista (WV).  WV does not boot anymore but the hard drive appears to be good.  There is a small DOS (fat16) partition which is bootable that contains diagnostics which allowed a pretty thorough amount of testing to determine that the hard drive is working properly.  The hard drive will be replaced by a solid state drive and the new system will run Linux.  The computer does not have a diskette reader.

 

I'd like to retain the ability to run the diagnostics and would prefer to have them on a bootable CD.  How do I create a bootable CD using the content (i.e., version of DOS plus diagnostics) that are presently stored on that utility partition?

[LIGHTNING UK!]

Can you access that partition within Windows via a drive letter?

 

If not, ImgBurn can't do anything with it.

 

If you just want a hdd diagnostics disc, get something like Hiren's Boot CD.

[aeneas]

Yes, I can mount the drive on a computer running Windows.  The easiest way to do this would be using a USB controller that supports SATA.  Therefore, ImgBurn can be provided access to the drive/partition via Windows.

 

Diagnostics are something one would prefer not to need but I did find these ones very useful for determining that the hardware on the computer being salvaged looks to be good whereas the WV is shot.  The idea of retaining these diagnostics, which are known to work independent of WV, simply seems like the prudent thing to do but I don't want to consume any disk space on the new system for this purpose.

 

I am not familiar with Hiren's Boot CD but the diagnostics supplied with the computer seem to be nicely tailored to the motherboard and related set of integrated adapters.  Why not retain it?

Edited August 24, 2016 by aeneas

[LIGHTNING UK!]

You'd have to access the files in that partition and copy them somewhere more easily accessible.

 

Find a bootable floppy disc image somewhere on the net that loads CD-ROM drivers.

 

Add that image as the boot image via build mode and add your diagnostics files / folder to the disc via the 'source' box.

 

Boot the disc, switch to the current drive of the mounted cd drive and run the diag program.

[aeneas]

Many thanks!