Version 2.1.654 released as full version

The 'full release' version was getting a bit long in the tooth, so I have updated it with the latest version.
Changes can be read at http://www.rmprepusb.com/documents/release-2-0/version-history.
If you click on the Help (F1) button and click on the update box, the new version will be downloaded. You must then click on the downloaded file to install it manually.

Easy2Boot tutorial updated

I have included the AutoLinux code from Tutorial #96 into the Easy2Boot Tutorial #72.
I have also tested over 30 ISOs using the 'partnew' technique used in these tutorials and with 98% success; only the Trinity Rescue Disk ISO failed to work correctly.
Even DOS based ISOs just worked fine.
This allows you to just copy any ISO onto your Easy2Boot USB drive and try it. The menu is automatically made as the USB drive boots.

Automatic grub4dos Linux ISO boot menu entry

Tutorial 96 shows how to add a grub4dos menu entry that will automatically create a new dynamically-created grub4dos menu in a ramdrive and list all your linux ISO files. You can then choose one of them and boot from it.

Thus means that you should be able to quickly try any linux ISO that you fancy without needing to make a special menu entry for each one. Just download the ISO file and copy it to the folder on your grub4dos bootable drive. Then boot from the drive and chose the Linux ISO menu entry - all the ISO files in a folder will be listed (as shown below) and you should be able to boot from any one of the ISOs.

Even a BackTrack 5 iso will just work!

Tails you win! A new method for booting linux from an ISO file!

I recently came across a post on reboot.pro by cdob on how to map an ISO file to a partition using grub4dos. This technique has the advantage that it should work for most linux ISOs, even the ones that don't support booting from an ISO file!
It also can get around the problem of booting a version of linux from an NTFS boot drive, even if that linux does not understand or support the NTFS filesystem.
This means that even if your USB grub4dos boot drive is formatted as NTFS, you can boot nearly any linux ISO from it!

Cool!

I tried this out using a Tails linux ISO file (which at the time I could not find a way to boot from an ISO file) and it worked a treat.

You can even boot from Ophcrack ISO file AND access the rainbow tables (no need to extract the rainbow tables onto the USB boot drive!).

If you have a linux ISO that you cannot get booting as an ISO file from a grub4dos boot pen/hdd, try this technique!

See http://www.rmprepusb.com/tutorials/tails for details.

See also here for booting Tails 3.16 from a USB HDD.

grub4dos and the blocklist command

It has always been there, but I have just found that the grub4dos blocklist command can be used to display the groups of contiguous sectors that make up a file. So you can use this command to check if an ISO file (for instance) is contiguous (and can therefore be directly mapped under grub4dos using map /xxx.iso (0xff)) or if it is not contiguous.

The file pe.bs is 512 bytes long and thus occupies one sector on the disk. The file knoppix511.iso however is split into two contiguous sector 'runs', one starting at block 24856 (1425152 sectors long) and the other at 1450616 (976 sectors long).
WinContig is included in RMPrepUSB and can be used to make all files on the drive contiguous if you run into this problem.