Hirens Boot CD

Hiren's BootCD (also known as HBCD) is a bootable software CD containing a number of diagnostic programs such as partitioning agents, system performance benchmarks, disk cloning and imaging tools, data recovery tools, MBR tools, BIOS tools, and many others for fixing various computer problems. HBCD can be considered a valuable tool[1] for use in troubleshooting and recovery of computers.

As it is bootable, the operating system of the computer need not be available for the tools to be usable. All that is required is that the computer is able to run Microsoft Windows and Linux. Most of the tools are also available when the operating system is already running.

Distribution

Hiren's BootCD is available as an ISO image zipped together with other information such as its changelog. The image file can be burned to a CD or onto a USB flash drive for use on computers that support booting from USB.

History

Hiren's BootCD, created by "Hiren" & "Pankaj", is based on Knoppix and a collection of other freeware tools. It has found some controversial stigma as a "hacker" tool violating copyright. However, today the majority of its software is freeware or shareware.

Licensing issues

Prior to version 11.0, Hiren's BootCD contained a significant number of commercial products. In version 10.6,[2] no fewer than 17 were listed in the release notes. Most notably Acronis True Image, Norton Ghost, Acronis Disk Director, and Paragon Partition Manager. (Partition Magic Pro had been replaced already in version 10.5.) To be able to start a commercial application, the user had to promise to be the holder of a license, but no validation of this statement was ever made.

In version 11.0, only three remained:

Mini Windows 98

Mini Windows XP

A collection of MS-DOS utilities

Source : Wikipedia