OK, I understand your suggestion now. Will try to work this into the next release too.

My only worry is that some apps might not be able to run from RAM disk, so I will have to leave those out, if I find any.

If memory serves me right, Avast had some problems running from RAM disk (though we have taken that out of UBCD).

@Victor

OK, here's the beginnings of my 'extract to ram' idea.

* Edit autorun3.bat on fdubcd to include this:



I did this so that when you launch apps from /dosapps you stay in that location when you've finished.

* Download enufdisc and stow from here (they have personal licenses so should be fine for UBCD) and add them to /bin on the fdubcd.img.

* Create a batch file called runapp.bat with the following contents and add it to /bin in fdubcd.



This will be used to check available space on the ram drive and extract the app to it.

* Create a text file called ramdrv.txt with the following contents and add it to /etc in fdubcd.



Message for runapp.bat!

* Finally create zip files of each app's files naming them after each app (see runapp.bat) then modify startup.bat to use runapp.bat. Here's and example for SCSIMAX:



I've stolen some idea's from another well known project here (uhm) aswell as adding a few of my own... what you think?

Edit (17/12/07): Simplified runapp.bat, lowered 'low ram drive space' threshold and moved error checking to startup.bat
Edit (22/12/07): Changed dir on ram drive to %tmp% to simplify things abit
Edit (22/12/07): Reverted dir on ram drive to %ramdrv%\apps due to problems with cleanup (vcswap000)

More stuff for you.

As I understand it XMSDSK (the ram drive for fdubcd) can only address up to 2gb of ram, any more and it fails.

Considering that you can now buy a system on high street with 4gb of ram I thought it might be a good idea to add a back up ram drive for fdubcd.

I added shsurdrv.exe to the image (which I believe doesn't have the same issues as xmsdsk, correct me if i'm wrong) and edited autoexec.bat (at line 137) to read like this:



Instead of this:



I have no idea what evnwrdrv is like as a ram drive to I wrote it out all together!

Again what do you think? Incidentally is Erwin still actively developing NwDsk?

-kof94

I chose the lazy option. I simply deleted xmsdsk.exe and added shsufdrv.exe, since the disk image didn't have room for both anyway. So shsufdrv.exe is automatically used on boot up. Do you think that's OK?

Also, wanna confirm, is the latest version of shsufdrv.exe available here?



Erwin seemed to have dropped of the radar since early this year. All my emails to him went unanswered, and his website has not been updated for a while.

I was using a radically slimmed down (UBCD) NwDsk of my own design (I don't need network support) and just edited my scripts for the purpose of UBCD so I didn't think about the space requirements for the full image (oops). I'll probably ditch my idea though if your considering adopting this stuff.

As far as I know the version of shsurdrv on that site is the current version. Incidentally, previous versions of the (UBCD) NwDsk images used shsurdrv. As far as I've read xmsdsk is supposed to be the superior ram drive though, thats why I made the edit to autoexec.bat but I can't see any issues with just using shsurdrv.



Oh well, it would have been nice to have had him make these changes and possibly expand on them, I'm no DOS guru after all.

The reason behind these edits is due to some of the idea's used in Hiren's boot disc.

Don't flame me straight away, I have no interest in warez and I have no intention of using the version I downloaded for productive means. I'm more interested in his use of DOS and the ram drive and how some of these ideas could be ported to UBCD. My 'extract to ram' idea is an example.

I still think UBCD has the edge and is vastly more expandable but it doesn't hurt to recycle a few ideas here and there .

What do you think?

Let's try shsurdrv and see how it goes... unless someone has any technical opinion to contribute over which one is better.

I tried researching on shsurdrv vs xmsdsk, but the result is inconclusive.

Few more requests.

For DBAN and NT Password and Reg Editor would you consider adding a submenu for trouble shooting options?

Examples:






For DBAN I've consolidated all trouble shooting options into one (Failsafe Mode). I've also preset the highest security wipe but that's up to you.

Duely noted! Thanks for the suggestion.