HAWKPE 42 The PC Tech's Swiss Army Knife Live CD

A fully-functional BartPE/WinPE (Windows XP SP2) + Linux (Slax-6) live
CD/DVD ISOs. Comes w/ AdAware SE + McAfee AV + ClamAV + SpywareDoctor
updated as of 29-Dec-08, Windows Explorer, SmartDriverBackup,
PCI-TREE, FoxIt PDF Reader, FileZilla FTP Client, Ghost 8, UltraVNC,
Partition Magic 8, CHNTPW (now Vista-compatible), WIPECMOS, MEMTEST,
the Hitachi/Seagate/WD hdrive diagnostics, etc. Boots to WinPE by
default. Download README-HAWKPE.TXT or HAWKPE-CHANGES.TXT in advance,
for details about the package.

What *is* WinPE, you say ?!? WinPE is a limited version of Windows
XP, which boots and operates from a CD, DVD, or USB thumb drive.
WinPE doesn't work quite as well as normal Windows XP/2K3/Vista, that
is, (for example) it doesn't do wireless or multimedia, but WinPE has
*all* of the capabilities you'll need prepare and repair your PCs.
Let's say your PC has been overwhelmed by malware or the PC has
crashed and Windows won't boot any more. Armed with a copy of HawkPE,
you *may* be able to: repair the issue that causes the boot failure
(replace a broken registry with a backup copy), transfer your data to
a USB external drive in anticipation of reinstalling Windows, remove a
forgotten Windows login password, or clean the malware infestation
(among other things.) OTOH, if you have a new PC and want to give it
a custom configuration beyond the conventional single hard disk
partition (like yours truly !), then you can boot HawkPE to
pre-initialize the PC as desired, prior to running the OS installer.

From the HawkPE main menu, you will also have direct access to a suite
of excellent utilities for identifying hardware problems, recovering
data, and initializing your PC in preparation of a new operating
system.

Slax is an excellent example of a portable Linux, which comes w/
Firefox-2+Flash-9, KDE's KOffice suite, multimedia goodies, and the
latest K3B CD/DVD burning application. So with a USB thumb drive and
your HAWKPE CD/DVD, you can carry a multimedia-enabled computer
system, with you at all times. Enjoy....

At last, you can carry HAWKPE on a bootable USB thumb drive ! See
README-HAWKPE for details of how you can make a USB-bootable version
of HAWKPE.

As a recap, here's the most up-to-date inventory of what's on the
disc:

A2Hijack
AdAware SE Pro
AusLogic Defrag
Broadcom 44xx-NIC Drivers
Broadcom Extreme-NIC Drivers
Change NT/2K/XP/2K3/Vista Passwords
Clamwin AV
Darik's Boot and Nuke
Firefox
Filezilla
FoxIt PDF Reader
Ghost 8
HWPnP
IBM/Hitachi Disk Fitness Test
Intel-10-100-1000MHz NIC Drivers
Intel-810 Display Drivers
Intel-Extreme Display Drivers
Microscope 2005
McAfee AV Scanner
Memtest86
MemtestPlus
MHDD Freeware Hard Drive Repair/Analysis Utility
NSSI
nVidia Display Drivers
Partition Magic 8
PCITree
PowerDefragmenter
PuTTY
Python
Sala Password Renew-Beta
Samsung HUTIL [2.10] Hard Drive Diagnostic
SeaTools (Seagate/Maxtor) Drive Diagnostics
Smart Driver Backup
Spyware Doctor
TFTPD32
Treesize Pro
UltraVNC
ViewCHM
Vista Recovery System (New for #42 DVD Edition)
WCPUID
Western Digital Drive Diagnostics 5
Windows File Explorer
WinRAR

** From HAWKPE-CHANGES ************************************************

4-Jan-09 - Changes to HAWKPE-42 from HAWKPE-41:

** Updated BartPE/WinPE w/ the latest McAfee, AdAware, and ClamWin
defs, somewhere around 29-Dec to 4-Jan. Removed Norton Security Scan
bec the current one needs some custom programming, before it can be
restored to the collection. Hopefully, next time out.

** Added the Vista Recovery System to the DVD edition.

** Replaced Ghost 8 executables w/ Ghost 11 executables. Ghost 11 is
probably the last cmd-line based Ghost (from 2007) that can make Vista
NTFS partitions.

** Have changed the archiver to 7-Zip from WinRAR, for a free archiver
solution that even newbies can obtain. Get the utility from
7-Zip.

******************************** Notes ********************************

It appears that BTS Driver Mass Storage Pack, while part of the
system, wasn't working at all. I was trying to add additional BTS
drivers when this was encountered. As always, I got feedback from
HawkPE users, which made me curious and here we are.

Had hoped to add other things to this update, but there was no time to
evaluate anything beyond the Vista Recovery System. This is the
official Microsoft Vista recovery tool, for doing basic repairs of
broken Vista installations. I haven't had the opportunity to use this
from the disc, but I have used it directly from Vista systems using
[F5] at boot time. When you launch the 'Vista Recovery System' menu
pick, you will see a prompt: 'Press any key to boot from CD or DVD'.
Press a key to actually launch the system, otherwise just like a
Windows boot CD/DVD, it will launch the OS on the hard drive.

C'ya next time.

:-- The Hawk --:

========================================================== 4-Jan-09 ==

PS: Download *ALL* components in order to use HAWKPE....

PPS: Better than UBCD, better than Hiren's CD. This is a true Swiss
Army knife for repairing and setting up PCs.

Snapshots:
The HawkPE boot screen

The HawkPE/WinPE screen