How to Make a Restore CD for Windows XP

1. Step 1

   Determine if you have the Windows XP Service Pack 3 installed on your computer. Service Pack 3 was the last upgrade for Windows XP released by Microsoft. Rich-click the My Computer icon on your PC desktop and select Properties from the pop-up menu that appears. Click the System tab and read the Operating System details. It will tell you if you have Service Pack 3 installed. If you do do not have the service pack installed, download the upgrade from the Microsoft Update website.

2. Step 2

   Click the Start menu button in the lower left-hand corner of your Windows XP screen. Click My Computer. Double-click on the C:\\ drive partition of your hard drive.

3. Step 3

   Right-click on any empty space inside the C:\\ drive window and select New Folder from the pop-up menu that appears. Rename the folder to "sp3" (without quotation marks). Drag and drop the Service Pack 3 installation file that you downloaded in Step 3 into the sp3 folder you just created.

4. Step 4

   Repeat Step 2 and 3, but rename the new folder "xp" instead of "sp3" (without the quotation marks). Do not put anything into this new folder.

5. Step 5

   Insert the Windows XP installation CD into your computer's CD slot. Wait for the CD to load.

6. Step 6

   Click the Start menu button and open My Computer. Double-click on the CD drive. Typically, this drive is labeled D:\\. It will be identified by showing the Windows XP installation disk name in the drive label. Use your mouse to select all the items in the CD folder and drag them to the folder you created in Step 4. Depending on the speed of your CD drive and your PC processor, this copying process may take several hours.

7. Step 7

   Click the Start menu button and select Run. Type "cmd" into the search field (without quotation marks) and click the OK button. A dialog window will appear. Type "c:\sp2\WindowsXP-KB835935-SP2-ENU /integrate:c:\xp" into the field (without quotation marks). Press the Enter key on your keyboard. Microsoft Windows will automatically combine the contents of the two folders you made in Step 3 and Step 4.

8. Step 8

   Open the folder you made in Step 4. Create a new folder in this folder and label it "software" (without quotation marks). Place any backup data you have into this folder.

9. Step 9

   Download and install a free trial version of ISObuster. This program will be used to create a working Windows XP restore CD.

10. Step 10

    Open ISObuster. Select the folder you created in Step 7 in the left-hand ISObuster menu. ISObuster will now create a disk image file of the entire folder's contents.

11. Step 11

    Open your CD burning software such as Roxio Easy Media Creator. Drag the disk image file from Step 10 to the CD burning software and burn it to a blank CD. You now have a bootable Windows XP CD to use if your installed version of Windows XP experiences problems and refuses to boot from the hard drive installation.

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