minimal OS for backup in case of Windows failure

js5895

If you want the ability to reliably write to an NTFS drive, you need some flavor of Windows. You should consider stripping down your main Windows parbreastion to the minimum (just the OS and applications--no data), and periodically cloning that parbreastion. That way, if your Windows OS drive fails, you just swap the drives and you're back in business. IMHO, all other alternatives are very painful (with the exception of getting rid of Windows altogether, which is great for a lot of us).

Seriously. If you're commited to using Windows, NOTHING beats having a clone of your OS parbreastion somewhere for emergency recovery. I'm buttuming that it'll work, though...I'm not sure how far Windows XP Home goes in paranoid detection of a "pirate copy". I prefer Windows 98, and I'll always avoid any version of Windows which doesn't allow me to make cloned backups of my OS parbreastion.

That said, I find it's also very nice to have a spare liveCD linux OS around. Knoppix and Mepis are my usual recommendations. The great thing about a liveCD is that you don't need to install it on any hard drive. You can even use it without any hard drive at all. You just boot up the CD, and it runs. You have a full GUI, and all sorts of applications and goodies. But the one thing you do NOT have is the ability to safely write to an NTFS parbreastion.

Isaac Kuo