Slipstreaming Windows XP Service Pack 2 and Create Bootable CD

Slipstreaming a Service Pack, is the process to integrate the Service Pack into the installation so that with every new installation the Operating System and Service Pack are installed at the same time.
Slipstreaming is usually done on network shares on corporate systems. But with the advent of CD burners, it does actually make some sense for the home user or small business user to do the same.
Microsoft added the ability to Slipstream a Service Pack to Windows 2000 and Windows XP. It not only has the advantage that when you (re)install your OS, you don’t have to apply the Service Pack later, also if you update any Windows component later, you’ll be sure that you get the correct installation files if Windows needs any.
Slipstream Windows XP Service Pack 2




Download the (full) “Network Install” of the Service Pack (English version [266 MB]), and save it to a directory (folder) on your hard drive (in my case D:\XP-SP2). Other languages can be downloaded from the Microsoft Download Web site.
Note: do not use spaces in the folder name!
Next copy your Windows XP CD to your hard drive. Just create a folder (I used \XP-CD), and copy all the contents of your Windows XP CD in that folder.

Next, open a Command Prompt (Start > Run > cmd), and go to the folder where you downloaded SP2 (cd \foldername). Type the command: servicepack filename /integrate:drive/path. In my example the command is WindowsXP-KB835935-SP2-ENU /integrate:D:\XP-CD.



If you get the error:



This is caused by the fact that your Windows XP CD contains updates that will be automatically installed when you run setup. This type of CD’s will usually be from larger OEM suppliers (like Dell, HP, or others).

You cannot use this type of CD to create a slipstreamed SP2 install.
First, the files will be extracted, and next they will be integrated in your Windows XP files:


When ready, you should get a confirmation. Windows XP Service Pack 2 has now been Slipstreamed into your original Windows XP files.



Creating a Bootable CD

For this part I used IsoBuster and Nero Burning ROM 6 (make sure you have the latest version, but at least 5.5.9.0).
After you install IsoBuster, you can choose to use only the product’s free functionality for what we want to do, IsoBuster will look like the image below (you need to have your original Windows XP CD in the CD-ROM drive).
Start to extract the boot loader from the original Windows XP CD. Using IsoBuster, select the “folder” Bootable CD, and right-click Microsoft Corporation.img. From the menu choose Extract Microsoft Corporation.img, and extract it to the folder on your hard drive where you have your Windows XP files (D:\XP-CD in my case).



Next, start Nero Burning ROM, and choose CD-ROM (Boot) in the New Compilation window. On the Boot tab, select Image file under Source of boot image data, and browse to the location of the Microsoft Corporation.img file. Also enable Expert Settings, choosing No Emulation, and changing the Number of loaded sectors to 4 (otherwise it won’t boot!)



The ISO tab should be configured correctly as shown below:



If you have an older version of Nero you won’t have the option.

Do Not Add “;1″ ISO file version extention under Relax ISO Restrictions. You won’t be able to boot your new CD, so update Nero!
You can configure the Label tab to your liking, I would however recommend that you keep the Volume Label the same as on your original Windows XP CD. Here are some (English) Labels:

6 FREE WAYS TO DOUBLE YOUR BLOG TRAFFIC IN LESS THAN A WEEK:

Everyone want's traffic.You set up a blog with great content but,no one is visiting your blog,so what's the use of it.So, you need atleast a decent amount of traffic and what's great than getting that traffic for FREE?
So,here is the good list of 6 Free ways to get traffic to your blog.

1.SEARCH ENGINE:Yea! it brings lots of traffic to your blog.There are millions of people search in the search engines like Google,Yahoo,msn everyday.So,if your blog has so many good posts and is well indexed by google,etc..you will get a good amount of traffic via search engines.There are a few steps to look at if you want a decent amount of traffic from the search engines like "submitting your blog sitemap to google",yahoo to index you blog pages very quickly.And the other important one is adding meta tags to your blog.If you follow these two simple steps,then you will get a decent traffic(massive traffic if your content is good).

2.Submitting your blog to Blog Directories:You may know this before,submitting your blog to blog directories will bring you a good traffic.
Here is a good list of blog directories(there are so many directories,but the below one's will bring you a good traffic).Most of these blog directories ask you to register before you submit your blog.My suggestion is,create a new email address solely for this purpose so,your personal emails are not flooded with the emails sent by the blog administrators,etc.
You can find the Blog directories list here.

3.Participate in forums,groups,etc:Just go to google and enter your [major keyword + fourm] or [keyword+groups] and search.Suppose,your blog is about blogging,then search 'Blogging forum'.You will find some forums,groups related to your site.Register in the forums and post articles,etc with a link back to your blog(as a signature).Answer questions,clarify doubts and provide a link to your blog.But,Dont' SPAM.

4.Social Bookmarking:Social Bookmarking is another way to build good traffic to your website/blog.If you don't know what Social Bookmarking is
"Social Bookmarking is a practise of saving Bookmarks,tagging the posts with keywords in a website".Bookmarking means saving a specific website url(address) in your browser that you wish to visit later.There are so many Social Bookmarking sites like del.icio.us,digg,furl,technorati.
One good thing about these Social bookmarking sites is,you will get instant traffic.Just register with them,store your bookmarks,tags,.. and you are done,See your site meter blasting with traffic.

5.Submit Articles to Article Directories:Submitting articles to article directories is another effective way to build more traffic.By submitting to them,your articles get massive exposure and gain you more traffic.
Some of the popular article directories are goarticles.com,ezinearticles.com,articlecity.com,etc.
There are hundreds of article directories,just google it.

6.Leaving Comments on other blogs:Leaving comments with a link back to your blog is another good thing to do.Leaving comments in the related blogs is more useful and it also increases your pagerank.Always leave good comments and don't Spam(by placing links like'click here' like that).

Microsoft Synctoy is a must-have utility to help you synchronize files in different directories of the same computer or between a computer and external storage devices like the iPod and USB pen drives.

SyncToy supports wild-cards in file names (like *.exe or holiday_*.jpg) so you can decide what files are included or excluded during the sync process.

And using SyncToy is completely risk free - it has a wonderful preview feature that lets you see what operations would take place during the run without performing any changes on your computer.

SyncToy v2.0 [for Windows XP and Vista]

*If you were to sync files and folders on multiple computers via the internet, consider FolderShare - it can also sync files between a Mac and Windows comput

You may find this technique useful even if you are not a very tech-savvy user.
Before getting into the actual process, let’s look at a couple of real-world situations that explain why you may want to turn your home computer into a web server.
Situation #1. Say you have music MP3s, documents and other important files on the hard drive of your home computer. If you turn this home computer into a web server, you will be able to access all these files from office or any other Internet connected machine including your mobile phone.

Situation #2. You have some personal photographs that you want to share with other family members. You can either upload these pictures online to a site like Flickr or better still, just convert the computer into a web server. Now you can connect the camera to the computer, transfer the digital pictures to some designated folder and they’ll instantly become available to your friends and family anywhere in the world.
Situation #3. You want to host a website on the internet but the web hosting jargon like FTP, DNS, etc. is way too complex for you. The workaround therefore is that you setup a web server on your home computer (it’s easy) and then host a website in seconds without spending a single penny on external web hosting services.

Now if any of the above reasons look convincing enough, here’s how you can convert your Windows, Mac or Linux PC into a web server in less than two minutes - no technical knowledge required.
Go to labs.opera.com, download the Opera Unite software and install it. Congratulations, you are now running a web server on your machine and just need another minute to configure local file folders that you want to share with others over the internet.
Here’s an illustrated screenshot of the configuration panel - nothing technical here again.

Start the Opera Web browser (yes, that’s also you web server now) and enable the Opera Unite service from the lower left corner. Now double click the File Sharing link and select the folder whose content you want to share on the web. Any file or folder inside this folder can now be accessed over the internet - you can either use a public URL or specify a password for private sharing.
The following screencast video has more detailed instructions on how to get started with Opera Unite or you may refer to the User Guide if you get stuck somewhere.




Opera Unite looks pretty useful but there are other services around that can also do pretty similar stuff. For instance, both PurpleNova and Dekoh Dekstop enable users share content on the Internet directly from the hard drive without having to upload it anywhere.

Update: It’s important to note that your computer must be in running state and also connected to the Internet for others to download files and web pages since Opera Unite streams content directly from your machine - it doesn’t upload or caches anything to its own servers. Give it a shot. [flickr]