First, sorry for my poor English: it’s not my native language (I’m from Italy).
Well, I repair PCs and I use to keep in my pocket a multiboot USB with tons of tools which can help me to solve most of the problems I face almost every day.
These are my favorite live tools:
> Antivirus: Bitdefender, Kaspersky, Dr. Web and AVG. Both Kaspersky and Bitdefender can have some wifi issue with some (few) cards, but everything works fine if you use them from the new UEFI-BIOS YUMI (it’s still a beta but it works fine). Don’t ask me why! 🙂 The latest AVG has improved its network tools and now wifi works like a charm (once you could connect only using eth0), so you can easily update the signatures.
> System Tools: Boot Repair Disk, Rescatux, Super Grub 2 (included in Rescatux) Gparted, Mini Tool Partition Wizard and my favorite ones: Clonezilla and System Rescue CD (which among hundreds of tools includes Gparted and Super Grub2). Clonezilla never failed me and System Rescue CD, though it’s not for newby, is absolutely one of the best multitool, if not THE best. I repeat: not very easy for beginners, but very powerful: you can clone, image, save data from failing disks, manage partitions etc… Many of its features are good for Windows too.
For Cloning you can also use Ghost 4 Linux but it doesn’t still have UEFI boot support.
> Distros: Porteus, on my opinion, is the best live OS you can use: it’s customizable BEFORE you download it and it’s very light (about 300 Mb). You can have more than one, depending on your needs: for example you can have one for BIOS 64 bit, on for UEFI 64 bit and one for BIOS 32 bit. Debian live it’s a good choice too. Puppy and Elementary are good but I don’t like them very much (it’s my opinion).
> More: if you want to be “bad boys” 🙂 you can use Pentesting and “Hacking” distros like Kali, Backbox or BlackArch. They are not so easy to use if you want to be a pro, but they are worth a try even if you are not interested in this kind of operations.
If you want to be anonymous you can use Tails, a Debian base distro that uses Tor for anonymous browsing.
Parrot OS is another distro which combines anonymous browsing and pentesting.
For forensics purposes i suggest CAINE and (but it’s not very updated) Deft. CAINE can be used like a regular distro, having LibreOffice, Browsers etc… The good is that it has a gui for Photorec and DDrescue, for those who are scared by command line: for example System Rescue CD has only the command line version of both.
Finally, I want to mention some discontinued tools that cannot be used on modern PCs (especially the UEFI based ones) but if you have an old machine they can be still useful: Trinity Rescue Kit, Falcons Four and, above all, Ultimate Boot CD. In fact, Ultimate Boot CD should be developed into a new graphical version that now is in a beta… I don’t know if it’s dead or not. Let’s wait and see!
Remember that none of these three tools are UEFI boot compatible.
Well, there are many, many other live tools, but on my opinion these are (among free ones) the best, and if I should mention all the rest I would take the risk of writing a boring, endless post! 🙂
Just a tip: most of the times you (me too!) don’t really need all these tools, but it can be a good idea to keep them in a multiboot USB. Easy2Boot and Yumi are the best multiboot USB creators. We’re waiting for Yumi to became stable in its UEFI compatible verisions. Yumi is also being rewritten for Linux but there’s not a ETA.
If you want to use a windows environment the next evolution of a Hirens type of disc would be a current PE environment. Not only could you run lower level tools but also modern applications. Bob.Omb’s Modified Win10PE x64 is what I’m using now and the only thing it need is a few more utilities, but if your working on a PC it can already do everything you need. Found it at vault.theworkpc.com – There was also a torrent.
Daphne
6 years ago
I created a Bitdefender USB for a Windows 10-based HP 15-version laptop, and it would not work. I changed into Legacy mode, created a BIOS admin password, and disabled the secure boot. Nothing worked, I could start the USB fine, but after choosing to start in English and getting past the start screen, it continually froze as starting 232. If anyone has any idea what to do in order to get this to work, I would appreciate the help!
I ended up saving files, resetting the entire machine, downloading Bitdefender, and running many and various antivirus softwares to finally make it work.
I used to use the Bitdefender rescue cd at first, it has a lots of customizations and great graphical interface, but at the end of scan results it always shows errors that not solved, whenever i choose to resolve them nothings happen.
So i switched to use Avira & Kaspersky Rescue Disks and both of them are totally Amazing, Avira has an interface of Ubuntu operation system and i loved it and it’s so simple and easy to use. While Kaspersky has both (Graphical & Text Mode) and also it has an additional scan for hidden system files and registry editor.
At the end i could say that the last two manufacturers that i mentioned are my favourites and i used to start with “Avira” ending with “Kaspersky” to make sure that I’m on a clean way from any malicious objects or malwares that could harm my pc.
Hello!
First, sorry for my poor English: it’s not my native language (I’m from Italy).
Well, I repair PCs and I use to keep in my pocket a multiboot USB with tons of tools which can help me to solve most of the problems I face almost every day.
These are my favorite live tools:
> Antivirus: Bitdefender, Kaspersky, Dr. Web and AVG. Both Kaspersky and Bitdefender can have some wifi issue with some (few) cards, but everything works fine if you use them from the new UEFI-BIOS YUMI (it’s still a beta but it works fine). Don’t ask me why! 🙂 The latest AVG has improved its network tools and now wifi works like a charm (once you could connect only using eth0), so you can easily update the signatures.
> System Tools: Boot Repair Disk, Rescatux, Super Grub 2 (included in Rescatux) Gparted, Mini Tool Partition Wizard and my favorite ones: Clonezilla and System Rescue CD (which among hundreds of tools includes Gparted and Super Grub2). Clonezilla never failed me and System Rescue CD, though it’s not for newby, is absolutely one of the best multitool, if not THE best. I repeat: not very easy for beginners, but very powerful: you can clone, image, save data from failing disks, manage partitions etc… Many of its features are good for Windows too.
For Cloning you can also use Ghost 4 Linux but it doesn’t still have UEFI boot support.
> Distros: Porteus, on my opinion, is the best live OS you can use: it’s customizable BEFORE you download it and it’s very light (about 300 Mb). You can have more than one, depending on your needs: for example you can have one for BIOS 64 bit, on for UEFI 64 bit and one for BIOS 32 bit. Debian live it’s a good choice too. Puppy and Elementary are good but I don’t like them very much (it’s my opinion).
> More: if you want to be “bad boys” 🙂 you can use Pentesting and “Hacking” distros like Kali, Backbox or BlackArch. They are not so easy to use if you want to be a pro, but they are worth a try even if you are not interested in this kind of operations.
If you want to be anonymous you can use Tails, a Debian base distro that uses Tor for anonymous browsing.
Parrot OS is another distro which combines anonymous browsing and pentesting.
For forensics purposes i suggest CAINE and (but it’s not very updated) Deft. CAINE can be used like a regular distro, having LibreOffice, Browsers etc… The good is that it has a gui for Photorec and DDrescue, for those who are scared by command line: for example System Rescue CD has only the command line version of both.
Finally, I want to mention some discontinued tools that cannot be used on modern PCs (especially the UEFI based ones) but if you have an old machine they can be still useful: Trinity Rescue Kit, Falcons Four and, above all, Ultimate Boot CD. In fact, Ultimate Boot CD should be developed into a new graphical version that now is in a beta… I don’t know if it’s dead or not. Let’s wait and see!
Remember that none of these three tools are UEFI boot compatible.
Well, there are many, many other live tools, but on my opinion these are (among free ones) the best, and if I should mention all the rest I would take the risk of writing a boring, endless post! 🙂
Just a tip: most of the times you (me too!) don’t really need all these tools, but it can be a good idea to keep them in a multiboot USB. Easy2Boot and Yumi are the best multiboot USB creators. We’re waiting for Yumi to became stable in its UEFI compatible verisions. Yumi is also being rewritten for Linux but there’s not a ETA.
Cheers, 🙂
Bert
If you want to use a windows environment the next evolution of a Hirens type of disc would be a current PE environment. Not only could you run lower level tools but also modern applications. Bob.Omb’s Modified Win10PE x64 is what I’m using now and the only thing it need is a few more utilities, but if your working on a PC it can already do everything you need. Found it at vault.theworkpc.com – There was also a torrent.
I created a Bitdefender USB for a Windows 10-based HP 15-version laptop, and it would not work. I changed into Legacy mode, created a BIOS admin password, and disabled the secure boot. Nothing worked, I could start the USB fine, but after choosing to start in English and getting past the start screen, it continually froze as starting 232. If anyone has any idea what to do in order to get this to work, I would appreciate the help!
I ended up saving files, resetting the entire machine, downloading Bitdefender, and running many and various antivirus softwares to finally make it work.
BOoooooooo, Bitdefender USB. Y U no love me?
I’m going back to Kali, Windows. 😛
I used to use the Bitdefender rescue cd at first, it has a lots of customizations and great graphical interface, but at the end of scan results it always shows errors that not solved, whenever i choose to resolve them nothings happen.
So i switched to use Avira & Kaspersky Rescue Disks and both of them are totally Amazing, Avira has an interface of Ubuntu operation system and i loved it and it’s so simple and easy to use. While Kaspersky has both (Graphical & Text Mode) and also it has an additional scan for hidden system files and registry editor.
At the end i could say that the last two manufacturers that i mentioned are my favourites and i used to start with “Avira” ending with “Kaspersky” to make sure that I’m on a clean way from any malicious objects or malwares that could harm my pc.