MediCat DVD: bootable toolkit with Windows 10 WinPE

MediCat DVD is a bootable troubleshooting environment that ships with Linux and Windows boot environments, and troubleshooting tools.

The author of MediCat DVD designed the bootable toolkit as an unofficial successor to the popular Hiren's Boot CD boot environment.

Hiren's Boot Cd has last been updated in 2012, and while it works in many cases, at least some of the software it ships with is outdated and requires updating.

It is still mighty useful, as it allows you to edit the Windows Registry without booting the system, reset Windows passwords, and do other things without booting into the operating system.

MediCat DVD

MediCat DVD comes in four different flavors; that's confusing at first, especially since you don't get good descriptions of the four options.

1. MediCat DVD -- This is the name giving distribution. It includes the PortableApps Suite, Linux boot environments and a full working mini Windows 10 WinPE Boot Environment.
2. MediaCat DVD Naked -- Like MediCat DVD, but without the PortableApps Suite.
3. Mini Windows 10 x64 -- Windows 10 WinPE Boot Environment, and PortableApps Suite.
4. Mini Windows 10 x64 Naked -- Like the one above, but without the PortableApps Suite.

The main distribution, MediCat DVD as a size of 7.5 Gigabytes currently. The naked variant a size of 5.05 GB, the Windows 10 x64 distribution one of 3.94 GB, and the naked Windows 10 distribution one of 1.47 Gigabyte.

Downloads are provided as multiple archive files. You need to extract the files once you have downloaded them all using 7-Zip or a compatible archiving program. This places an ISO image on your disk that you can burn, copy to USB to create a bootable USB drive, or boot using a virtual environment.

The main menu displays various options to you. You can start one of the bootable operating systems included with the distribution, or access diagnostic, repair and troubleshooting tools instead that MediCat ships with.

The menu lists the following options in this regard:

1. 64-Bit windows Recovery: Choice of Microsoft or Easy Recovery options for Windows 10, Windows 8.1 and Windows 7.
2. Hard Disk Tools: includes currently Acronis TrueImage 2017, GParted, Norton Ghost 11.5, Paragon Hard Disk Manager, PloP Boot Manager, SpinRite, SuperGrubDisk, Darik's Boot and Nuke.
3. Diagnostic Utilities: includes currently Hardware Detection Tool Memtest86+, TestDisk / PhotoRec / LiliPad, Ultimate Boot Cd.
4. Scan for Viruses: this launches Comodo Rescue Disk currently only.
5. Remove User Account Passwords: Active Password Changer, Daossoft Windows Password Rescuer, Offline NT Password & Registry Editor, PCUnlocker, Boot Kon-Boot CD.

You may boot in any of the available operating systems. If you pick Windows 10 for instance, you get the following screen once the operating system is booted.

You get to access all sorts of programs right there, and even more if you are using a version of the toolkit that came with PortableApps included. This include many tools that help you troubleshoot issues on a PC; to name a few: EaseUS Partition Master, HDDExpert, NTFS Permissions Tool, backup tools, Dead Pixel tester, CPU-Z, RegAlyzer, Dr.Web CureIt, Kaspersky TDSSKiller, Malwarebytes Anti-Malware, and Autoruns.

The author updates the ISO images every six months following new releases of Lubuntu. If you copy the bootable toolkit to USB, you may update PortableApps manually, and even add other tools that you require to it.

Closing Words

MediCat DVD has a lot to offer. You get four different versions and can pick the one that you want to use. If you are unsure, I suggest you pick one that includes the PortableApps suite, as it adds several tools to the troubleshooting environment that you can make good use of.

The downside is the fairly large download, and that you have to use a program like Rufus to create a bootable USB drive.