--- title: "Boot medium - bootable media — ZEBR.ai" description: "A boot medium, or bootable medium, is a medium that makes it possible to boot / launch an application or environment contained on that medium independently of…" url: "https://zebr.ai/en/knowledge-base/boot-media" markdown_url: "https://zebr.ai/en/knowledge-base/boot-media.md" language: "en" alternates: cs: "https://zebr.ai/cs/knowledge-base/boot-media.md" sl: "https://zebr.ai/sl/knowledge-base/boot-media.md" sk: "https://zebr.ai/sk/knowledge-base/boot-media.md" hr: "https://zebr.ai/hr/knowledge-base/boot-media.md" sr-Latn: "https://zebr.ai/sr-latn/knowledge-base/boot-media.md" bs: "https://zebr.ai/bs/knowledge-base/boot-media.md" sq: "https://zebr.ai/sq/knowledge-base/boot-media.md" fr: "https://zebr.ai/fr/knowledge-base/boot-media.md" es: "https://zebr.ai/es/knowledge-base/boot-media.md" de: "https://zebr.ai/de/knowledge-base/boot-media.md" pt-BR: "https://zebr.ai/pt-br/knowledge-base/boot-media.md" pl: "https://zebr.ai/pl/knowledge-base/boot-media.md" it: "https://zebr.ai/it/knowledge-base/boot-media.md" nl: "https://zebr.ai/nl/knowledge-base/boot-media.md" hu: "https://zebr.ai/hu/knowledge-base/boot-media.md" ro: "https://zebr.ai/ro/knowledge-base/boot-media.md" tr: "https://zebr.ai/tr/knowledge-base/boot-media.md" id: "https://zebr.ai/id/knowledge-base/boot-media.md" --- [Home](https://zebr.ai/en/) [Knowledge base](https://zebr.ai/en/knowledge-base) Boot medium - bootable media # Boot medium - bootable media A boot medium, or bootable medium, is a medium that makes it possible to boot / launch an application or environment contained on that medium independently of the installed operating system—even on a computer that does not contain any operating system. A classic example of bootable media is Windows operating system installation media. **What is a boot medium used for?**\ A boot medium is always intended for a specific purpose. There is no universal boot medium. The most commonly used boot media are probably those intended for installing operating systems. There are also various boot media containing diagnostic tools, utilities, and disk tools. For example, Acronis True Image software makes it possible to create bootable media that can be used to create and restore a system backup. Acronis Disk Director software makes it possible to create boot media that can be used to split a disk partition, merge disk partitions, create disk partitions, and delete disk partitions. Bart-PE CDs and Live CDs are a separate category. A Bart-PE CD contains a standalone Windows installation that can be run independently of the installed operating system. The term Live CD usually refers to a CD containing a standalone Linux distribution that can be run independently of the installed operating system. What types of removable media can be bootable?\ The most common boot media are bootable CDs, bootable DVDs, and USB flash drives. To start boot media, you need to set the system boot device to the desired device in BIOS or UEFI. **What Acronis boot media can do** Acronis Disk Director boot media\ After booting from this media, you can create and delete disk partitions and resize disk partitions without data loss. This boot media (CD, DVD, or USB) can be created after purchasing an Acronis Disk Director license. Acronis True Image boot media\ After booting from this media, you can create and restore backups of disks, disk partitions, and data, and clone basic (MBR) disks using the disk-to-disk method. The boot media allows you to restore a backup even to hardware that is different from the original machine. This boot media supports only desktop operating systems (Windows 7 – Windows 10 and Mac). This boot media (CD, DVD, or USB) can be created after purchasing an Acronis True Image license. Acronis Backup boot media\ After booting from this media, you can create and restore backups of disks, disk partitions, and data. The boot media allows you to restore a backup even to hardware that is different from the original machine. This media supports both desktop and server operating systems. This boot media (CD, DVD, or USB) can be created after purchasing the relevant Acronis Backup license. - Features · Software - [Acronis True Image](https://www.acronis.cz/produkt/true-image/) · [Acronis Backup](https://www.acronis.cz/produkt/acronis-backup/) · [Acronis Disk Director](https://www.acronis.cz/produkt/acronis-disk-director/) · [Acronis Disk Director (Workstation, Server, Technician license)](https://www.acronis.cz/produkt/acronis-disk-director-advanced/) - Which environments the product is suitable for - For households · Yes · Yes - For organizations of all sizes · Yes · Yes - Which machine types are supported - Computers running Windows OS (Windows 7, 8, 10) · Yes · Yes · Yes · Yes - Computers running Mac OS (Apple computers) · Yes · Yes - Physical Windows and Linux servers · Yes · Yes - Virtual machines (VMware, Hyper-V, RHEV, Citrix, KVM) · Yes · Yes - Cloud machines (Azure, Amazon EC2) · Yes · Yes - Mobile devices based on iOS and Android · Yes · Yes - What can be backed up - Entire machine backups (disk, volume, and partition images) · Yes · Yes - Data backups (files and directories) · Yes · Yes - Database backups (Exchange, SQL, SharePoint, AD, Oracle) · Yes - How backup is managed - Backup is managed directly from the backed-up machine · Yes - Backup and recovery are managed centrally, from one location · Yes - Remote installation of agents on backed-up machines · Yes - Backup can be started manually at any time · Yes · Yes - Backup can be scheduled to run automatically · Yes · Yes - Backed-up machines can be organized into groups · Yes - Backup can be managed by subordinate administrators · Yes - Option to configure email backup notifications · Yes - Backup options - Full, incremental, and differential backups · Yes · Yes - Always incremental scheme, GFS scheme, custom scheme · Yes · Yes - Backups can be encrypted with a custom password (AES 256 standard) · Yes · Yes - Backups are compressed automatically · Yes · Yes - Backups can be deduplicated · Yes - Backups can be stored in multiple repositories at once · Yes - Where backups can be stored - Local disks, external disks, USB disks · Yes · Yes - Network storage, including NAS · Yes · Yes - Tape drives and tape libraries · Yes - FTP servers · Yes - SFTP servers · Yes - Acronis cloud storage (at an additional cost) · Yes · Yes - How recovery from backups can be performed - From the operating system – if the machine is working · Yes · Yes - From boot media that can be created (CD/DVD, USB) · Yes · Yes - A machine without a functioning OS can also be restored · Yes · Yes - Recovery can be performed to hardware that is different from the original machine · Yes · Yes - Recovery can be started remotely from central management · Yes - Recovery can also be performed to a larger or smaller disk · Yes · Yes - Partition sizes can be changed during recovery · Yes · Yes - Recovery can be performed from HDD to SSD and vice versa · Yes · Yes - What can be restored from a backup - Entire disk, volume, partition · Yes · Yes - Required data (files and directories) from both data and image backups · Yes · Yes - Entire databases or individual database components · Yes - Virtual environment backup - Machines can be replicated to a standby ESXi host · Yes - Backups can be automatically converted into ready-to-use virtual machines · Yes - Backups can be started as virtual machines · Yes - Backups can be restored as ready-to-use virtual machines · Yes - Backups can be restored inside virtual machines · Yes - Virtual machines can be backed up without an agent inside them (Hyper-V and VMware) · Yes - Virtual machines can be backed up with agents inside the virtual machines · Yes - Support for granular recovery of virtual machines · Yes - Hard disk operations - Support for both HDD and SSD drives · Yes · Yes · Yes · Yes - MBR disks can be cloned using the Disk-to-Disk method · Yes · Yes - MBR and GPT disks can be cloned using the Disk-to-Backup-to-Disk method · Yes · Yes - Option to create new disk partitions · Yes · Yes - Option to delete a disk partition · Yes · Yes - Option to increase or decrease a disk partition without data loss · Yes · Yes - Option to format disk partitions · Yes · Yes - Option to merge disk partitions without data loss · Yes · Yes - Additional software information --- - Source: - Site overview for AI agents: