Parted Magic PXE for Windows

Boot and install a special Linux distribution over your network with the PXE version of this freeware OS and tools. Parted Magic is a version of Linux containing numerous applications designed to repair and restore hard drives. This application expects expert understanding of PXE environments to properly install the OS, and doesn't include extensive Help files for any of the included applications. Even expert users may not have the specific knowledge required to properly install and operate this OS and tools.

Once installed the simple menu leads to many functions to partition and affect your drives. This isn't a set of utilities for novices. We're hesitant to even recommend this set for anyone other than system administrators. However, if you have experience using Linux or delving deep into hard-drive partitioning then this OS should be easy to use. Most of the apps are small with single-drive-specific functions.

Before going to the trouble of setting up this distribution it's a good idea to surf to the publisher's Web site to get the latest version of Parted Magic. Version 2.0 of the PXE install has some boot issues and the suite doesn't include Gparted, a more robust partitioning tool. Gparted offers to charge partitions without losing data, but that's no excuse not to first perform a backup.

With all the included tools, we recommend users take the extra time to study the functions. System administrators and some advanced users will find Parted Magic PXE robust and useful.