How to Boot From a CD, DVD, or Blu-ray Disc
This process usually takes around five minutes:
What to Do if the Disc Won’t Boot
If you tried the above steps, but your computer still isn’t booting from the disc properly, check out some of the tips below. If the optical drive isn’t first in the boot order, your PC will start “normally” (i.e., it’ll boot from your hard drive) without even looking at what might be in your disc drive. When booting from a Windows setup disc, and occasionally other bootable discs as well, you may be prompted with a message to press a key to boot from the disc. For the disc boot to be successful, you’ll need to do this during the few seconds that the message is on the screen. If you do nothing, your computer will check for boot information on the next boot device in the list in BIOS (see Step 1), which will probably be your hard drive. Most bootable discs don’t prompt for a key press and will start immediately.
About Booting From a CD, DVD, or BD
When you boot from a disc, you’re actually running your computer with whatever operating system is installed on the disc. When you start your computer normally, you’re running with the operating system (Windows, Linux, etc.) installed on your hard drive. Certain kinds of testing and diagnostic tools, like memory testing programs, hard drive testing programs, and bootable antivirus software, can require booting this way. Another reason is if you must reinstall Windows, erase everything on your computer, or run automatic Windows repair tools. The easiest way to know if a disc is bootable is to insert it into your drive and follow the instructions above. Most operating system setup CDs and DVDs are bootable, as are many advanced diagnostic tools.
