National Instruments Two-Slot Embedded Controller NI PXI-8183 - Manual (Page 30)

Chapter 2 Installation and Configuration
© National Instruments Corporation 2-17 NI PXI-8183 User Manual
Hard Drive Recovery
NI PXI-8183 controllers include Phoenix Technologies Ltd. Firstware
tools, either Recover or Vault, or both. These tools allow you to recover the
original factory condition of the hard disk from a small protected area of
your hard drive. This protected area contains an image of the hard disk
provided to you at the time of shipment. Should you need to restore your
software to its original condition, you can access that image by pressing a
hot key during the initial boot process. For more information regarding
these tools, refer to the documentation on your hard drive in the
c:\Images\Firstware directory.
Note Your system hot key is <Alt>. To access the Phoenix Firstware Recover tool, press
and hold <Alt> when video first appears during the boot process.
If you need to recover your factory-installed operating system from a CD,
you can use the included OS installation CD with an external CD-ROM
drive such as a USB CD-ROM drive. Boot the PXI controller using the
OS installation CD to recover the OS. You also may need to reinstall other
software after using the CD to recover the OS.
Note Recovering the OS using Firstware or the recovery CD erases the contents of your
hard disk. Back up any files you want to keep.
Installing an OS
NI PXI-8183 controllers include a preinstalled OS. In some cases, you may
want to reinstall the OS or install a different OS. When doing so, consider
the following guidelines.
Installing from a CD-ROM
The NI PXI-8183 supports the installation of Windows XP from a USB
CD-ROM. However, many other operating systems do not support
installation from a USB CD-ROM. For example, Windows 2000 aborts
during the install process because it does not have drivers for the CD-ROM
device.
With DOS drivers, you can install Windows 9x operating systems.
However, only a few USB CD-ROM drives have DOS drivers.
As an alternative to a USB CD-ROM drive, you can use an external SCSI
CD-ROM with a PXI-SCSI adapter.