I am wondering what is going to happen with SpinRite 7? Steve said it was going to be a true Windows program. I thought he said he was going to make a version that runs on On Time’s RTOS, as some people use other operating systems such as linux. Maybe the SR7 will be both a true Windows app and also can run on RTOS for people that do not have Windows, it looked like RTOS was geared towards people that know Windows programming. If it is going to be a Windows program, will it run in the background monitoring the drives health? Not sure if that was be a performance problem or not. I guess my other question is about what the earliest version of Windows it will support? I am a bit weird in that I sometimes use old operating systems, mostly in VMs at this point, but I would like to do it on real hardware. Those old operating systems and software are still useful! I hope he goes back at least to Windows 7.
SR 7 / RTOS / Earliest supported Windows OS.
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BootAble – FreeDOS boot testing freeware
To obtain direct, low-level access to a system's mass storage drives, SpinRite runs under a GRC-customized version of FreeDOS which has been modified to add compatibility with all file systems. In order to run SpinRite it must first be possible to boot FreeDOS.
GRC's “BootAble” freeware allows anyone to easily create BIOS-bootable media in order to workout and confirm the details of getting a machine to boot FreeDOS through a BIOS. Once the means of doing that has been determined, the media created by SpinRite can be booted and run in the same way.
The participants here, who have taken the time to share their knowledge and experience, their successes and some frustrations with booting their computers into FreeDOS, have created a valuable knowledgebase which will benefit everyone who follows.
You may click on the image to the right to obtain your own copy of BootAble. Then use the knowledge and experience documented here to boot your computer(s) into FreeDOS. And please do not hesitate to ask questions – nowhere else can better answers be found.
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Any work on SpinRite 7 is likely at least a year or two off at this point, as Steve continues work on his DNS utility, and then he had thought he'd work the disk wiping utility before SpinRite 7. Anything can change in two years, so there's no real plan or goal until he refocuses on that work.
So are some of us!
I would agree that any work on SpinRite 7 seems at least a year or more off as Steve always seems to have an overflowing plate to work with.
At one point @Steve seemed committed to using RTOS-32 to create a pure 32 bit SpinRite 7.0 with dual BIOS/UEFI boot capability and additional native drivers for external USB and internal M2 NVMe drives.
Once this version was done, the pure 32 bit nature of it would seem to have made its future limitless, as adding features would be easy to do pretty much without limits (as Steve indicated).
Steve has also talked about a SpinRite 7 Win app that would
- Be limited to scanning USB drives (like ValiDrive)
- Utilize Window’s native USB drivers (like ValiDrive)
- Take exclusive control of the USB drive being scanned (like ValiDrive)
This app would have provided the USB capability that SpinRite 6.1 could not deliver.
Most recently Steve has said SpinRite 7 would be a full blown Windows app. Some years ago that was referred to as SpinRite “8”, the then eventual speculated evolution of SpinRite.
A question I had then – and have now – is this: How would such an app scan the C: drive when Windows is running and has large chunks of C: restricted to Windows only use?
I too am wondering
what the future of SpinRite 7 might be.You’d do what I outlined in the instructions for running SpinRite under VirtualBox: create an external drive running Windows and boot from that, and run SpinRite from that drive to target your internal disks.
Rufus allows you to create that type of Windows installation
Right. That is a way to do it.
I would suspect, however, that there are a lot of non-techie types who would be intimidated by your excellent very thorough instructions. And that seems wrong for SpinRite 7 IMHO. Presumably @Steve has something neat in mind? Time may tell.
I think his goal (assuming things don't change once he starts work on it) was that the EXE file would be a Windows native app, and can do some things under Windows, but the full features would be required to boot into the RTOS environment (much like how current 6.x (at least, I only got my copy when 6.0 was the latest version) comes with a DOS environment, but can run under Windows to create the DOS boot media)
Steve's original RTOS-32 vision was for a pure 32 bit SpinRite 7 that would boot and run on either a BIOS (DOS) or UEFI system.
Once the system was booted and SR 7 was running, SR 7 (being pure 32 bit) would then be totally independent of either the BIOS(DOS) or UEFI aspects of the system.
And yes, this SR 7 would also most likely run as a Windows app for creating boot media.
Steve has also talked about a "mini' SpinRite 7 win app that would be USB only (like ValiDrive), use Window's native USB drivers (like ValiDrive), and take exclusive control of the USB drive being scanned (like ValiDrive). This app would have bridged the "gap" between SR 6.1 (limited USB support, no NVMe support) and SR 7.0 (full native driver support for USB and NVMe).
All of this would now seem at odds with @Steve 's most recent comments that SR 7 will now be a totally Windows app.
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