Emergency repair disk

For information about generic boot/recovery discs, see Recovery disc

A Microsoft Windows Emergency Repair Disk (ERD) is a specially formatted diskette that creates backups of important system files and settings and is used to troubleshoot and repair problems in Microsoft Windows NT and Windows 2000 systems. An ERD is used in conjunction with the Windows repair option. The Emergency Repair Disk provides only the ability to restore the system to a bootable state. It is not a replacement for system and file backups. Note: The emergency repair disk is not to be confused with a standard boot diskette as it cannot be used alone.