This tutorial will explain how to get your computer to boot from a CD or DVD drive.

Quick Explanation.

When your computer is turned on before it does anything it must first read the information on a chip called the BIOS, the information on this chip tells the computer how it should be set up, what to use and how to use it.  We are interested in setting the computer to read the information from a CD or DVD before it looks at the hard drive.

Notes before trying to access the BIOS
You may see a screen with graphics on it when you start the computer this is called a splash screen, press escape to remove it and see the boot text it is hiding, be quick as it usually does not stay on too long.
There are many different ways to access the bios on computers and laptops but the most common keys are the F1, F2 or Del key, and you may have a prompt at the bottom of the screen which tells you exactly which key it is.

Your computer or laptop may have an option on start-up to change the boot device, have a look for this when starting up; generally it is the F12 key and can be pressed to change the boot device without actually going into the BIOS.  If you have this option simply press the key on start-up and choose the CD\DVD with the arrow keys and press "Enter", the computer will now boot from the device you selected.
Entering the BIOS. (You may need to try this a few times with each key listed below before you get it right)
1.    Make sure your computer is fully turned off.
2.    Start your computer.
3.    Press the (F1, F2 or Del) key about 2 seconds after the computer starts and hold it in, if the computer starts bleeping let it go and press it again.
4.    If you have been successful your will be presented with a screen (usually blue) with a menu listing the various options you have available in your BIOS version.
5.    It is important that you do not change anything you are unsure about in these menus as it may harm your computer and prevent you from booting into Windows.

Finding the BIOS option to boot from the CD\DVD drive.

There are many different types of BIOS screens and each one has a different way of changing the boot order to CD\DVD, we are looking for something called "First Boot Device" or "Boot Sequence" or "Boot Device Priority" and this can be on the first screen that you can see or you may have to go looking for it, if you are lucky your BIOS will have its own menu for "BOOT".

Navigate around the BIOS using the arrow keys and Enter, use Esc or Escape to exit from a screen back to the Main Menu.

If you don’t have a BOOT menu then look for "Advanced BIOS Features" and inside there you usually find "First Boot Device"

If you have none of these options you may have to look inside each of your menu options to find your Boot Sequence, if you really can’t find it then send us an email or text with your BIOS type (Named at the top of the screen, e.g. Phoenix, AmiBios and the revision number) and we will try and give you clear instructions on how to change it.

Changing the BOOT sequence in the BIOS to boot from the CD or DVD drive.

Once you have found the section where you change the boot priority or boot sequence we can now change the order and set your computer to boot from a CD or DVD drive.

Once again changing the order of things in the BIOS can differ from manufacturer to manufacturer but they usually provide instruction at the bottom of the screen, in most cases you press the "Enter" key and select from a list but some of the older computers use the "+" and "-" (plus and minus) keys to change the order.

Try and keep your hard drive as the second boot option unless you boot from floppy drives often.

If you have two CD or DVD drives on your computer these will be listed and it is not obvious which one the menu is listing, set either one of them and you can always switch the CD around if it does not work.

Once you have changed the order of the boot sequence you now need to save this change to the BIOS before you exit.

Navigate back to the main menu by pressing "esc" or "Escape" and select the option to "Save and Exit Setup" or some BIOS versions have s "Save and Exit" option on the top menu.

Your computer will now restart and if you have a CD or DVD in the drive it will attempt to boot from this before the hard drive.

We hope this tutorial has helped.