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document updated 15 years ago, on Nov 10, 2008

The individual steps that OS's normally take when booting.

MS-DOS

io.sys + msdos.sys (prior to MS-DOS 7, it was required that these be the first directory entry, and the first three data sectors had to contain io.sys)
- config.sys
- logo.sys
command.com
autoexec.bat

Linux

bootloader (lilo, grub, isolinux, ...)
kernel
initrd (which calls pivot_root() near the end when it has the root filesystem all setup)
init (pid=1)
the /etc/init.d/ and /etc/rc#.d/ scripts

Windows PE

When booting from a ISO9660 filesystem, the files are normally contained in \i386\. When booting from FAT/NTFS, this folder is renamed \minint\.

/i386/setupldr.bin — this is NTLDR
- /i386/boot.ini
- /i386/ntdetect.com
ntoskrnl.exe

Windows PE 2.0 (Vista)

\bootmgr
- \boot\bcd — similar to the old boot.ini, but in the format of registry hives
- (optional: begin working inside of a .wim file)
winload.exe

Windows before NT

Windows NT