Bootable ISO to USB stick xp quickest method

My dog took a leak on my PC when I went out (ye funny), now it reandomly restarts - I'm convinced the HDD is failing because the Windows seagate diagnostic program fails on a few tests.

I want to run this prior to windows in an attempt to try and recover sectors, the program includes an iso which can be written to cd and booted, but i dont have any cd's. I tried using unetbootin to create the bootable usb from the iso file (SeaToolsDOS222ALL.576.ISO) but it doesnt work. When i boot from the usb hdd unetbootin loads with "default" in the menu. No joy booting though. I checked the usb hdd in windows and all the files are there, extracted from the iso file, wont boot though.

Any ideas? Im using windows xp.

More info - when the computer restarts (like i just did now) it constantly reaches the end of POST and then restarts in infinite loop. If I pull the power cable out it will get back into windows, the longer i leave it between attempts, the longer I am able to stay in windows until it restarts. i.e if i leave the power cable out 5 minutes it will stay operable for longer than if i had left it out for only a few seconds.

Is the ISO file you are copying from on a network share? I have had similar issues with using ISO files on unc shares with unetbootin, if its local try a different iso like opensuse see if it works.

Use HP USB Disk Storage Format Tool to make a USB flash drive bootable.