Make my own restore cd

You know, the restore CD/DVD's which come with most computers now a days are a pain in the butt to many computer user who would prefer to have a genuine Windows CD/DVD to reinstall from when something goes wrong.

On the other hand, those restore things are easy to use, and the only real downside, as far as I can see, is that the manufactors stuff the restore CD/DVD's with a lot of junk you would rather do without.

The general idea of restoring a configuration that has proved itself to be ok, instead of having to reinstall OS, drivers and programs again every time you are forced to go back to Adam & Eve, suits me.

Question: Is it possible to create your own restore CD/DVD from an image of the OS partition? In my case it has to be a bootable CD - possible more CD's - as my computer does not have a DVD drive.

If possible, which program should I use?

Are there any free(ware) options?

Thank you in advance

Sebastian