466 replies to this topic

[Sawyer007]

On my 3rd try. I used an un modified ISO and the system is up and running with all the updated pretty stable now.
Rox. Its a better experience then windows 8 so far.

[Sico2]

I tried all the steps and always get "BOOTMGR is missing. Press Ctrl+alt+del to restart" No matter what I try.
I am using WD250gb USB HDD attached to my Acer 5920G which has installed win7 on a spare internal hdd.

I even downloaded WAIK from microsoft (1.7gb) and took the original files again. Win7 ISO working fine, the installer.wim reports that bootmgr menu has been created, all fine and I need to restart. I spent over 8h today on it and not a single thing works...

I used win repair via the consol x to rebuild the BCD file (strangely, after the installer.wim finishes, no "x:/boot" folder is to be seen on the USB HDD partition, it is on the original internal C:\ hdd).
Manual add of this file and folder causes error "\Boot\BCD Status 0xc0000000f wrong boot configuration data" to appear.
Any advice, please?

[Meatball]

Running through this setup and it's actually working like a champ, but I've run into one strange issue.

Once I boot into Windows 7 I get a "Performance" window popup and I notice that there's no swap file. I'm trying to set a swap file, it asks me to reboot, but when it reboots, there's still no swap file.

Anyone have any problems setting a swap file with Win 7 setup on a USB drive?

[amalux]

I'm trying to set a swap file, it asks me to reboot, but when it reboots, there's still no swap file.

Hi Meatball and welcome

It's possible that the setup is using an existing swap file on another (internal) drive but then when you boot from USB alone, there's no swap file present. You need something like DiskMod to force a swap file located on the USB drive. http://reboot.pro/9461/

[Meatball]

I'll have to try that diskmod for the swap file, but I've run into another problem. After I run some Windows updates and finish installing SP1, the USB key will no longer boot into Windows 7. I'm wondering if it's messing up the MBR or something.

Anyone had any problems with that?

[steve6375]

You cannot update to SP1 as it destroys the registry USB boot hacks. If you want SP1 then start with SP1! This is explained in the intro and in my tutorial.

[admn]

umm anyone can integrate this method to SARDU usb hdd as win7 itself instead winPE??
so we can boot to win7, win7 installer and other rescue utility from one usb hdd
would be great!!

[Gabriel Oliveira]

Hi there! The setup worked great for me! But now I can't go back to my old os. Can someone tell me how to go back to my old os (XP) and undo win7 setup?
(When i plug off my usb hard drive, the pc shows startup error and I tried everything but I can't comeback to my old one)
PS- I didn't do the sys... run thing to plug off my usb hd)
I need it quickly!
Please help me!

[Escorpiom]

I would like to share a little discovery a made today...
Now that UEFI bioses are rather common and the size of the harddisks is getting over 3TB, the question is:
Can nt6.x fast installer be used to apply an OS image to a GPT partitioned disk?
The answer is yes, and not only can it be applied, we can also prepare the GPT partitions on the harddisk from within a x86 WinPE, booted in MBR mode.

It is said that we can only prepare an UEFI - GPT boot environment when booted in UEFI mode. This is not true.
It is also said that we cannot apply a WIM image from a x86 MBR booted WinpE because it would not work. This is not true either.

Tools needed:
- WinPE with diskpart functionality. I used Wimb's MakePE3 package to make Windows 7 PE. The included diskpart works fine, it should work from Vista PE also.
- bcdboot.exe from Windows 8 CP. You can find it in the system32 folder
- nt6.x fast installer

Replace bcdboot.exe that is used in nt6.x fast installer with the Window 8 x86 version.
Create diskpart script for the partitioning. It is just a text file. Name it "makepart.txt".
You will create a EFI System partition 100GB, a MSR partition 128GB and the basic data partition(s) according to your needs.
Add the partition types as GUID identifier in the dispart script. Mine would not work without it.
The EFI partition will need a drive letter, name it "S" or anything you like. The basic data partition(s) will need a letter also.
If this is not clear, I can post an example script.
You can prepare all partitions and format from one single script. Run it like this:

diskpart.exe /s makepart.txt

This will do the partitioning and formatting with GPT layout.

Change the nt6.x script at the line were bcdboot is called so it becomes

bcdboot %installpath%Windows /s %bootpath% /l %lang% /f UEFI 2>nul

Change the nt6.x script at the line were bootsect.exe is called so it becomes

rem bootsect.exe /nt60 %bootpath% >nul

We don´t need that on GPT formatted disks.

Start nt6.x fast installer and apply the x64 Windows Image. Remeber, x86 cannot boot from GPT partitioned disks.
When asked, choose the drive letter for the Windows partition. After that the script will ask for the system partition. Give the letter from the 100GB EFI partition you defined in the diskpart script.
Let it do it's thing, bcdboot.exe from Windows 8 will prepare the EFI partition with the Windows 7 boot files and create the bootstore (BCD).
When finished, the PC will boot in UEFI mode, all prepared from MBR booted x86 PE.
Microsoft says it is not possible. Here you go.

Cheers.

Edited by Escorpiom, 13 August 2012 - 08:33 AM.

[steve6375]

I think that if you change the line to use ALL then it should work on MBR and EFI systems??

bcdboot %installpath%Windows /s %bootpath% /l %lang% /f ALL 2>nul

[Escorpiom]

Yes Steve, that should work. But I haven´t tested it.
The all switch creates a bootstore for both MBR and EFI boot, when you choose the /ALL switch you need to do the bootsector also.

The interesting part of this is that you CAN prepare the uefi-only boot from x86 mbr booted PE, there were some reports about "Windows 8 on the Go"
but to do a W7 uefi boot has not been documented yet, to my knowledge.

Cheers.

[steve6375]

The 2011 Win8 To Go seminar says that it supports MBR and EFI booting - see 20:40 in video. So I think this will work but only for external USB drives for Win8ToGo (which detects it is booting on a removable/USB?? device. Have you tried it with an internal HDD drive?

[Escorpiom]

The procedure I described is indeed for an internal HDD, Western Digital Green 1TB sata. Tested OS: Windows 7 x64.
To be sure it actually worked, I took another disk (Samsung 160GB sata), wiped it and repeated the test. It works as expected.
I did NOT include MBR booting with the /ALL switch, because I was testing exclusively the GPT boot with UEFI bios.
My intention was to discover if it is possible to prepare a GPT boot disk from mbr booted x86 PE, use winnt 6.x installer to apply the Windows 7 OS image and afterwards boot this on an UEFI compatible bios.

I used the Intel DH55TC as testmachine, this board is extremely picky (not to say buggy) when it comes to EFI boot.
Windows 8 with the /ALL switch on USB should be a lot more easier to do, but that was not what I was after.

Cheers.

[steve6375]

Can you post an example diskpart script please?

[Escorpiom]

Here is one example for 80GB basic data (Windows) and the rest of the disk as a second basic data partition:

rem === create GPT disk with two partitions, system and data ===

select disk 0

clean

convert GPT

create partition EFI size=99 offset=1024

format quick fs=fat32 label=EFI

assign letter=S

set id="C12A7328-F81F-11D2-BA4B-00A0C93EC93B"

create partition MSR size=128

create partition primary size=80000

format quick fs=ntfs label=System

assign letter=C

set id="EBD0A0A2-B9E5-4433-87C0-68B6B72699C7"

create partition primary

format quick fs=ntfs label=Datos

assign letter=D

set id="EBD0A0A2-B9E5-4433-87C0-68B6B72699C7"

exit

Take note that the MSR partition hasn't got a GUID.

Cheers.

[Escorpiom]

It is important to understand that we have to deal with TWO guid id's for each partition, it's a little bit confusing but:

- The GUID in the diskpart script is the GUID for the partition TYPE
- The GUID as it appears in the bootstore (view with bcdedit) is the actual GUID of the partition.

Those two are different, the first is standard, the second one is unique.

Cheers.

Edited by Escorpiom, 16 August 2012 - 08:41 AM.

[ndog37]

I would like to share a little discovery a made today...
Now that UEFI bioses are rather common and the size of the harddisks is getting over 3TB, the question is:
Can nt6.x fast installer be used to apply an OS image to a GPT partitioned disk?
The answer is yes, and not only can it be applied, we can also prepare the GPT partitions on the harddisk from within a x86 WinPE, booted in MBR mode.

Is it possible to install windows 8 without the reserved partition? I would rather use grub2 as my MBR - (I hear GPT still uses the first part or drive as MBR)

[Escorpiom]

Is it possible to install windows 8 without the reserved partition? I would rather use grub2 as my MBR - (I hear GPT still uses the first part or drive as MBR)

The "mbr" as seen in a GPT partitioned disk is a "protective mbr" for legacy applications. Unless you wanted to say "hybrid mbr/gpt" but that's something else.
If your question is about using a normal mbr with Windows 8 install (install.wim applied with nt6.x fast installer and imageX) but without the system reserved partition, then yes - I see no reason it should not work.
I still have to test that, and the same goes for grub2.

As for using grub2 with GPT partitioned disks, haven't tested that either, but reports say that it is indeed supported, more here:

http://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/GRUB2#Hybrid_GPT.2FMBR

A lot of stuff that can be experimented with, it only takes a bit of time.

Cheers.

[rocketero]

I didn't know that now one could install Windows 8 to a stick memory using this NT 6.x Fast installer. Correct me if i'm wrong ??

[Escorpiom]

The procedure I described is indeed for an internal HDD, Western Digital Green 1TB sata. Tested OS: Windows 7 x64.

Officially, only an USB harddisk is supported. USB stick would be slower anyway, perhaps too slow. Windows 8 to go on USB needs a minimum USB disk of 32GB, so it might be interesting to test nt6.x fast installer on a stick with sufficient capacity.
Not that I want to boot a full flown Windows 8 from stick, but for testing it would be nice. Note that the registry fix as included in nt6.x fast installer is not needed for Windows 8.

Cheers.

Edited by Escorpiom, 25 August 2012 - 03:54 AM.

[JanuszChmiel]

Dear Steve,
You are advanced programmer, who is deeply familiar with Macro Assembler, Visual Basic 6.0, C programming language and even with Visual basic scripting language.
I would like to very valuably and kindly ask You for reliable and really functioning solution, which is able to install Windows 7 to bootable USB harddisk, with success.
If you had find reliable NT6 fast installer, other packages or programs version, which is really able to do this task, please write me some instructions.
Unfortunately, algorithm build inside The .exe variant of NT6 FAST INSTALLER v1.05 build0228
The function, which should support booting from USB harddrive is causing The problem.
System will be automatically rebooted several seconds after The stage, when NT kernel stops The harddisk and when NT kernel will reactivate The harddrive again.

When i tested NT6 fast installer dated to year 2011, it will terminate when i press The letter of my target USB drive.

I know, that Windows 7 have not been developed officially to support booting and using from external USB stick or USB harddisk, i Am very deeply appreciating Yours programmers work and Yours study of various articles how to do this.

I would like to boot X86 WIndows 7, i have both variants, without SP1 or with SP1 professionaly integrated by developers from Microsoft CORP.
So if You know about reliable solution, please let me know about it.

With kindness regards.
Janusz Chmiel

[steve6375]

Hi
Did you follow Tutorial 47 on my site - if it did not work please explain what happened and how many different systems you tried?

If I were you however, I would use WIndows8ToGo as it can be booted on different systems.

[JanuszChmiel]

Dear Steve,
I would like to deeply apologize to You. I can confirm, that Yours NT6fast installer, The version downloadable from Yours tutorial 47 of Yours WEB site is really producing fully usable, bootable USB external media with fully functioning Windows7 and Windows 8 operating systems.
Special registry values, which are being imported to The offline Windows registry are causing, that Windows can be reliably to use even after appliing many updates.

I have complex programmers pleasment addressed to You.

Do You know about reliable procedure, which would force Windows 7 kernel to allov users of USB external harddisks to use virtual memory?

This is not causing problems with Windows 8, because drivers and NT kernel is adapted officially to use virtual memory even while running from USB harddisks.

Diskmod is not allov me to use virtual memory.
I can not simply update driver of my USB harddisk, Windows core is not allov me to update this driver and replacing it with diskmod.
I have even downloaded special archive with diskmod.sys and .inf and with some .bat files, but registry changes are not causing Windows 7 to allov me to use virtual memory while booting from USB harddisk.

Have You tried to find some .sys driver, which would allov to do this?

And thank You for Yours installer, it is really producing usable Windows operating system installed on USB media.

I can even safely plug my USB stick while running from external USB harddisk and Windows is not causing The error and system is not rebooting.
So very, very, well done.

Thank You very much for Yours answer.
I know, that i can use virtual memory of SATA harddisk while running WIndows 7 from external USB harddisk, i have tried it.

[steve6375]

Hi,
First, NT6FastInstaller is not my creation and I can take no credit for it. I believe that fujianabc and others developed it, all I did was to change a few lines for my version of the script.
I don't quite understand what you want and I am not familiar with diskmod, but maybe others can help. I am not sure, but maybe ImDisk is what you could use?

[steve6375]

A user has contacted me about using the NT6FastInstaller. His Win7 1TB NTFS formatted USB drive had bootmgr missing and would not boot.
After some investigation, we found that the Installer.cmd script reports that the bcdboot command worked when actually it had failed after the ImageX copy had completed - we then found...

1. The Installer.cmd command bcdboot e:windows /s e: /v actually gives the error:
BSFVC: Failed to create a new system store: Status=[0xc000003a]

2. The command bcdboot e:windows /s e: /f ALL /v just gives the standard syntax/usage message.

His system is a Dell M15X Alienware from 2008 and it appears to be in EFI mode as EFITest.exe reports 'EFI' and not 'Legacy'.
I think that the problem is that it is trying to create an EFI boot system on the USB drive (E:) but as it is not a GPT disk it is failing.

any ideas?
cheers
Steve


Has anyone any suggestions?