1007 replies to this topic

[Aye Htay]

Hi Wimb,

Updating my testing.
Compressed VHD is still OK now.
But bootmgr file must not be compressed as never boot.
Now my compressed VHD is 2.62gb, 558mb free space.
DotNet and WMP OK.
Office 2007 Word, Excel, PP, Outlook works fine.

P-S: Never recommended to use in USB HDD as may seriously damage either your internal hdd or usb hdd when freezing in boot time.

Regads,

ah

[Doodoo]

Hi Wimb

I've been playing quite a bit with your package in the last few days, and there are a few things I would like to ask. Having read again all your instructions, I realise there is something I might have been doing wrong for a long time, but this is the procedure I have been following:

• Start from a clean XP installed in an IMG
• Boot it, and plug in my target USB flash drive to have it recognised
• From an external OS, patch my IMG with USB_XP_Fix
• Copy the patched IMG on my flash drive

I have found that if I swap the order of steps 3 and 4, the result is different. You will find attached a diff of the system hive in both cases (i.e. patch applied on USB in one case, and applied on HDD in the other case). The differences are not very numerous, but enough to cause a BSOD in one case, and not in the other. Are these differences to be expected ? Is it possible to apply USB_XP_Fix on HDD and still get a correct behaviour (I find that more convenient, to keep backup copies of the IMGs I'm using).

On a slightly different note, I have noticed in version 2.3 of your package, that when usb_xp_init.cmd is invoked, a command prompt appears in the background, applying the registry tweaks to the offline system. Quite a few tweaks seem to go wrong ("error: wrong parameter" being reported). Is that to be expected ? (e.g. depending on which devices are installed on the current system). Maybe that can explain a few occasional BSODs ?
In version 2.4 you seem to have reorganised quite a few things, and I can't seem the command prompt anymore, so I have no means to know if the same problem occurs again, but certainly the registry seem to be fairly different again (see attached diff between versions 2.3 and 2.4).

Attached Files

•  Diff_USB_HDD.html   69.77K   9 downloads
•  Diff_23_24.html   370.36K   8 downloads

[Doodoo]

Is it possible to apply USB_XP_Fix on HDD and still get a correct behaviour ?

Ah well yet another request
If the answer to that question is no, i.e. if USB_XP_Fix must be used on an IMG which resides on USB, would it be possible to envisage avoiding step 2, i.e. avoiding the target USB device recognition, because USB_XP_Fix could detect it (the IMG residing on it) and directly install the required drivers or make the required registry tweaks in the offline system ?

[ambralivio]

Aye-Htai,

since I presume that most people is getting to use a USB-HDD for this task, could you please better clarify the point below ?

Hi Wimb,

P-S: Never recommended to use in USB HDD as may seriously damage either your internal hdd or usb hdd when freezing in boot time.

Regads,

ah

Specifically, what is the major risk (and why) on using a USB-HDD ?

[Aye Htay]

Aye-Htai,

,,,,,,,,,,,,


Specifically, what is the major risk (and why) on using a USB-HDD ?

Lond story with it.
Really I don't know exactly the tech of attach and detach of VHD in windows.
I'm just telling about my experience.
I'm trying to boot VHD from my USB Flash several times.
Every time, the screen is black and the light on Flash is blinking so I'm sure something is loading from my USB Flash.
After waiting for half an hour, it is still the same figure so I force to shutdown pressing power button.
And then I restart my PC and everything is normal state. That's OK. Nothing wrong.
But...
I tried to load my VHD from Sumsung Story 1.5 tb these times.
First a few times, it is still OK and nothing occurred any odds.
Last time I loaded from it and the same thing happended like USB Flash.
It was blinking and seemed to be working, after 20 minutes, I forced to shut down the PC and restarted my PC from that drive.
Oddly, the screening is black and nothing happened so I detached USB HDD and restarted my PC.
On my PC I have 2 SATA, 500gb and 160gb. I have 2 partitions windows 7 x86 and 1 partition of windows 7 x64. All my Windows 7 are installed in 500gb.
I've 3 partitions of XP and all XP are installed in 160gb.
After log in, when I checked Diskmanagement, something is wrong.
I noticed that my Sumsung Story 1.5tb is listed within the partitions of 500gb hdd.
So I checked with Sumsung Story, surely it is not connected with PC, even USB cable is taken off and power is also off.
And I went to Device Manager and rechecked and rescanned my 2 HDDs.
Suddendly, some flash came out and blue screen came out a message with "xxSF not not installed in your PC and reinstallation will be solved"
I've never seen that error message before my life. I googled in web with my other pc and nothing came out.
After a while, I restarted PC and I noticed 500gb is blank and all data is gone.
I attached my Sumsung Story to that PC and that's also blank and all data are gone.
Previously I tested with 2.5" slim 350gb USB Flash, and that drive had died after testing a few times.
I can see all partitions on it. But every partition showed 0 byte.
And I can't open, browse on any of it and can't format or delete on any partitions, message "no harddisk is detected, I/O error", I've tried with more than 5 of famous partition manager software.
Finally, I used low level format software and message came out "not match file system, do you want to procede? Yes or No. I said Yes and it reformat it. After reformatted, it can't play any more in any PC. If I attach in a PC or laptop, windows is dead and freezing, waiting a couple of hours, still the same and I need to shutdown.
That drive is bought not longer than 4 months. I dumped it finally.
Above experiences I assume as follow:
When trying to load VHD from USB Drive, windows will attach your VHD file into one of your hdd in your pc.
And then it will boot from it, when shutdown, windows will detach vhd file from hdd and shutdown.
If the process goes nothing wrong, that's fine. But if something went wrong, it has attached in HDD or somewhere and it made serious errors.

I dare not say it'll occur but it may at least for me.

So just remind to all of you with my bad experiences to avoid those.

Regards,

ah

[wimb]

Is it possible to apply USB_XP_Fix on HDD and still get a correct behaviour (I find that more convenient, to keep backup copies of the IMGs I'm using).

USB_XP_Fix.exe can be applied to XP Image file located on HDD or USB.
The program does not detect whether the file is on HDD or on USB.
I just advice to apply the program to Image file after copy to USB, so that it has the right properties for that location.
The original file on HDD keeps then the desired properties for booting from HDD.

But it is up to you, you can also keep the file suitable for booting from USB as backup file on HDD (as long as you remember what you are doing ...)

I cannot explain the difference between applying USB_XP_Fix to XP Image file on HDD and USB that you describe.
It should be the same. Make the comparison for version 24 and not for 23.

Of course version 24 is not the same as version 23.
Version 24 has improved (and more) tweaks and does NOT make use any more of usb_xp-init.cmd

How is version 24 performing for you ?
Can you boot from USB on Dell laptop now ?

[wimb]

@Aye Htay

Could it be that you mixed up drive signatures.
The signature for the VHD drive in Mounted Devices Registry key should correspond to the MBR signature of the VHD file.
You can use TinyHexer to read drive signature in MBR.

I have made today NTFS Compressed VHD file with Windows 7 for booting from USB-harddisk.
Procedure as described earlier taking drive signatures into account.
Everything is working fine.

[Doodoo]

I cannot explain the difference between applying USB_XP_Fix to XP Image file on HDD and USB that you describe.
It should be the same. Make the comparison for version 24 and not for 23.

Well I certainly didn't expect any difference, so I thought I would ask. It took me a long time to figure it out, but I just insisted because I got many BSODs, but I knew I got it to work at some point, with the very same version. It turned out I applied USB_XP_Fix directly on USB when it worked, and had BSODs when I applied it on HDD. I will try with version 2.4 and will let you know.
Can you explain the errors I'm seeing in version 2.3 when applying usb_xp-init.cmd ? Is there any chance the same errors exist in version 2.4 ? (given that I can't see the console - Is it possible to have a log file just to make sure ?)

How is version 24 performing for you ?
Can you boot from USB on Dell laptop now ?

No it still gives me BSOD 7B on the Dell laptop. I am making many experiments with usboot.org to figure out what is different. I will report on that soon, so that we can hopefully have more insight and get some ideas out of it !

[Doodoo]

I cannot explain the difference between applying USB_XP_Fix to XP Image file on HDD and USB that you describe. It should be the same.

OK I've repeated the experiment, and I'm definately getting different results. They're not exactly the same as those I published earlier, but something goes wrong when usb_xp-init.cmd is applied, I can clearly see (some) error messages in the console. But it doesn't really matter.....

Make the comparison for version 24 and not for 23.

Just tried it, and it now produces the same result when applied on HDD and on USB. That's great news, something has clearly changed for the better
It still doesn't work on the Dell laptop, but here is some information.

Starting from the very same XP IMG, I made several copies of it, then applied USB_XP_Fix to it (both on USB and on HDD), and at last applied USBoot to yet another copy.
Attached is the system hive for the various combinations, so that you can compare and have a look.

I have also attached the complete log file produced by USBoot so you can look at the details, but the here are the main points. On top of installing 4 critical elements (USBoot DeviceGuard, USBoot ServiceGuard, USBoot ArcGuard, USBoot DriveGuard, see this post and a few others), USBoot does the following:

Processing step VII:  Installation of all available drivers of classes "USB" and "1394"

Processing step VIII: Installation of all available drivers of critical classes (excluding class "SCSIAdapter") but only generic ones for classes "System", "Keyboard" and "Mouse"

Processing step IX:  Removal of information concerning non present devices

Processing step X:  Reinstallation of present devices of class USB

Processing step XI:  Reinstallation of present devices of class SYSTEM preferring generic device IDs

It looks like all this driver management is critical, as it probably helps making sure all devices along the path to the boot USB device have correct drivers. It probably also explains why Usboot doesn't seem to require that the target USB device be recognised by XP to begin with. Something which may have a similar effect, but which I haven't tried yet, is to enable KTD when using USB_XP_Fix.
What I can say however, is that if I apply only Phase I & II of USBoot (which take care of DeviceGuard, ServiceGuard, ArcGuard, DriveGuard, and also all the driver stuff described above), then apply USB_XP_Fix, I can boot successfully from the problematic Dell laptop.

Attached Files

•  system_hives.7z   239.98K   27 downloads
•  USBoot.7z   29.88K   11 downloads

[wimb]

Thanks Doodoo

I think gradually we will confine the problem and find out what is still essential to have booting from USB for the Dell laptop.

I will have a look at the results that you shared.

At the moment I am making progress with a NEW program named VHD_W7_Compact.exe
that from W7 installed in 10 GB VHD will create 2 GB VHD with 1.2 GB Win7 booting from USB
and still having IE8 + WMP + .NET Framework 2.0 (EasyBCD 2.0 is working).

There is still a lot to be done, but the first results show that this can be achieved ....

[Aye Htay]

Could it be that you mixed up drive signatures.

Thanks Wimb.
It could be, I'll check it later.
Good to hear you'll get compress vhd working fine.
Waiting for your VHD_W7_Compact.exe to test it.

Regards,

ah

[Doodoo]

I think gradually we will confine the problem and find out what is still essential to have booting from USB for the Dell laptop.
I will have a look at the results that you shared.
At the moment I am making progress with a NEW program named VHD_W7_Compact.exe

Sounds like a very good plan to me !!! I plan on trying W7 soon, I have not even installed it once for now !!
For XP, there is no rush really, I don't need to boot from this Dell laptop at any cost !! But I agree with you, it would be nice to get to the bottom of this problem and understand why. I will keep investigating, with my limited knowledge and understanding . Many thanks for the help and support you have already provided !

[Doodoo]

Just tried it, and it now produces the same result when applied on HDD and on USB. That's great news, something has clearly changed for the better

HHhmmm maybe I claimed victory a little bit too soon
Yes the result is the same when USB_XP_Fix is applied on HDD or on USB, which is what you'd expect. But what I didn't check is that is was booting fine.... And it doesn't on my AMD desktop (as usual, BSOD 7B with version 2.4 but works well with version 2.3).

I have noticed that between versions 2.3 and 2.4 you made a few changes in ControlSet001\Services\usbhub. usbccgp, usbstor, etc...
I edited make_bt/registry_tweaks/HKLM_systemdst_USB.reg and reverted to the settings used in version 2.3 but that didn't help and it still gives me BSOD 7B.

However, this morning I have just found out that the following registry keys, which used to be applied by usb_xp_init.cmd, have disappeared altogether:

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\systemdst\ControlSet001\Control\CriticalDeviceDatabase\PCI#CC_0101]

"ClassGUID"="{4D36E96A-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318}"

"Service"="pciide"



[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\systemdst\ControlSet001\Control\CriticalDeviceDatabase\PCI#VEN_8086&CC_0101]

"ClassGUID"="{4D36E96A-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318}"

"Service"="intelide"



[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\systemdst\ControlSet001\Control\CriticalDeviceDatabase\PCI#CC_0C0300]

"ClassGUID"="{36FC9E60-C465-11CF-8056-444553540000}"

"Service"="usbuhci"



[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\systemdst\ControlSet001\Control\CriticalDeviceDatabase\PCI#CC_0C0310]

"ClassGUID"="{36FC9E60-C465-11CF-8056-444553540000}"

"Service"="usbohci"



[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\systemdst\ControlSet001\Control\CriticalDeviceDatabase\PCI#CC_0C0320]

"ClassGUID"="{36FC9E60-C465-11CF-8056-444553540000}"

"Service"="usbehci"



[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\systemdst\ControlSet001\Control\CriticalDeviceDatabase\USB#CLASS_08]

"ClassGUID"="{36FC9E60-C465-11CF-8056-444553540000}"

"Service"="usbstor"



[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\systemdst\ControlSet001\Control\CriticalDeviceDatabase\USB#CLASS_09]

"ClassGUID"="{36FC9E60-C465-11CF-8056-444553540000}"

"Service"="usbhub"



[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\systemdst\ControlSet001\Control\CriticalDeviceDatabase\USB#ROOT_HUB]

"ClassGUID"="{36FC9E60-C465-11CF-8056-444553540000}"

"Service"="usbhub"



[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\systemdst\ControlSet001\Control\CriticalDeviceDatabase\USB#ROOT_HUB20]

"ClassGUID"="{36FC9E60-C465-11CF-8056-444553540000}"

"Service"="usbhub"

Have you intentionally removed this bit ? Or should it be added back to HKLM_systemdst_USB.reg ?
I'll give it a try and see if it boots.

[wimb]

Have you intentionally removed this bit ? Or should it be added back to HKLM_systemdst_USB.reg ?

Thanks for feedback of BSOD 7B problem.

Sorry, I must have forgotten those keys, when integrating the tweaks made by usb_xp_fix.cmd
Please add them as you proposed and have a try.

I will make a quick fix later this afternoon .....

[Doodoo]

Please add them as you proposed and have a try.

I won't be able to actually try it until later tonight. For now I have added the keys in HKLM_systemdst_USB.reg, but it's not clear to me if that's the right place or if they should go in HKLM_systemdst_Add.reg or even HKLM_systemdst_Add_XP.reg. Is HKLM_systemdst_Add.reg supposed to be common for both XP and W7 ?

[wimb]

=
*** IMG_XP package Version 2.4 - Boot XP from Image file on USB ***

Quick Fix needed for HKLM_systemdst_USB_XP.reg and HKLM_systemdst_USB_W7.reg registry tweaks

Thanks to Doodoo for feedback http://reboot.pro/98...post__p__124420


Download - IMG_XP

Please Redownload and Extract to new location instead of Updating old IMG_XP folder

@Doodoo
I have made that mistake because Windows 7 does NOT need those extra tweaks.
The problem is solved by treating XP and Win7 now differently for those set of tweaks.

[wimb]

*** IMG_XP package Version 2.5 - Boot XP from Image file on USB ***


NEW PROGRAM - VHD_W7_Compact.exe


Download - IMG_XP

Please Extract to new location instead of Updating old IMG_XP folder

Thanks to Aye Htay for sharing his filelist of Mini7 , which was used as start info for VHD_W7_Compact.exe
This list is further improved with the list of Portable 7 PE and used as file copy_7vhd.txt in folder VHD_W7
http://reboot.pro/98...post__p__122370


Procedure for booting with 2 GB Portable Windows 7 VHD file on USB-harddisk
Step 1. - Direct Install Windows 7 in a 10 GB VHD file on local harddisk and created by WinNTSetup2_x86.exe with Ctrl + Shift + V
Step 2. - Run VHD_W7_Compact.exe to Copy Win7 VHD content in 10 min to New VHD file of Reduced Size on USB-harddisk
Step 3. - Reboot with 2 GB Win7 VHD file from USB

On Running VHD_W7_Compact.exe you need to Select your User Folder in folder Users of the Win7 VHD Source file
The program takes care of Attach and Detach of VHD files by using diskpart.exe of your Windows 7 or 7 PE Operating System.

The program is suitable for 32-bits Windows 7 and was tested with en-US Ultimate version,
but may work with other distributions as well.


VHD_W7_Compact.exe - makes 2.0 GB Win7 VHD file for booting from USB-harddisk

 VHD_W7_C2.png   28.54K   56 downloads ==  VHD_W7_2.png   876.5K   51 downloads

[maanu]

@ wimb

congratulations on releasing the new version with new tool .

i dont know why , but i just dont like this VHD stuff. or at least you could through some light ?

1. is it necessary to use vhd's for 7 ?cant we use .img ?
2. does it go like below with vhd's ?

a. fire up JFX's tool , press ctrl shift v . make a 10GB vhd .
b. attach it .
c. format it
d. mark as active it disk mgmt .
e. install 7 to it

now comes the tricky part , whenever i tried to boot that VHD for finalising the 7 install . it did not boot up through BCD , giving me some sort of

" windows could not start " error at very early stage of booting .

i was just wondering if it is possible to boot the VHD by grub4dos directly ?

or can i do this process in reverse , means 1st install 7 to hard disk as normal . then move it to VHD file through your program ? and then further compact it ?

[Aye Htay]

by grub4dos directly ?

Yes, you can.
For example, you have 3 partition on usb hdd.
Partition 1 is 7 32 installed.
Partition 2 is 7 64 installed.
So you do not want to mess with this 2 partitions and you place your vhd into partition 3.
If you haven't install g4d, install it on your usb hdd using grubinst.
You have to make partition 3 as Active before you install g4d.
Copy grldr and menu.lst into Partition 3.
Add menu.lst as follow.
title 7_32 VHD
chainloader /bootmgr

There are bootmgr file and boot folder as hidden in partition 3 when you created with Wimb tool.

Now you're ready to start with usb hdd.

@Wimb

Good tool.
Just one thing is wrong while booting.
ie4**** files and registering needed, something like those files are not registered properly. And explorer shell can't start and freezing.



ah

[art_civil]

Thank you Wimb!

VHD_W7_Compact.exe wonder execution sequence?


"Details of Procedure to create Win7 VHD file for booting from USB-drive:
1. Boot with Windows 7 or 7PE
2. Use R-mouse menu to Mount Windows 7 Setup ISO file in ImDisk virtual drive (if needed first Install imdiskinst.exe)
3. Run WinNTSetup2_x86.exe and use Ctrl + Shift + V to create Win7 VHD file on local Harddisk (or use Disk Management)
4. In WinNTSetup2_x86.exe adjust Windows 7 Tweaks and Select install.wim and Bootdrive and your attached Win7 VHD
Select all System-Only Tweaks except Turn OFF USB and select other tweaks that you like
5. Use Setup to prepare Win7 VHD file and Boot drive menu and Reboot to Start Install of Windows 7
6. Reboot 2x with Win7 VHD to finish Install of Windows 7 in VHD
7. Install anything you need like ImDisk and 7Zip and connect your USB-harddisk to Update registry
Use Computer Properties and Set System Protection for Win7 VHD drive Off and Reboot Win7 VHD
8. Reboot with Windows 7 or 7 PE
9. Copy Win7 VHD to bootable USB-drive and use Disk Management to Attach Win 7 VHD located on USB
10. Open cmd prompt and create Boot Manager menu on USB-drive by running

bcdboot N:\Windows /s P:


where N: is your attached Win7 VHD and P: is your USB-drive

11. In Disk Management Detach Win7 VHD

12. If your USB-drive was NOT formatted in Windows 7 OS, then you need to fix the Bootsector of USB-drive P: with


bootsect.exe /nt60 P: /force


13. Run USB_W7_Fix.exe of IMG_XP package to fix the registry of Win7 VHD file on USB
14. Reboot with Win7 VHD from USB"



In the above order of a few second after you run the "VHD_W7_Compact"? After 10 or 14 times are after?
VHD_W7_Compact.exe wonder execution sequence?

[wimb]

Procedure for booting with 2 GB Portable Windows 7 VHD file on USB-harddisk
Step 1. - Direct Install Windows 7 in a 10 GB VHD file on local harddisk and created by WinNTSetup2_x86.exe with Ctrl + Shift + V
Step 2. - Run VHD_W7_Compact.exe to Copy Win7 VHD content in 10 min to New VHD file of Reduced Size on USB-harddisk
Step 3. - Reboot with 2 GB Win7 VHD file from USB

Above is the procedure to be followed.

@art_civil
Above Step 2. wiil do all of points 9-13

@Aye Htay
bootmgr and folder Boot with BCD do NOT occur inside VHD, but are located in root of USB-harddisk bootdrive.
So your USB-harddisk is booting directly with Bootmanager Menu, where you can select to boot with Win7 VHD file.
Try to use WinNTSetup2_x86.exe to prepare 10 GB VHD Source file with freshly installed 32-bits Windows 7 (first don't add anything else).

@maanu
Let WinNTSetup2_x86.exe do all the work, don't do anything manually.
Ctrl + Shift + V creates 10 GB VHD file and then on Windows 7 tab use Tweaks as described and use Setup.
It will make Boot Manager menu in your selected Bootdrive and it will prepare VHD file for Install of Windows 7

[wimb]

**** 2 GB Portable Windows 7 VHD file on USB-harddisk ****

Booting from USB-harddisk with 2 GB Windows 7 VHD file has great advantage as compared to booting with Windows 7 PE
- VHD means booting as FILEDISK so that you don't need to load RAMDISK as in 7 PE
- VHD can be used for fast booting from USB for computers with less RAM or slow USB boot speed
- VHD Win7 remembers installed drivers and programs, so you boot direct with perfectly installed OS
- VHD Win7 has built-in Printer and MultiMedia support as in full Windows 7 OS
- VHD Win7 has more built-in driver support as compared to full XP Image booting as FILEDISK

It might be possible to remove more files from the list to make the 2 GB Windows 7 VHD file.
I hope you can help to further reduce the filelist VHD_W7\copy_7vhd.txt
so that we can make smaller Portable Windows 7 VHD file without loosing (too much) functionality.

[Aye Htay]

Hi Wimb,

ie4uinit.exe entry point not found with error Advpack.dll
so explorer shell can't open.
I've used explorer++ ulternatively to open folders and reg hives.
I saw Wow6432... in regkeys, no need for 32bit version.
I tested with fresh full Ultimate 7 source.
Yes, I've used g4d direct boot to vhd file.

BTW: Could you possibly edit on USB_W7_Fix.exe to enable any vhd to boot from USB, please?
When I edit my own VHD with it, it said MBR BootCode NOT Found and can't go any further.
Thanks.

Regards,

ah

[i]

Hi I have question (very old one at that)




Why IMG_XP_Update.exe updates registry and drivers ONLY? The last time i deleted files from ramdisk, and clicked update button, files remained on .IMG




Also, when programs are updated to new versions (for example media player classic home cinema) and when i replace them from ramdisk system, press update button, old version remains

[davlak]

Hi I have question (very old one at that)




Why IMG_XP_Update.exe updates registry and drivers ONLY? The last time i deleted files from ramdisk, and clicked update button, files remained on .IMG




Also, when programs are updated to new versions (for example media player classic home cinema) and when i replace them from ramdisk system, press update button, old version remains

as you can now boot XP in filedisk (via winvblock) it doesn't matter anymore, I imagine.
also: you can anyway mount the image with IMDISK and make the changes.