First of all in my first post here let me congratulate all of you on building such an extensive body of knowledge related to the Windows boot process. The amount of quality information here is really astonishing!

What I am trying to do is coerce a 13" Macbook Air Early 2015 into booting Windows 7. Apple specifically says W7 is not supported but cannot hurt trying (They recommend using W8 or W8.1 which do install work just fine.) This is their first firmware that does not have BIOS emulation / CSM mode available, and both the standard boot manager as well as rEFInd only show EFI-compatible bootloaders. W7 UEFI installer immediately goes into a blank screen but (long story short) I did get a UEFI-compatible W7 installed / imaged on the HDD and apropriate entries added to the BCD. However, like the installer, it will not boot, going straight into a blank screen and hanging there forever once W7 is selected in rEFInd.

Avenue One

Knowing that (1) Windows 8 works just fine and that (2) the hang seems to occur early on, I hoped that "simply" replacing a known-good winload.efi with one from W8 would get me started. Since its job is to mostly initialize hardware and then run ntoskrnl.exe I hoped this should not be too bad. Alas, my W7 install with winload.efi from W8 seems to get a little further: it displays a message that ntoskrnl.exe's signature could not be verified and allows me to go back to the F8 menu. Just for kicks I then replaced ntoskrnl.exe as well as its dependencies (BOOTVID.DLL, hal.dll and kdcom.dll) but got a crash soon after.

Do not yet know enough about the interplay between winload.efi and ntoskrnl.exe to judge if disabling signature verification is all I need to do or that there is so much communication between the two that they're utterly incompatible beyond surface-level hackery.

Avenue Two

Try to debug the boot process and see where it hangs. However, (1) Air does not have a serial port, (2) I do not yet have the required NET20DC debug cable, and (3) someone recently did not have much luck debugging even bootmgfw.efi with serial so I'm not sure I'm going to have much luck debugging a later-in-the-process EFI program with USB.

Summary

I do have programming experience but this is way more low-level than I have ever tried. Also, do have IDA but do not know what to look for yet, especially lacking the symbol files. Will thus be grateful if any of you could point me in the right direction. 

• Do you think I should chase forcing W8's winload.efi to work with W7 or will I be better off looking for that USB debug cable already?
• Is there some way I can learn — without a debug cable — at what step is W7 hanging to make sure it's winload.efi and not ntoskrnl.exe that is the root of the problem?
• Looking at all this and knowing much more than I do, what likelihood would you guesstimate there is of making this to a successful end?

(Final remarks:

• I did have a cursory search here as well as on Google but came back empty-handed. There are many threads on Air+W7 but all of them immediately conclude "not supposed to be done, sorry”.
• No, I'd much rather spend a few days making it run natively than use a virtual machine.)

Just successfully recover lost partition with the help of The Expert

http://reboot.pro/topic/20952-problem-with-ntfs-partition-and-data-recovery/#entry197482

and now i was given a desktop that won't boot all the way.

booted with WinPE to check disk:

PLPPART32 v0.1  20070403  by Elmar Hanlhofer  http://www.plop.at
Using physical drive 1

Drive geometry:
  Media Type         : FixedMedia
  Cylinders          : 19457
  Tracks per Cylinder: 255
  Sectors per Track  : 63
  Bytes per Sector   : 512

NR  ID  BOOT     SS  SH   SC    ES  EH   EC     LBAST    LBASEC  SIZE
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1  0x07 *[0x80]   1   1     0   63 254  1023        63 287370657 137.03 GByte
2  0x07          63 254  1023   63 254  1023 287386785  25189920 12.01 GByte
3  0x00           0   0     0    0   0     0         0         0 0.00 MByte
4  0x00           0   0     0    0   0     0         0         0 0.00 MByte

I have tried http://www.cgsecurity.org's TestDisk. Program could not recover partition 1.

Computer brand: hp

some hidden data stored in sectors [1-62] for recovery purpose

attached mbr and partition1 boot sector and backup boot sector

There is a way to copy a file defragmented to a free space defragemented?

Often I copy a file to a device that has sufficienten space defragmented but the file is fragmented after copying and again I have to defragment the entire disk.

Followed this:

http://sysmagazine.com/posts/175669/

or at webarchive:

http://web.archive.org/web/20150404200500/http://sysmagazine.com/posts/175669/

but with a difference, that I am still using my existing PXE menu from a different PXE server, but just added to existing default this entry:

label sccm
menu label Boot to SCCM 2012 R2
COM32 pxechn.c32
APPEND 10.0.0.86::smsboot\x86\wdsnbp.com -W

which starts booting from SCCS PXE, but crashes as it can not find its BCD store:

\\ssccm-server\REMINST\SMSTemp\2014.10.30.11.15.17.01.{10CEDB89-9093-44D6-BF1B-0FA357C08F58}.boot.bcd

I hate how SCCM is not configurable in any way, but have to live with it.

So does anybody know how to make it work?

I do not want to use SCCS PXE as default, as it means that my iso images are transferred by TFTP (currently I boot ipxe undionly.0 which does the transfer by http - which is way faster!)

sebus

Edit

There is

-o 66.x=xx:xx:xx:xx -S 

option, but I could not make it work either...

DOSbox compiled as Javascript, running a Windows 95 image.

https://win95.ajf.me/

If you have the issue in the title, where these are working in 32-bit WinPE but not 64-bit WinPE - you need to add SysWOW64\comctl32.dll AND replace System32\comctl32.dll with one from a full Windows install (WinPE version seems to be trimmed down)

That took an inordinate amount of time to figure out, hence posting here.

Hi,

i'm using WinPE and i'm creating menus with choice command.

But i want to use arrow keys to navigate my menus. is it possible?

Thanks

Friends some script to integrate HFS+ driver in Win8PE, I have already tried but failed.

Thanks

• CloneDisk (included)
• DMDE (included)
• Forensic Acquisition Utilities (included)
• FTK Imager (copied from local install)
• HWiNFO (included)
• LinuxReader (downloaded automatically)
• MW Snap (included)
• NT Password Edit (included)
• Opera (included)
• Sumatra PDF Reader (included)
• WinHex (copied from local install)
• X-Ways Forensics (copied from local install)
• Write Protect Tool (included)

Trying to work back through this script: http://w8pese.spam.net/Projects/Win8PESE/Build/5-Wow64.script

So far I've added all the regkeys, copied the entire syswow64 folder from a fully working Win10PE SE image to my the image I'm working on, copied the patched smss.exe into system32, copied the syswow64 three core files into system32, copied all the entries from winsxs, and copied all the entries from system32\catroot.

Unfortunately when trying to boot the image it crashes early in boot with "PROCESS1_INITIALIZATION_FAILED". Which some people say is related to bootcat.cache under system32\codeintegrity but this file does not exist in either of the PE images.

Have I missed something from the script?

EDIT: Just copied the original smss back, no luck, so it's not related to that in any way.

By default, the virtual drive shows up as a BD-ROM drive on your computer, so even if you don’t have a Blu-ray drive, you kind of do with the ZM-VE200

The problem is the "ANY" .iso.

Very little has changed since this thread:
http://www.boot-land.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=808

In a nutshell:
ALL DOS based .iso usually work or can be made to work easily
SOME Linux based .iso work, ALL of them can be made to work (not so easily)
ONLY RAMDISK (from Server 2003 SP1 or R2, NOT "gold", NOT SPS2 - limited to 512 Mbyte images) NT based images are known to work

This is not "limited" by grub4dos or other bootmanager, but by the actual way the .iso images are built and, in the case of NT based images, by the lack of a suitable driver.

With plenty of RAM there is a Commercial Ramdisk driver capable to go over the 512 Mb limit.

In other words, there is not (yet) a one-size-fits-all solution, each .iso has it's own "story" and needs "particular" attention:

• some work "as-they-are"
• some need a few, easy changes
• some need complex, difficult/undocumented changes (and a solution may even not exist yet)

grub4dos, .iso images and (hd32) or (0xFF) mapping
Post here ONLY reports of working setups!

• your mileage may vary
• stop asking how many miles per gallon (EU, please read Liters/100Km) "a" car will do, there is simply NOT a valid answer for that.

Have fun with this one: http://www.windows93.net/

Comes with a few games included.

Hello Saviours,

I am using TFTPd32 as a mechanism to transfer my Litetouch.wim, My issues is for other HP Desktops other than Z400 transfer rate is very fast and wim gets copied very quickly, but for Z400, transfer is very slow, and 256MB files takes more than 10 hrs to complete.

I tried connecting the systems directly, tried changing the cards and cable, but same issue... This machine has Broadcom card. 

This is a topic where I will collect frequently asked questions about ImDisk and related projects, together with answers or links to other topics with explanations, documentation etc.

• I want a RAM disk to be automatically created and formatted when Windows starts up.
  
  
  Spoiler

  You could for example use Windows Scheduler (look in Control Panel) to schedule a command to run at system startup. Command should be something like:
  
  imdisk -a -s 400M -m R: -p "/fs:ntfs /q /y"
  
  This will create a 400 MB RAM disk as drive R: and format it as NTFS during system startup.
  
  
   
• I want my auto-created RAM disk to be pre-loaded with a disk image file.
  
  
  Spoiler

  Change command line above and remove -p parameter (no need to format in this case) and include -f parameter with an image file name. For example:
  
  imdisk -a -t vm -f C:\ramdisk.img -m R:
  
  This will create a RAM disk and load contents of C:\ramdisk.img onto it.
  
  
   
• Image file for my auto-created RAM disk is small and I want RAM disk expanded to larger size automatically.
  
  
  Spoiler

  Just add another command to be scheduled:
  
  imdisk -e -s 400M -m R:
  
  This will add 400 MB to RAM disk drive R:
  
  You could of course put both commands in a batch file and schedule that batch file instead. This will make sure that they run in correct order:
  
  imdisk -a -t vm -f C:\ramdisk.img -m R:
  
  imdisk -e -s 400M -m R:
  
  
   
• How do I save a RAM disk as a disk image file from command line?
  
  
  Spoiler

  rawcopy -mld \\.\R: C:\ramdisk.img
  
  The rawcopy program is available on web site: http://www.ltr-data.se/opencode.html
  
  
   
• I want a RAM disk that uses memory above 4 GB in 32 bit Windows. Can ImDisk do that?
  
  
  Spoiler

  If your 32 bit Windows version supports memory access above 4 GB through address window extension (AWE) and with physical address extension (PAE) turned on, it could be done through an additional memory allocation driver called awealloc.
  
  Create the RAM disk with the awe option (schedule this command with Windows Scheduler if you want it to happen automatically at system startup):
  
  imdisk -a -s 400M -o awe -m R: -p "/fs:ntfs /q /y"
  
  This will ask awealloc driver to allocate 400 MB and then create a RAM disk drive R: within that memory and format it with NTFS. The 400 MB will primarily be allocated from as high memory addresses as possible, but parts of it could be allocated at lower addresses if not enough memory is free or otherwise accessible at high ranges. Check Windows Event Log to see error messages during memory allocation.
  
  
   
• When I delete files from my RAM disk memory still seems to be used. What is wrong?
  
  
  Spoiler

  ImDisk allocates memory for whole of RAM disk when RAM disk is created. Due to the way memory management works in Windows it might look like memory is not allocated until you put files on your RAM disk, but that is actually just a delay in committing memory pages and not a feature of ImDisk. When you delete files there is no way for ImDisk to tell Windows to "decommit" pages because all of RAM disk is allocated in one chunk.
  
  Some of these problems could be partially solved with awealloc driver as discussed above, because with awealloc not all of RAM disk memory needs to be in virtual address space at all times. But apart from that, there is sadly no good solution in sight as it looks right now.
  
  
   
• I would like to mount a vhd file from Microsoft Virtual PC, Virtual Server, Hyper-V etc. Can ImDisk do that?
  
  
  Spoiler

  Fixed size vhd files could be mounted without any special tweaks. Dynamically sized vhd files could be mounted through proxy mode with a program called devio. Download devio here: http://www.ltr-data.se/files/devio.exe
  
  Open a command prompt and type:
  
  devio shm:vhd1 C:\harddisk.vhd
  
  It will automatically find out that it is a vhd file and select first partition. There are various parameters available to devio if you want to mount as plain image or want another partition from the image file.
  
  Then, create the virtual disk:
  
  imdisk -a -t proxy -o shm -f vhd1 -m V:
  
  Make sure you leave devio running while virtual disk is mounted. You will get all sorts of disk I/O error messages and trouble if you kill it before dismounting the virtual disk. The devio process will automatically exit when you dismount the virtual disk.
  
  imdisk -d -m V:
  
  You can change devio command line to open image file in read-only mode:
  
  devio -r shm:vhd1 C:\harddisk.vhd
  
  The vhd1 name here is just an example. It is the name of shared memory and synchronization objects used to communicate between ImDIsk and devio. You can use any name you want but remember that it needs to be unique in case you mount many files simultanously.
  
  
   
• I would like to mount an image file of another format, for example vmdk or vdi. Could ImDisk do that?
  
  
  Spoiler

  ImDisk can not mount these formats natively, but it can interact with the DiscUtils library and that way mount them. You need to download a program called DiscUtilsDevio.
  Download DiscUtilsDevio.exe, ImDiskNet.dll and DevioNet.dll.
  
  You also need DiscUtils.dll, it is available on DiscUtils project pages or here: DiscUtils.dll
  
  Put downloaded exe and dlll files in same directory. Please note that .NET Framework 4.0 is needed for this to work.
  
  Open a command prompt, change to directory where you put DiscUtilsDevio.exe and DiscUtils.dll and type:
  
  DiscUtilsDevio /mount=V: /filename=C:\harddisk.vdi
  
  It will automatically find out that it is a vdi file and select first partition. There are various parameters available to DiscUtilsDevio if you want to mount as plain image or want another partition from the image file.
  
  Make sure you leave DiscUtilsDevio running while virtual disk is mounted. You will get all sorts of disk I/O error messages and trouble if you kill it before dismounting the virtual disk. The DiscUtilsDevio process will automatically exit when you dismount the virtual disk.
  
  imdisk -d -m V:
  
  You can change DiscUtilsDevio command line to open image file in read-only mode:
  
  DiscUtilsDevio /mount=V: /filename=C:\harddisk.vdi /readonly
  
  
   
• I try to mount an image file named something.bin and it does not work. What could be wrong?
  
  
  Spoiler

  If the image file has .bin suffix it is automatically treated as a CD/DVD image. If it is actually a disk volume image try to manually select "Harddisk volume" in Control Panel applet or specify -o hd at command line.
  
  
   
• My image file has a master boot record with partition table. When I mount it using Control Panel applet it asks me which partition to mount, but this does not seem to work from command line.
  
  
  Spoiler

  You need to add -v partitionnumber to imdisk.exe command line to automatically find offset etc for mounting a specific partition with image file. You could also use the multipurpose -b switch with -b auto to mount first specified partition in partition table. The -b auto argument also works with other kind of known image file formats with headers that must be skipped to find the actual disk data.
  
  
   
• I would like to mount a virtual disk to a subdirectory on my hard disk instead of using a drive letter. How to do that?
  
  
  Spoiler

  The subdirectory where the virtual disk will be mounted need to be on an NTFS volume and it needs to be empty (not even any hidden files or directories in it). This feature also requires Windows 2000 or later, it does not work on Windows NT 3.51 or 4.0.
  
  First, create an empty directory where you want to mount your virtual disk:
  
  md C:\vdisk
  
  Then, mount your virtual disk. In this example we use type "vm" to copy image file C:vdisk.img to memory and thus create a RAM disk.
  
  imdisk -a -t vm -f C:\vdisk.img -m C:\vdisk
  
  Now C:vdisk will point to your ImDisk drive, for example DeviceImDisk0 (drive number could be other than 0 if you have other virtual disks mounted, correct drive number will be shown on console).
  
  When you want to dismount, type:
  
  imdisk -d -m C:\vdisk
  
  This will remove the reparse point at C:vdisk and turn it back to an empty directory. If you instead type for example imdisk -d -u 0 you will just dismount the virtual disk but not remove the reparse point. In this case C:vdisk directory will automatically point to the next ImDisk drive you create, and you do not need to specify that directory as mount point in that case.
  
  imdisk -a -t vm -f C:\vdisk.img
  
  
   
• When I try to use the rawcopy program to save disk contents as image file, I get corrupt image files that cannot be mounted later. What is wrong?
  
  
  Spoiler

  To make sure that filesystem drivers or filesystem filter drivers do not interfere with rawcopy, use the -d flag:
  
  rawcopy -mld \\.\R: C:\ramdisk.img
  
  
   
• I would like to script a silent install of ImDisk, but when I try imdiskinst.exe -y it still shows a message box at end of setup. Is there a way to avoid all kind of user interaction during setup?
  
  
  Spoiler

  If you are calling imdiskinst.exe from a script or similar, define the environment variable IMDISK_SILENT_SETUP to the value of 1 before running imdiskinst.exe. This makes the install script skip message boxes and similar.
  
  For completely non-interactive setup, for example included in other setup packages, it is recommended that you extract the contents of imdiskinst.exe (use 7-zip) to a temporary setup directory. Then, run rundll32.exe setupapi.dll,InstallHinfSection DefaultInstall 132 path-to-setup-files\imdisk.inf or similar.
  
  It is also possible to edit install.cmd in the setup package and remove all calls to msgbox.exe utility. That utility is only used to display message boxes.
  
  
   
• Is there any step-by-step guide to creating a RAM disk at system startup?
  
  
  Spoiler

  Yes, "Bad_Machine" created one here: http://thessdreview....ftware/1834.htm

I've been looking for a solution for this for a long time...hoping to find a solution here...

i've religously followed Sir Cristian Magadan's tutorial...

https://windowsdisklessaoe.wordpress.com

and been able to boot winxp via aoe (encountered problems along the way, but successfully managed to get it working)

i've been able to boot it only on old systems (g31 and g41)

but...using the exact same method of successfully booting the above systems but using new hardware

h61 (gigabyte h61m-ds2+intel g620) have not able to boot successfully, always stop (7b) or stuck at loading screen

now, this has been the common problem of the above tutorial and googling about the topic

leads to no answers

these are the steps i've taken to successfully aoe boot on my g31, g41

1) install winxp (mines an nlited winxp sp3, without driverpacks) on a single 3gb partition, disabled pagefile

2) installed only lan driver (via driverpack solution)

3) installed aoe driver

4) set lan card driver "start" parameter to 0

5) used dd to image whole partition to a "shared" drive on the server (IMG file created)

6) disconnecting drive and enabling network boot, while serving the IMG via vblade

I've used this steps to successfully network boot 6pcs i have here (g31, g41) without problems

i tried this same steps on the h61 board, it doesn't work...

-more info

the gigabyte mobo uses UEFI

tried updating to standard drivers (ide+isa), still won't boot

haven't tried creating vhd from virtualbox, then using that...i will try that next...

enabled /sos on boot.ini, stuck on the first screen where cpu and memory is displayed

what could seem to be the problem? as the steps i've taken works on the old architecture...

i'm trying to solve this for the longest time...

i will give more details on what i've done, also reading "universal xp", "usb boot", other topics that could

help me in this one...