[nickblame]

i know this could seem noobish but here goes:

what i was trying to do is make a usb stick that replaces the need of a bootcd with any xp iso.

this new feature does exactly that, it boots your iso with cd emulation. unfortunately text mode installation crashes on starting windows with a nice blue screen.

i also found out that seting up xp (the unnatended ones) is actually possible with pe enviroment, copy some folders and reboot. well this gets comfusing while following the long guide.

will it ever be possible to boot any iso as if it were on cd-rom? is there an easy way to have any xp setup iso running off a usb with no errors?

sorry for the newbie aspect of the post, i really don't want to look like complaining about all these cool efforts on usb setup booting!

This post has been edited by nickblame: 01 August 2009 - 10:24 AM

[jaclaz]

nickblame, on Aug 1 2009, 06:17 PM, said:

i know this could seem noobish but here goes:
what i was trying to do is make a usb stick that replaces the need of a bootcd with any xp iso.

YES . (meaning that it DOES sound noobish).

nickblame, on Aug 1 2009, 06:17 PM, said:

this new feature does exactly that, it boots your iso with cd emulation. unfortunately text mode installation crashes on starting windows with a nice blue screen.

Hmm, not exactly:

• it's blue
  
• it's NOT nice
  
• it's NOT "a" blue screen
  
• it's a blue screen with STOP ERROR 0x0000007b (there are several tens if not hundreds of "blue screens")

nickblame, on Aug 1 2009, 06:17 PM, said:

will it ever be possible to boot any iso as if it were on cd-rom? is there an easy way to have any xp setup iso running off a usb with no errors?

sorry for the newbie aspect of the post, i really don't want to look like complaining about all these cool efforts on usb setup booting!

NO. (meaning it is NOT possible now, unless you use a RAMDISK and the source .iso is relatively small, 512 Mb for the 2003 SP1 or R2 files or 640 Mb for the free/trial version of Diskless Angel wdsys.sys driver, and you have at least 1 Gb of memory )

Your initial newbie error is the "any" you put near "iso" , and, unfortunately, it's not even a "new" question:
http://www.boot-land...?showtopic=6896
http://www.boot-land...?showtopic=2936
http://www.boot-land...?showtopic=8026
http://www.boot-land...?showtopic=7761

This is a very complex topic, definitely not for a newbie, however if you want to learn about what is possible and what it is not, start from here (hopefully an understandable explanation):
http://www.boot-land.net/forums/index.php?...=2692&st=26
http://www.boot-land.net/forums/index.php?...=3287&st=52

Something is in the works:
http://www.boot-land...?showtopic=8168
http://www.boot-land...?showtopic=8415
but DO NOT expect anything soon.

nickblame, on Aug 1 2009, 06:17 PM, said:

sorry for the newbie aspect of the post, i really don't want to look like complaining about all these cool efforts on usb setup booting!

No prob.

jaclaz

[cdob]

nickblame, on Aug 1 2009, 11:17 AM, said:

it boots your iso with cd emulation. unfortunately text mode installation crashes on starting windows with a nice blue screen.

Do you refer to grub4dos ISO file mapping?
There is a windows driver missing to mount the ISO file. So far this driver dosn't exist.

Quote

will it ever be possible to boot any iso as if it were on cd-rom?

This is very unlikely.
Expect the contrary: no iso file can be booted as if it were on cd-rom.
Exeptions are listed at http://www.boot-land...?showtopic=5041

Just dreaming: PLoP with ISO image mounting capability

Quote

is there an easy way to have any xp setup iso running off a usb with no errors?

Most likely you will have to edit XP CD ISO file always. A default XP CD ISO file will fail.

So far RAM loading a ISO image is promising.
http://www.msfn.org/...howtopic=135083

[nickblame]

thank you both and sorry for not finding a same question thread myself. it is a real same though not to be able to do that since stupid cd-roms should be nowdays treated as floppies.(totaly useless).

to end the noob delirium what about this (!) :
lets hook the bios into thinking that the usb stick is a usb cd-rom! oh a hitachi one ide interface if you guys can plz. lets "low level emu" this sucker

again thanks and fingers crossed on the ramdisk.sys method!

[cdob]

nickblame, on Aug 3 2009, 11:42 AM, said:

lets hook the bios into thinking that the usb stick is a usb cd-rom!

A U3 USB Stick is a fake USB CD-ROM.
Some BIOS boot from this fake USB CD-ROM. Other BIOS fails.
http://www.msfn.org/...howtopic=121502

fingers crossed on the ramdisk.sys method!

It's working at booted CD so far.
Booted from USB, windows setup behave different, because there is a booted USB drive.
Clean solution: don't boot from USB. Circle closed

[nickblame]

can't one just boot in linux, make two partitions, one to setup windows in and one to hold the setup files and then get the system ready to boot from hdd and kick the installation from the partition? no need for usb boot then

[cdob]

Yes, this is possible.
Read the sticky messages.
And run: winnt32 /h
Next write a shell script to prepare installation files.