[Atari800XL]

OK, a little addendum to my last post:
I said that the PE system shouldn't rely on the harddisk, but of course, that's not the right way of thinking: Because before starting WinNTSetup, I already have a formatted C:\ drive ready! So I can make a small pagefile on the C: drive!
Now I only need a way to create the pagefile in a script, I never did that before so that will need some more work, but I believe all this could work beautifully!

EDIT:

Aargh... so close... :

wmic computersystem where name="win7pese" set AutomaticManagedPagefile=False
wmic pagefileset create name="C:\pagefile.sys" (NOTE single backslash)
wmic pagefileset where name="C:\\pagefile.sys" set InitialSize=100,MaximumSize=100 (NOTE the double backslashes)

... this "almost" works, except it needs a reboot (of course, that's not possible in WinPE).

This post has been edited by Atari800XL: 02 June 2012 - 11:59 AM

[JFX]

Atari800XL, on 02 June 2012 - 10:45 AM, said:

So then the only solution would be adding more RAM, I guess. Or the conclusion that the combo WinPE_SE + WinNTSetup + Windows 8 Release Preview can't be done with 512mb. Do you think it would be practical to add a memory check in WinNTSetup? (If only to avoid this nasty appcrash? You don't want your app to look bad, when Microsoft is to blame?)

Well, not sure if installing windows 8 on an old system with only 512MB RAM, will be much fun.
But you right I should avoid this. Guess memory check and creating pagefile on installation drive will be the right solution.
Just need to figure out how to use the API

Atari800XL, on 02 June 2012 - 10:45 AM, said:

OK, one last thing: Is there no way to use the "Consumer Preview" apply method (~49mb) with the new "Release Preview"? (Guess not...)

No, that's not possible.

This post has been edited by JFX: 09 March 2013 - 10:15 AM

[Atari800XL]

Well, using Windows 8 on a 512 mb system might not be very common, but it can be done. If you're fed up with dealing with the "problems" I keep bringing up, PLEASE say so (I was kind of waiting for that already, but you just keep on being so polite and nice!).

It all depends on how you install your complete system, I guess. After installing XP/W7/W8, I turn off/delete most unnecessary stuff, and only keep the bare essentials needed for running a business oriented system. On my test system (HP nc6320, 1,66ghz Intel Core2 T5500, 512mb), Windows 7 runs beautifully, and Windows 8 even leaves more RAM free! So when you say "it's not much fun", you may be right, but it IS "much business"!
I use a "postinstall" system (fully unattended, of course) to install all my applications and settings, and as an example, you cannot even tell XP/W7/W8 apart from a distance, beacuse they all have just a blue, empty desktop greeting you after it's done. I hardly even use the startmenu, all apps and settings are available from a (boring) big window full of (categorized) buttons, like a poor man's metro interface!

It would be perfect if (in WinNTSetup) you could create a pagefile on the install drive prior to applying the image, but I really couldn't ask that from you! I even wonder myself if it's worth the trouble. With my limited skills, the best I came up so far is an Autohotkey script to call up the Virtual Memory dialog. That way, the only thing left to do manually is to click "OK", and then start WinNTSetup with Windows 8 (ctrl-sh-8 on my Win7PESE system).

But of course, if you DO decide to build it, I would be one happy customer! Would it be necessary to delete the temporary pagefile from the install drive? Would it be problematic for the new W8 installation if there's already an existing pagefile.sys on C:\?

This post has been edited by Atari800XL: 03 June 2012 - 04:41 AM

[JFX]

Well no problem, I want WinNTSetup as perfect as possible

Just noticed that the normal setup.exe also creates a pagefile: winpepge.sys
I try to add similar next week.

This post has been edited by JFX: 09 March 2013 - 10:15 AM

[JFX]

Atari800XL, on 03 June 2012 - 04:40 AM, said:

Would it be necessary to delete the temporary pagefile from the install drive? Would it be problematic for the new W8 installation if there's already an existing pagefile.sys on C:\?

Well a used pagefile can't be deleted without reboot and during setup the new system will overwrite it.
Existing pagefile should not be problem but it's preferable to format the partition before install.

Was just about 30 lines of code, Alpha 5 uploaded.

This post has been edited by JFX: 09 March 2013 - 10:15 AM

[Atari800XL]

That is pretty amazing. I don't know how to begin to thank you.

This kind of support is just baffling....

Did a quick test (512mb RAM, Win7PE_SE from USB, format C: with diskmgmt, WinNTSetup 2.3 Alpha 5, W8RP): WORKS!
[Edit: I can confirm that the pagefile, introduced in Alpha 5, was in fact created on C:).

Thank you, sir!

This post has been edited by Atari800XL: 05 June 2012 - 06:58 AM

[Atari800XL]

JFX, on 03 June 2012 - 05:43 AM, said:

I want WinNTSetup as perfect as possible

It's already pretty perfect. There's only cosmetic things left: I would really like the "Setup" button to have focus on startup (also, the "OK" button in the next "Ready?" dialog).
(Hey, I KNOW I'm nitpicking here, but as I said, the program itself already IS perfect, and seeing as there's no recent activity in this thread in the last week, I thought I'd squeeze in this last request before WinNTSetup 2.3 goes out of Alpha stage).

[dksvertix]

If we already are in cosmetics shop.. then I found few more things that could be better,.. or logical:

Location of Bootdrive and Installationdrive edit boxes.. why are they so **** long if only 2 characters go into them? Could there just be a short, available letter selection box instead?
Location of install.wim, Right-click to select an ISO file... I right-clicked, selected my ISO, but nothing appeared in that box. So I still had to extract the ISO and navigate to install.wim. I think this problem may require more than just makeup, a plastic surgery perhaps.

Also, in your first post, with download links. Could you write the correct, full app version number above the dl links?

Thank you!


(P.S. Why is D A M N censored out in this forum? )

This post has been edited by dksvertix: 09 June 2012 - 03:10 PM

[JFX]

@Atari800XL

Your right, is more stable then expected. I focused the buttons in Beta 1.


@dksvertix

I think the size of edit boxes is more personal taste, i like it that way.

The ISO file handling have to be defined inside WinNTSetup2_iso.cmd.
WinNTSetup only passes the iso filename to the batch an wait for newly arrived CD/DVD drives.

This post has been edited by JFX: 09 March 2013 - 10:16 AM

[Atari800XL]

Thanks for the focused buttons (above and beyond...), now I think I can setup XP/W7/W8 from (WinPE_SE-) USB with just 3 keystrokes (not counting disk management): ctrl-sh-x or xtrl-sh-7 or strl-sh-8 mounts the correct install ISO and calls WinNTSetup with the correct command-line arguments, then (after a quick check of the parameters) the unattended setup is just 2 <Enter>s away...

It just keeps getting better and better...

This post has been edited by Atari800XL: 11 June 2012 - 04:38 AM

[exta]

Hi everybody,

I use WinNTSetup since version 1.5 and I really want to thank you JFX for your great work !

I've just one suggestion about XP install. Can you add a button to switch partition alignment between XP and Vista/7/8 and a button that shortcut disk management (or an embedded disk management with option to create an XP or Vista/7/8 partition but I assume that's a lot of work for a small enhancement). I use Win7PE_SE and I change the default partition alignment with the registry keys that is on http://support.microsoft.com/kb/931760, then I create the partition before launching WinNTSetup. It would be faster to launch only WinNTSetup for doing that.

But it 's just a very small detail, because your software is already perfect for installing XP from Win7PE_SE.


Again thank you for your amazing work on this software !

[JFX]

Hi exta,

I have added an alignment option inside the system menu (right-click on title bar or ALT+SPACE)

If you click WinXP it will set these 4 Dword's to 0. A click on Win7 will delete them.

Hope that's what you wanted.

This post has been edited by JFX: 09 March 2013 - 10:16 AM

[exta]

That is exactly what I want and that is already include, just wonderfull !

Thanks again ! =)))

[exta]

After doing some tests with beta 2, x64 works fine on x64 os and x86 works fine on x86 os .

I don't know if this is a bug but the x86 has some issues on x64 os, the menu is incomplete and there is an error when left-clicking on the title bar.

As I said each version works very well on the os it is expected to work on.

 winntsetupb2-menu.png (40.21K)
Number of downloads: 9
 winntsetupb2-error.png (41.38K)
Number of downloads: 10

This post has been edited by exta: 12 June 2012 - 10:13 AM

[JFX]

Had not expected someone would use the x86 in an x64 Winpe.

Should be fixed now, no version change this time.

This post has been edited by JFX: 09 March 2013 - 10:16 AM

[exta]

I know that it is not a common use but that allow me to use just one exe (not lazyness, just for simplicity).

What are the advantages of running x64 versus x86 on WinPEx64 ?

For me x86 has the advantage of a better compatibility, however that's great to have the choice between compatible and optimized version =)

Thank you very much for the fix !

[JFX]

exta, on 13 June 2012 - 08:08 AM, said:

What are the advantages of running x64 versus x86 on WinPEx64 ?

Only 1 real advantage: the x64 version will always be a bit faster.

my average time to apply an install.wim:

x86 : 40 seconds
x64 : 37 seconds

So with SSD's or RAMDisk's one can noticed a slightly faster install, but with normal hard disk there won't be.

This post has been edited by JFX: 09 March 2013 - 10:16 AM

[exta]

Thanks for these informations, as I don't have (yet) SSDs I couldn't find the speed benefit. Good to know for the future

This post has been edited by exta: 13 June 2012 - 09:18 AM

[Escorpiom]

Hi JFX,

At the moment I'm using nt6fast installer, modified to suit my needs. I would like to start using your GUI installer, and it definitely works for W7.
The point is, I have made an universal XP WIM image, that can be applied by the nt6fast installer script.
I have modified the script so it doesn't create W7 bootfiles but instead XP bootfiles when the XP WIM has been selected.
Could you implement some (advanced) option to choose the type of bootsector to be written?
I would be able to select my XP WIM and after imaging the WinNTSetup would write the correct bootsector.
On a side note, I don't use normal XP setup anymore, it takes too long.

Another request, is it possible to add a post processing command in the tool? Such as: After imaging run xxx.cmd.
So far for the requests, I can't remember if there is an option to automatically load the .ini at startup...If not, it would be neat!

It should be noted that the NT6fast installer didn't work on Windows XP, I'll have to test your tool to see if it does, the problem lies in the multilanguage OS.
I use Spanish and it only runs on Windows 7, not on XP.
Given the fact that my XP PE is much smaller and thus loads faster, that would be the preferred platform for WinNTSetup.

Cheers.

There may be a solution to this...
From the help page:

- /NoBootSect - will not update BootSector and Master Boot Record
- /RunAfter:{command} - will run a command before reboot

So lets say we use these commandline switches to launch WinNTSetup, then it would be possible to run a .cmd file that does the bootsector for XP.
Automatically loading of the .ini should be possible in the same way.
You have done a pretty good job!

This post has been edited by Escorpiom: 26 June 2012 - 02:55 AM

[JFX]

Hi Escorpiom,

You could do this indeed with the runafter parameter. But no need, I have added a check that will automatically write the right Bootsector.

be careful installing that way, winntsetup don't understand that currently, so any GUI option will not work

WinNTSetup2.3 beta3

This post has been edited by JFX: 09 March 2013 - 10:16 AM