[weaz1dls]

Ok thought I'd post some things. Most of this may be common knowledge by now, or maybe not. It was news to me.


/noreboot switch works with 5048....
(did xcopy of boot drive as backup first)
mounted lh iso then at run command or command prompt
"drv ltr"\sources\setup /noreboot


after entering some info setup counted down then disapeared. Saying come back in 15 minutes.

Anyway I then created a folder called root and a folder called Trgt. I xcopyed (w/switches) my boot drive with the boot.ini to the root folder and the target drive (the one with the ~ls folder to the Trgt file. I am entering this post before reboot.


Changes in boot.ini file.....

new switches apear after the boot entry. Some are familiar such as /noexecute=optin and /Fastdetect but here are some new ones.....
/USENEWLOADER /DETECTHAL /MININT

The ~bt folder looks like a pe disk ready to be burned... well hope this is info someone can use....I'm off to reboot....will post more info as I go.


I used alcohol120 created a virtual drive.
On that drive I mounted the iso
created 2 clean partitions. so I now have c: d: e: f: g: h:
c=boot
d:=xp pro
e:=
f:=
g:=
h:=
i:=dvd usb
j:= alc 120 mounted lh iso

made folder on e:\rootbk
xcopied w/switches c: to rootbk
made folders on f:\root and f:\trgt and f:\trgt2

plan is to install to H: as the trgt drive while in the XP environment. Now have a backup of boot partition, so from a cmd window or from the run box navigate to the iso drive....
j:\
change dir to sources
j:\sources\
enter "setup /noreboot"
then enter the info it asks....first choice read or install...
install....
next enter key....self explanitory.....
next click on install location and I chose drive H:....
computer name...left it as is...
click continue....
it copied files...then came to a countdown...after the countdown the install window disapeared.

C:\ ....now had the *****.~BT file and some others
H:\ had the ****.~LT file and others.
also noted were the new switches in the boot.ini file ....
will post more details if anyone is interested.



Get off the fence and quit playin with the models VM and VPC and Get those hands a little dirty with some real installs whistle.gif

as you may have guessed the root folder was quickly filled with the xcopied contents of c: and the trgt was filled with the contents of H:...I know it only apears to be the install.wim file but wait til next boot!.....also if you modify the boot.ini file while still in xp change the countdoun time as well as the default....install doesn't change it back it asumes that the file is untouched and holds your choice change of default.

Anyone care to attempt adding the contents of the "root" file and "trgt" file to a PE disk...or even xcopy from a xp environment...root to the boot drive and trgt to the target drive. Both including the $drvltr$ . I know this could all be automated with an xml but what fun is that?

[weaz1dls]

Ok there was one reboot during the install and I took the oportunity to return to the xp environment and have a look. Did I mention that I modified the boot.ini default back to my xp pro . Anyway since last post upon initial reboot I rcved a red screen....reset then held down f5 key....the screnn bounced a couple of times and I could see the choices were legacy pre longhorn and longhorn ...longhorn was highlighted and off she went.
Back to the gathering info screen only this time step 2 was highlighted. At the end there was the countdown and returned to xp. A look at the target drive showed various new folders. Will share if anyone is interested.

[weaz1dls]

postin from lh here...I noticed that folders and files added to the source folder of the iso will copy over to the root of the boot partition...however the install fails becase the iso was modified. So where then would one put the unattend.xml. This is probly just isolated to this release and were upgrade functional ....anyway...

[prathapml]

Nice lot of info here!
Thanks for the fiddling around and posting results here, weaz1dls

Will surely be useful, as more and more ppl get started on their journey of longhorn.

[weaz1dls]

recap cause Vista acts the same as 5048 here......

When installing if done from command prompt, or run, the /noreboot switch will create the usual ~bt and ~ls files on the system drive.

Also created are a boot folder and a drive letter assignment file. (or whatever it's called).

In the ~bt folder if you modify the bmp file for winpe it changes the background for part of the installation.

Actually I believe it is the temp desktop for pe.

Anyway the same holds true for this version as 5048.

You can add things to the setup folder in the ~bt\sources\Panther\setup\ and they will be copied to the root of the target install drive.

Also of interest is the shift+F10 option to invoke a command window durring install. start taskmgr from there and browse throught the items you added to the setup folder.

Copy them to the correct keys in the registry with regedit for runonce on the fly!