Using Oscdimg to create an ISO image.

[Paul Black]

Good afternoon,

A couple of questions.

(1)
I have an original Windows Vista DVD that I want to backup.
I want to create an exact copy of the DVD as a bootable ISO.
I have WAIK installed and want to use Oscdimg.
I have copied all the files from the DVD to the folder C:\Test.
Is this the correct command to use in an Elevated Prompt:

C:\Program Files\Windows AIK\Tools\PETools>oscdimg -n -d -m C:\test C:\test.iso

From what I can make out:
-d - Will allow use of lowercase file names. If left out all characters will be uppercase.
-m - Ignores the maximum size limit of an image.
-n - Enables long file names (makes it possible to use filenames up to 30 characters in length).

(2)
I have also been playing around with DISM in Windows 7 etc.
The mounted image is in the C:\Win7ISO\ folder.
I found the below command line on a website that said this was the Elevated Prompt command to use to create an ISO image:

Oscdimg –m –u2 –bc:\Win7ISO\boot\etfsboot.com C:\Win7ISO\ C:\.iso

-b - Specifies the location of the El Torito boot sector file. Do NOT use spaces. Is this NEEDED, what is it?
-m - Ignores the maximum size limit of an image.
-u2 - What an earth is this parameter???

Thanks in advance.

EDIT:
I think I should have posted this in the Backup And Restore forum!

I have just found an eplanation for -u2:

-u2 - Produces an image that has only the UDF file system on it. Any system not capable of reading UDF will only see a default text file alerting the user that this image is only available on comouters that support UDF. This option cannot be combined with the -n, -nt or -d options.

 

[JoWazzoo]

m32 ..... I use Macrium

 

[Paul Black]

Thanks for the reply Snick,

Why Oscdimg?

Are you talking about number (1) or number (2), or BOTH.

I have done a lot of reading about DISM because I wanted to see what it was all about. I mainly wanted it for integrating updates, and once that was done then create a new upto date ISO. It mentioned using Oscdimg.

Is there another way to do this with the mounted ISO?

Thanks in advance.

 

[Paul Black]

Thanks for the reply JoWazzoo,

m32 ..... I use Macrium

I am assuming that you are talking about question (1)?
I wanted to be able to do this using the tools I already have as opposed to third party software.

Thanks in advance.

 

[SIW2]

Oscdimg and Mkisofs are command line iso creating tools.

If you don't want to use a command line tool, you can use an iso handling program instead.

Most free versions only allow editing very small isos.

Gburner is fully functional for 30 days as a trial. That will be fine for your purposes.

gBurner - A powerful CD, DVD and BD burning software

 

[SIW2]

-b - Specifies the location of the El Torito boot sector file. Do NOT use spaces. Is this NEEDED, what is it?

It writes bootsector to the iso file. Without that, the iso will not boot.

You might want to include efi support as well.

Oscdimg -bootdata:2#p0,e,bc:\Win7ISO\boot\etfsboot.com#pEF,e,bc:\Win7ISO\efi\microsoft\boot\Efisys.bin -u1 -udfver102 C:\Win7ISO C:\My.iso

 

[dg1261]

I mainly wanted [DISM] for integrating updates, and once that was done then create a new upto date ISO. It mentioned using Oscdimg.
[...]
I wanted to be able to do this using the tools I already have as opposed to third party software.

Paul, you're on the right track. I've occasionally used oscdimg and it works just fine. The command syntax I generally use follows this format:

oscdimg.exe -b{boot-image} -u2 -h -l{CD-label} {source-files} {destination-iso}

so it might look something like this:

oscdimg.exe -bC:\Win7ISO\boot\etfsboot.com -u2 -h -lWIN7_HomePrem C:\Win7ISO\ C:\test.iso

(That's a lower-case L for the label parameter.)

An iso file is akin to a giant zip file. Burn an iso to a CD, put that CD in a CD reader, and you'll see all the encapsulated files. But that CD won't be bootable--to make it bootable, you need to include a boot image. That's the purpose of the -b parameter. (FWIW, El Torito is a common boot image format.)

If you have an original bootable CD/DVD you can extract the boot image from it (it's normally hidden, ala the boot sector of your Windows partition) and specify that as the source for the -b parameter. In the case of the Win-7 installation disc, however, Microsoft has saved you the trouble by putting a fully accessible copy of the boot image within the file space--namely, boot\etfsboot.com, so you don't have to extract anything, you just point the -b parameter to that file.

I don't burn DVDs larger than 4.7GB (thus don't create iso files larger than that, either), so I'm not fluent in the use of the -m parameter. I don't suppose it would hurt, but I don't use it.

Aside: In fact, in an interesting use case, I've used oscdimg in the past to shrink a Dell Win7 installation DVD. In later years Dell's DVD had grown to over 5GB, so was shipped on a DL DVD. But not all of the machines I wanted to use it on had DL readers, so I set out to see what I could eliminate to shrink it so it would fit on a regular DVD again. I found there was a whole folder of foreign language files that were optional, so I deleted them and recreated an iso without them that turned out to be less than 4.7GB.