Install Windows 7 FAST without a DVD or USB device

Copyright said:

I'm having trouble using this to install 7127, I get to the part where imagex is used, and it says that the specified image [5] was not found:
pastebin - collaborative debugging tool (really long)

Do I put 4, because it says this:
WIM Information:
----------------
Path: c:\windows7\sources\install.wim
GUID: {471a7030-949e-4ed9-98a4-534c221f0404}
Image Count: 4
Compression: LZX
Part Number: 1/1
Attributes: 0xc
Integrity info
Relative path junction

Be incredibly careful with this. I just did an install of 7127 using this method YESTERDAY and I didn't have to modify my scripts at all. To my knowledge there are still five (5) images in a legit 7127 install.wim. Gimme a few minutes to check it out...

Five images confimed in 32-bit -- 4 in 64-bit. I sincerely hope you've got reason to be installing 64-bit. Please don't tell me you're installing on a 2GB laptop or something

zrtom said:

I used this method to prep. a hard drive for a fresh install if 7127 x64 on my laptop. After applying the image to a cleaned HDD set to "active," it would not boot ("bootmgr is missing"). I did all the work with the HDD on an eSATA HDD dock from my desktop. After it didn't boot I did the "active" command again, just in case. But it still didn't boot.

The command: <my drive>:\windows\system32\bcdboot <my drive>:\windows
reported success but I didn't see where it added any boot files, hidden or otherwise, anywhere.

So I booted from my USB install flash key and ran startup repair. It found a problem, repaired, went to reboot but still missing bootmgr.

Repeated the startup repair again, found and fixed problems again, rebooted and it worked.

Any idea why the bcdboot command didn't create the necessary boot files?

One other comment. This technique doesn't create the hidden 100MB repair/recovery partition. It might be possible, I'm thinking, to create one, copy over the boot.sdi and winre.wim files to it, and configure with the setautofailover.cmd command.

Any thoughts?

The eSATA dock is not the primary boot device in the BIOS. As I explained in the tutorial, things get a little more messy when secondary hard disks are taken into account. bcdboot asks your BIOS for the primary boot device and then transfers the system to it. Even wonder why there's a "from" parameter and no "to" parameter to the bcboot command line? Well there is but it doesn't always work so I didn't include it as I couldn't figure out how to explain it without clouding the simplicity of the tutorial.

You can include a /s <drive> parameter to tell bcdboot where to put the files thus overriding the location it reads from the computer's firmware (BIOS). While that seems straightforward enough, it's really not considering I then have to somehow explain how to make dozens of different BIOS variations on an even greater number of mainboards boot from an arbitrary device. That becomes more of a chapter than a tutorial -- which I am considering provided I get the advance from the publisher

If you know how to work your BIOS then the /s parameter stands a decent chance of working. It stands a better chance for actual hard drives and most SSDs than USB Flash Drives and Cards but I've managed to make them work too. Even devices that Windows 7 would completely REFUSE to install to because the BIOS has them flagged as removeable can be used in this way since once their booted from Windows ignores the removeable flag.

That 100MB partition is a "nice to have" not a requirement. It simplifies a variety of things since the boot partition is not also the system partition. Disk utilities and virus scanners could run more cleanly in this pre-execution environment because the "Windows drive" could be completely dismounted cleanly if needed. It also centralizes the location for dual boots and beyond. Clearly it's a good idea as OS designers have been doing it on mainframes and minis forever and it's a defacto standard on the various UNIX flavors but it's just not required on Windows, not even Windows 7. I think Microsoft would like to move people in that direction but I don't have a solution for creating it using the WAIK toolset.

expo703 said:

D:\Users\JPE\Desktop>imagex /apply f:\sources\install.wim 4 g:\

ImageX Tool for Windows
Copyright (C) Microsoft Corp. All rights reserved.


[ 100% ] Applying progress

Successfully applied image.

Total elapsed time: 7 min 0 sec





D:\Users\JPE\Desktop>g:\windows\system32\bcdboot h:\windows
This version of g:\windows\system32\bcdboot.exe is not compatible with the versi
on of Windows you're running. Check your computer's system information to see wh
ether you need a x86 (32-bit) or x64 (64-bit) version of the program, and then c
ontact the software publisher.



??? i'M trying to install Windows 7 x64 i currently doing this on Windows 7 32 bit.. i thought this would work.....

SEEN HERE
Installing Windows 7 64 Bit from a 32 bit XP

HELP?

Yeah, that'll never work. You've got a 64-bit bcdboot.exe trying to execute on 32-bit Windows. Try using this 32-bit one: bcdboot.zip

expo703 said:

so what do i write in the cmd line? if i put the bcdboot.exe to my desktop?

D:\Users\JPE\Desktop>bcdboot g:\windows


g= the 7new partion 16gig.

If BIOS is configured to boot g: then yes. Otherwise add "/s g:" to the end of the command line. Read up in the thread for more information.