andy_le2k

@mikesw Please explain! So you don't have a BIOS that can boot USB sticks? You want to load DOS from a USB stick? If you can express your problems in a clearer way it would be easier for us to help you. And as jaclaz mentioned, this post is about installing multiple OS from USB - if your issue does not fit in this topic perhaps it's best to start a new post.

Thanks ilko_t! This will give me something to do for the whole day! VMware doesn't like booting from my USB hard drive, can you do this from qemu?

Thanks for the tip cdob, modifype works like a charm and after I used it on setupdd.sys, I can now have multiple Windows 2003! Looks like the project finally is complete, every single Windows OS can be installed from one USB hard drive. I have updated my first post to include instructions for Windows 2003.

Thanks ilko_t for the links, the original sp1 2003 setupldr.bin links are dead so I couldn't play around with them. The cracked version of setupldr.bin works, you can load txtsetup using it but once it loads it will give a "unable to load setupdd.sys errorcode 4" I was thinking that maybe setupdd.sys has checksum checks as well since it's the file that we hex edited the txtsetup won't load it. The reason why I need to have 2003 as an additional source is because I already have one flavor of 2003 using up the unmodified $WIN_NT$ slot which works fine. So if I add another version of 2003 it will need to be $WIN_0x$ and txtset0x.sif I have also edited the first post to include the methods of getting multiple XP, multiple Vista and multiple PE to work.

Never really had a chance to thank wimb for implementing the multiple XP sources in version 9 and 10 of his program, so thanks heaps for taking the cumbersome task of manually doing this out of the way. Here are a few things I've noticed with these latest releases: It can't handle multiple WIN2003 sources, the installation process between XP and 2003 should be very similar but if you use multiboot10 to add 2003 as an additional source, it will give you a ntldr corrupted error! If you were to use a setupldr from an XP source, txtsetup will load but it will error once it starts expanding some files. Here's what I did: I created 2 XP sources so there are 2 XP setupldr's (XAT01 and XAT02). I then created a 2003 source which has XAT03 which i renamed to XAT03.old and copied the XAT01 over as XAT03. I then hex-edited XAT03 and replaced all instances of $win_01$ with $win_03$ and also did the same for txtset01 to txtset03. This loads the txtsetup portion of 2003 fine but it complains about a file note found in txtsetup.sif. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Here's my personal wishlist for future releases of multiboot: It would be nice to be able to automate the multiple PE process (BartPE + WinFLP + ERD Commander). Some how be able to add multiple Vista installs without multiple partitions. Currently I'm booting into a Vista PE then navigate by cmd prompt to the desired source folder and executing the setup.exe - I also have 2 Vista PE's booting from bootmgr, one for x86 sources and one for x64. So from the grub4dos menu (I have my boot.ini directly load grub4dos) I run the bootmgr which then gives me the option to run x86 PE or x64 PE. That is like 3 layers of menus I go through plus manually navigating to the right source path and launching the setup. It would be better to shorten this somehow. My USB hard drive: USB:\Vista\x86\Setup.exe USB:\Vista\x64\Setup.exe USB:\Vista\Server2008x86\Setup.exe USB:\Vista\Server2008x64\Setup.exe Thanks a lot for reading.

It seems this error only happens if UBCD4WIN is created on a Vista machine, tried rebuilding in XP and it's all good.

Maybe this won't be relevant here, the above method works fine btw. What doesn't work is UBCD4WIN, if any of you guys get a chance, try it out. See if you can build it and make it boot from a usb hard drive. It boots fine for me but when it gets into the PE I get an error "File not found" for the Prelogon program. It works fine though if booted from a CD which is odd. I know this is UBCD4WIN's error but just want to see if you guys can get it to work using the above method.

copy /y %usbdrive%\minint\setupldr.bin %usbdrive%\PELDR makebt\gsar -sBT:x00:x00:x00\:x00:x00:x00txtsetup -rBT:x00:x00:x00\:x00:x00:x00notsetup %usbdrive%\PELDR %usbdrive%\peldr.new -b -f if exist %usbdrive%\peldr.new copy /y %usbdrive%\peldr.new %usbdrive%\PELDR if exist %usbdrive%\peldr.new del %usbdrive%\peldr.new As being used in USB_MultiBoot_8.cmd wimb Wow thanks for that wimb. You ever thought (I know this is a lot to ask) of making your next release able to detect if there is already an xp source or pe already on the drive and have the option to create another co-existing source on the usb? I mean with all that's out there already about multiple sources, all that's left is for you to work your batch magic I would think. Anyways, when trying your gsar command I get this: gsar: command error, multiple search & replace requires the 'o' option

Yeh I thought about multiple partitions especially while I was messing around with the multiple Vista stage. The only thing is that I would hate to plug my usb hard drive into a computer and have 10 additional drives come up, anyway to hide them but setup still pick them up? Also, I tried your method above there and it doesn't work, maybe its my work's workstations but it just goes to blank screen without any loading on the comp or the usb drive.

Always helpful, Thanks so much ilko_t, currently stuck at work but will try this out as soon as I get home. See the real reason why I need this to work is because I think WinFLP boots into a custom PE and then installs the .WIM image. I tried booting into a normal BartPE and launch the WnFLP setup directly but this won't work, so hopefully being able to boot into more than 1 PE will allow me to install WinFLP directly from usb and completing my ultimate hard drive which will have every single OS and admin tool I could possibly need. Also, I use grub4dos which can chainload the loaders directly without boot sectors so I don't think I will need to run makebs.cmd (it's a great tool don't get me wrong). What is this ram boot method you speak of? I probably won't use it because I need to be sure it is compatible with all systems and some of the PE's are 200MB+.

Hi everybody, Recently I managed to make multiple XP instalations from USB work and I also figured out a way to do multiple Vista installs from the 1 usb hard drive. So now what I want to do is multiple PE's from the usb hard drive. I can get multiple WinPE2 to boot by just copying and editing bcd entries but when I try to get more than 1 BartPE on the usb txtsetup usually gives me errors for missing files. What I've tried so far: attempt 1: hex edited peldr and changed every instance of "minint" to "mini01" 3 instances were changed but when it loads into txtsetup stage it gives errors. attempt 2: renamed the <minint> folder for each flavour of PE, for example - <mini01> - ERD Commander <mini02> - Bart PE <mini03> - UBCD4WIN so each time i want to use one of the flavours I have to log into DOS or any other OS, rename the desired folder to <minint>, reboot and load the PE but that still won't work. ilko_t? jaclaz? cdob? Anybody want to help? Thanks a lot.

If you want to install XP from a usb hdd, please use the usb_multiboot(7).cmd http://www.msfn.org/board/install-XP-USB-t111406.html Unfortunately you can't install XP x64 from a USB HDD because during the install process we need to use a driver (rdummy.sys) which tricks setup in thinking that the usb hdd is a removable disk and this driver has not yet been written for 64bit. Your should be able to use the above mentioned program to install x64 from a normal usb flash drive.

If you want to only have 1 source of Vista on your USB the easiest way is to use the usb_multiboot.cmd program then copy over the [bOOT] [sOURCES] folders and BOOTMGR to the root of the USB. Then edit the grub4dos menu.lst with: title Setup Windows Vista find --set-root /grldr chainloader /BOOTMGR this will work if you only need one version of Vista to be on the usb but more than one will not work. So what if you needed more than one version, say x86 and x64 (well there's a guide out there to combine them into one install.wim) or what if you had one integrated with SP1 and one original? Honestly I have tried many methods - adding new entry to BCD, hex editing, renaming install.wim (works but messy), renaming folders (works but also messy). The best way that I have found so far is to create a Windows PE 2, boot into that with your usb and launch the setup program directly. This actually works very well because when Vista installs it requires to load Windows PE 2 anyways so you already crossed that bridge. What's best is the ability to have the source files in any folder you want just as long as you have install.wim in the same folder as setup.exe. Also WinPE2 can run both x86 and x64 files so u can launch both setups from one PE. I hope this helps.

Did you mean here XPS01 instead of SETUPLDR1 Same for index 2 Thanks for the pickup! Yes this is a mistake and I have edited on the first post. I initially named my setupldr files setupldr1 and setupldr2 but I think ntfs boot sectors needs to be 5 chars that is why the make boot batch file will not accept setupldr1 or setupldr2. I'm glad you finally got it working. It feels really good to be able to accomplish something like this eh? Which is why I'm very thankful to everybody who made this possible.

Thanks very much for your hard work ilko_t!! Very much appreciated it and I'm glad you got it working. (Un)fortunately I have to go out with the misses now but would much rather stay in all night and get this to work for me too. I'll give this a shot when I get home and hopefully I can share some of your success. Thanks again.

How would setup know to load txtset01.sif an txtset02.sif? Every other steps seems right and could possibly work. I think the best way is probably still to boot into PE and run winnt32!

Did you edited setupldr.bin? Change setupldr.bin, apply renamed names. And edit setupdd.sys. Yep, I went to great lengths to make sure everything is renamed, backed up then made another source, then to restore the previous source i renamed and backed up everything again! Every single file gets renamed/replaced but txtsetup will still give me errors. I will try to get screenshots of these errors and post them here.

This is what I did, I kind of gave up on the idea of a smooth menu where you can install multiple flavours on the fly. But this method still does not work! What I did: I renamed the <$WIN_NT$.~BT> and <$WIN_NT$.~LS> folders as well as the txtsetup.sif and setupldr.bin on the root to <SETUP01-BT>, <SETUP-01-LS>, txtsetup01.sif and setup01ldr.bin. I then used multibootxp6.cmd to add the other xp setup to the hard drive. Everything seems fine but during the txtsetup phase it fails to format or gives an error about the txtsetup.sif file being missing or corrupted. The whole point of my project is to have ALL the OS that I frequently need to install on one usb hdd to make things more convenient. Thanks everybody so much for the replies and ideas this is very facinating as it is much as it is annoying

Thanks again for the links. Been trying so hard to get this to work but no hope. First when I tried the usb_multiboot6 program it works perfectly when installing XP but the problem now is that I can only have 1 xp source. The program makes hard drive setup folders $WIN_NT$.~BT and $WIN_NT$.~LS. This makes it very difficult to add a second source as they would need to replace the default folders. I also tried renaming these folders as well as the txtsetup.sif and bootldr files and replace them with another source but that didn't work either. Grub4dos: I kept getting the txtsetup.sif corrupted, status 14 error whenever it loads a hex edited \PRO1\setupldr.bin Heaps of thanks to jaclaz for letting me learn so much and actually getting at least one xp to setup from usb hard drive. I'm very sorry for double posting just thought this project of mine should be in this forum rather than the other.

This post has evolved quite a bit since I started out on my quest to boot from a single USB hard drive which will then be able to launch every single OS install as well as every diagnostic tool from it as well. So below I will list the methods I use to get my USB hard drive working, of course you don't have to follow this but it's here as a guide. Thanks: Without these guys this would not have been possible! wimb cdob jaclaz ilko_t AIM: To be able to install multiple OS installs from the single USB hard drive Software needed: wimb's usb_multiboot - check the stickies in this forum for the download details. a hex editor WAIK (if you want to have multiple Vista sources) a DOS menu program or an autoplay creator (for multiple Vista) OS/TOOLS Sources Hardware: USB Hard drive preferably > 20GB Outline: Use wimb's usb_multiboot to create XP sources as well as adding the boot sector onto the hard drive and load it with NTLDR. NTLDR uses boot.ini which then launches grub4dos automatically Reason for not using boot.ini is because grub4dos is superior in handling and loading bootloaders whereas boot.ini needs boot sectors which will cut out one extra step. Grub4dos has extra functionality which we can add to later such as emulating virtual hard disks and fdd's, it can load Vista's BOOTMGR directly and also its menu is also better to look at Reason why I personally did not load grub4dos's bootsector directly to the hard drive but went through the trouble of using NTLDR (boot.ini) then loading grub4dos is because I already have grub4dos installed on my other hard drive and grub4dos's bootsector looks for the file "grldr" automatically which is already present on my other hard drive so it might load my permanent hard drive instead of my USB. So I have renamed and hex edited the grldr on the USB drive to look for "brldr" and set boot.ini to load brldr instead. If you do not have this dillema, feel free to use grub4dos's boot sector installer if you wish to cut out the extra step of loading NTLDR then grub4dos. Currently working on: [sOLVED]Trying to get multiple versions of Windows 2003 to co-exist on the USB hard drive. --------------- Multiple PE --------------- This applies to anything that uses WINPE1 (Windows FLP install, BartPE, ERD Commander, etc) As PE was initially intended to be run off a CD the original structure for them would be inside the [i386] folder. If your PE came from a USB source it would be in the folder [minint]. It's not important which folder it is in because we will rename them once it is copied to the USB hard drive anyways. Make sure you copy winbom.ini to the USB root as well. The convention you should stick to is: [mini01] [mini02] [mini03] [minixx] So once we have the folders copied to our hard drive and renamed appropriately we will need to also copy the setupldr.bin file from the [minixx] folder to the root of the USB and rename them according to this convention: peld1 peld2 peld3 peldx Now you will need to change the first occurrence of txtsetup.sif in PELDx to notsetup.sif. gsar -sBT:x00:x00:x00\:x00:x00:x00txtsetup -rBT:x00:x00:x00\:x00:x00:x00notsetup %USB%:\PELDx -b -o Change all occurances of minint to minixx. gsar -i -o -s\minint -r\minixx peldx Notes: WinFLP requires all additional folders on the CD to be on the USB root, such as the [setup] which houses the flp.wim which setup requires. So as a rule of thumb: copy all folders from the source CD for WinFLP, ERD Commander and BartPE to the root of USB drive and rename the i386 folder to minixx. WinFLP's setupldr.bin has a checksum protection which will error if you hex edit it, I suggest you use BartPE's one. --------------- Multiple Vista ---------------- Ok this is not much of an automated process but it is somewhat more streamlined than my original concept. Dump all your Vista sources onto the USB hard drive (11 gigs for me - x86 + x64 Vista + x86 + x64 Server 2008) - Best if they are in a separate folder... tree view for mine is below USB | |----->BOOTMGR | |----->[boot] | | | |--->Modified BCD store | |----->[sOURCES] | | | |--->x86.wim | |----->[Vista] | |----->[Vistax86] | | | |--->[sOURCES] | | |----->[Vistax64] | | | |--->[sOURCES] | | |----->[serverx86] | | | |--->[sOURCES] | | |----->[serverx64] |--->[sOURCES] First thing is to copy the BOOTMGR file along with the [sOURCES] and [bOOT] folders from any Vista source to the root of the USB hard drive. You can delete the Install.wim from the [sOURCES] folder. Now what you will need to do is create a new Windows PE 2.0 (x86) from WAIK - I won't go into details about that here but it's very simple. Reason we use the x86 version of WINPE2 is because the 32bit version of WINPE2 can launch the setup of both 64 and 32 versions (with some tweaking as discussed below). Mount your WINPE2 image on a local hard drive folder with read/write and you will need to modify your WINPE2 with: Create a text file in [mounted_wim_folder]\Windows\System32\ and name it: winpeshl.ini Edit the winpeshl.ini with: [LaunchApp] AppPath=%SYSTEMDRIVE%\menu.cmd What the winpeshl.ini file will do is start up WINPE2 and run whatever your AppPath program is as a shell. So you can make a simple DOS batch menu for you to select whichever Vista/Server 2008 you want to install. What I did was made an autorun program using Autoplay Studio which will prompt me with 4 options and whatever I click on, it will launch a batch file which will run the setup for that OS. Two important things you need to keep in mind is: 1) You will need to find the USB hard drive before you can launch the setup. So you may want to add this line to your batch files: FOR %%i IN (C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z) DO IF EXIST %%i:\usb_tag_file SET USB=%%i:\ You can then launch the setup by adding this line to your batch file: %USB%\Vista\Vistax86\sources\setup.exe 2) You cannot load a x64 setup from a x86 WINPE2, the workaround for this is to copy contents of the SOURCES folder (including Setup.exe but excluding boot.wim and install.wim) from the x86 version of the Vista source. **IMPORTANT** do not overwrite the install.wim in the destination folder or you will just be installing the x86 version! Once you have modified the WINPE2, make sure you commit the changes. If you have more than one WINPE2 on your USB, you will then need to edit the bcd store inside the BOOT folder on the root of your USB using bcdedit.exe - if you don't have any other WINPE2, you can just copy the BOOT and SOURCES folders and the BOOTMGR file from any Vista source to the <ROOT> of the USB hard drive, then name your newly created WINPE2 as boot.wim and copy it over to the SOURCES folder and overwrite the original. So now, from your USB's grub4dos menu, load the bootmgr on the root of your USB it will then load the bcd store. If you have more than one WINPE2 it will load the BOOTMGR menu, if not it will load into the WINPE2 that you have created. Once that WINPE2 loads, it should load your batch menu or VBS or if you really want to be fancy... an autoplay application. ------------------------ Multiple Windows 2003 ------------------------ The process of getting multiple sources of Windows 2003 onto your USB hard drive is pretty much the same as making multiple sources of XP with a few more extra steps. First, you will need these files: Cracked setupldr.bin : http://www.msfn.org/board/post-a9193-crack...PLDR-1-.BIN.zip ModifyPE : http://unattended.msfn.org/files/global/MODIFYPE.EXE Steps: Copy and replace the cracked setupldr.bin to the i386 folder of your source before you use usb_multiboot. Create the source using usb_multiboot, for this example we will assume the source folders are [$WIN_xx$.~LS] and [$WIN_xx$.~BT] Goto [$WIN_xx$.~BT] and you should find both setupdd.sys and setupdd.sy_ Delete setupdd.sy_ and apply the following to setupdd.sys modifype.exe setupdd.sys -c makecab setupdd.sys I have not yet tested putting a checksum on setupldr.bin but I would assume this method will work as well. So if you don't want to download the cracked setupldr.bin you may wish to try the following but it may not work. modifype.exe XATxx -c and modifype.exe XPSxx -c ---------------- Multiple XP ---------------- This has changed a lot since wimb updated the usb_multiboot to automatically do this, so basically, run the usb_multiboot program twice (or however many times you want) making sure you carefully select the settings again for each time you run it. Below are the original instructions for historic and nostalgic reasons. Thanks to everybody who made this possible for me - especially these superstars: jaclaz, ilko_t, cdob and wimb I just want to list the steps I took below, I can't promise that it will work for all of you but it worked for me. 01 - Make XP1 Source using usb_multiboot.cmd 02 - Rename $WIN_NT$.~BS and $WIN_NT$.~LS to $WIN_01$.~BS and $WIN_01$.~LS 03 - Rename SETUPLDR.BIN to XPS01 and rename TXTSETUP.SIF to TXTSET01.SIF 04 - Make XP2 Source using usb_multiboot.cmd 05 - Rename $WIN_NT$.~BS and $WIN_NT$.~LS to $WIN_02$.~BS and $WIN_02$.~LS 06 - Rename SETUPLDR.BIN to XPS02 and rename TXTSETUP.SIF to TXTSET02.SIF 07 - HEX Edit XPS01 replace every reference of "$WIN_NT" to "$WIN_01" - HEX Edit XPS01 replace every reference of "txtsetup" to "txtset01" 08 - HEX Edit XPS02 replace every reference of "$WIN_NT" to "$WIN_02" - HEX Edit XPS02 replace every reference of "txtsetup" to "txtset02" 09 - EXPAND setupdd.sy_ to setupdd.sys located in your ~BS folders - For $WIN_01$.~BT\setupdd.sys run "GSAR -i -o -s$:x00W:x00I:x00N:x00_:x00N:x00T:x00$:x00.:x00~:x00L:x00S:x00 -r$:x00W:x00I:x00N:x00_:x000:x001:x00$:x00.:x00~:x00L:x00S:x00 setupdd.sys" - For $WIN_02$.~BT\setupdd.sys run "GSAR -i -o -s$:x00W:x00I:x00N:x00_:x00N:x00T:x00$:x00.:x00~:x00L:x00S:x00 -r$:x00W:x00I:x00N:x00_:x000:x002:x00$:x00.:x00~:x00L:x00S:x00 setupdd.sys" 10 - MAKECAB setupdd.sys for each of the ~BS folders 11 - Use MakeBS3.cmd (located in your usb_multiboot package under \makebt) "MakeBS3.cmd [uSB_DRIVE_LETTER]:\XPS01" and "MakeBS3.cmd [uSB_DRIVE_LETTER]:\XPS02" - This will make 2 boot sector files in your [uSB_DRIVE_LETTER]:\btsec folder named XPS01.bs and XPS02.bs 12 - EDIT boot.ini and add the lines "C:\btsec\XPS01.bs" and "C:\btsec\XPS02.bs" 13 - In \$win_01$.~ls\I386\ren_fold.cmd change SET TAGFILE=\$WIN_NT$.~BT ren %USBDRIVE%\txtsetup.sif txtsetup.bak ren %USBDRIVE%\$WIN_NT$.~BT WIN_NT.BT ren %USBDRIVE%\$WIN_NT$.~LS WIN_NT.LS to SET TAGFILE=\$WIN_01$.~BT ren %USBDRIVE%\txtset01.sif txtset01.bak ren %USBDRIVE%\$WIN_01$.~BT WIN_01.BT ren %USBDRIVE%\$WIN_01$.~LS WIN_01.LS In \$win_01$.~ls\I386\undoren.cmd change SET TAGFILE=\$WIN_NT$.~BT ren %USBDRIVE%\txtsetup.bak txtsetup.sif ren %USBDRIVE%\WIN_NT.BT $WIN_NT$.~BT ren %USBDRIVE%\WIN_NT.LS $WIN_NT$.~LS to SET TAGFILE=\$WIN_01$.~BT ren %USBDRIVE%\txtset01.bak txtset01.sif ren %USBDRIVE%\WIN_01.BT $WIN_01$.~BT ren %USBDRIVE%\WIN_01.LS $WIN_01$.~LS 14 - Repeat the above for the batch files in \$win_02$.~ls\ making sure you replace 01 with 02 0

Hi everybody, I've been searching everywhere on these boards but I can't find any solution. I have recently perfected (well not really) an AIO-DVD which can: - Install XP (integrated with updates) and XP (untouched) - Install Vista - Boot UBCD - Boot BartPE Using bcdw as the menu. I did this by hex editing boot loaders and putting the XP sources in different folders. This works fine, but I can't seem to get Vista to install in this way, I only have 1 version of Vista on the DVD because the only way I can get it to work is to leave the DVD directory structure of the Vista DVD and just point the BCDW loader to chain the bootloader of Vista. Aim: So for my next project I want to put all my OS CD/DVD's on a single usb hard drive and make the hard drive bootable and able to install all the OS. OS needed to be installed from the disk: XP [untouched] XP [integrated with latest hotfixes] Vista [untouched] x86 Vista [integrated with SP1] x86 Vista [untouched] x64 Vista [integrated with SP1] x64 Current Problems: BCDW only supports DVD/CD boots and I can't find a way to bring this over to a removable disk. Currently studying syslinux and grub4dos but they are a lot more complicated than bcdw. Vista source folders can't be renamed or moved to subfolders and as such only one Vista edition can be present on the hard drive. PE (Bart, UBCD4WIN, VistaPE) can't have more than 1 as they all need correct folder structures as well and I do not know how to make their boot loaders to point to a different source folder (i386, SOURCES, etc.) If anybody out there can help or provide links it would be much appreciated.

Before you start... I searched... nothing helpful. Just want something simple that doesn't involve autoit or something like that? can you 7-zip it maybe? Audition will install with /QB but will error on run! I got no idea what Director's switches are and how would u regiester with either of them?