johnhc

devsfan1830, many here have successfully run nLite against MCE. I know little about it, but I do know that only some versions of MCE can accept SP3. Please do some searching here on MCE. You can learn about how to deal with the two CDs and other aspects. Drivers (including text mode) can be DLed from your MB or computer maker's site and integrated with nLite. If you have further questions or problems, please attach (not paste) your Last Session.ini. Make sure to always start with a fresh copy of your CD files/folders, do all your work in one nLite session and integrate only one SP. Please report when you have a solution, so others can benefit. Enjoy, John.

b-man, I don't see WMP11 in your hot fix section. How did you slip WMP11? You need to remove the Tweak "Explorer-Launch folder windows in a separate process." This exposes a Windows bug, but I think it has nothing to do with your problems. Assuming you have followed the rules I post regularly, I suspect your problem lies in the services you have disabled or components you have removed. This is a fairly worthless statement, I know. So, try putting all back to normal and see if you get a running system. I also see you have done a 'remove files' on several things I know nothing about. Put that back to normal. I see you have included no hot fixes and no SP3 in your Last Session. Are you sure you ran nLite only once? Enjoy, John.

Sp0iLedBrAt, great find on the version! I suspect Abyssal has a pre-release version of SP3. Abyssal, please post the size (not size on disk) and the MD5 for the SP3 installer you are using. I was really intrigued by your title. I don't know what you mean by deleting the files from your failed session. What you must do is create a fresh source folder by copying your original CD files/folders before you run nLite. Do you have booogy's WMP11 Slipstreamer installed on your system? My standard post: Please make sure to always start with a fresh copy of your CD files/folders, do all your work in one nLite session and integrate only one SP. Please report when you have a solution, so others can benefit. Enjoy, John.

Spinner, it has been some time since I installed my RAID0 (ePox MB), but I remember after defining the RAID0, I had to format it using the RAID BIOS utility. This sets up the block size you select in defining the RAID. I looked quickly at the manual you posted and did not find reference to this but I did see reference to a CD called AusRock (or something like that) and instructions for building a floppy for the text mode drivers. I still suspect you need SATA text mode drivers and they may be on the CD. So, pop in the CD (on a running system) and explorer it and see if you can find SATA drivers. I have not a clue why, if they are need, Asus did not include them in their DL area. If all else fails, e-mail (or call, if you can) Asus and ask about the SATA drivers. I would guess if you had SATA drivers but bad RAID drivers, you would find the HDDs but not be able to install with some other error. Please keep us informed. Thanks, John.

Blam-O!, I don't think you can slipstream .NET, at least I don't. There are some AddOns (see above and RyanVM forum.) I use the method from Kurt_Aust's great tutorial. I use the installer pointed to in his first page. It is 231 MB and I don't worry about size, since my ISO is more than 2.5 GB and I use a DVD when I need a disk. As you will see in Kurt_Aust's tutorial, .NET is installed out of the Unattended RunOnce exit as well as adding the updates. I am not aware if you can extract and remove the x86 or x64 files, but please let us know if you re able to do such a thing. I am really not so worried about the size. I am not familiar with "ngen.exe executequeueditems." What does it do? I would assume .NET needs a reboot after install, so I think you could schedule a RunOnce out of your RunOnce batch file, then a restart (see referenced link.) Your scheduled RunOnce would then run after the reboot. I also use Windows Post Install (WPI) and do a number of things after the nLite RunOnce finished (I do my reboot from WPI.) Have fun, John.

b-man, sorry, your phrasing confuses me. When you run nLite, and let it Finish, a Last Session file will be created. This file (also called a Preset and found in the nLite folder with date Stamps) is available for future nLite runs. I am creating ISOs for two different machines and I just save my Last Session after a good run and refer to it later when I need to build another ISO for that machine. Be sure to copy both the .ini and the U_.ini files and when you rename be sure the first part of the names are exactly the same. Enjoy, John.

vgsangiuliano, I think alcatraz678 wants to avoid rebuilding his system and install these components on a running system. This may be impossible but, assuming your files are the correct ones, he could try placing them in his System32 folder and see if that will work. I suspect they need some Registry support, etc and it won't work. alcatraz678, you can search your un-nLited source folder for the .inf files that install these two components and see if you can determine how to install them. I think the real truth is that you will have to start over and don't remove any components that there is any chance of needing in the future. Good luck, John.

shanike81, sorry but this is not true: Sorry also vgsangiuliano. I install .NET 3.5 (only) out of nLite's Unattended RunOnce, plus its updates with no problems on my XP x64 system.Instead of messing around with all the schemes to determine if nLite included what you asked it to, just install it on a virtual system and test it there. You really need to do this anyway. VirtualPC, VirtualBox and VMware Server are all free. I use VMware Server and can install XP x64 in less than 15 minutes from an ISO file (NO CD). Enjoy, John.

vgsangiuliano, I don't think you need to extract the cab files, but I am curious now. Please post a link to where I can DL the drivers. Thanks, John.

Spinner, I went to the ASUS site and DLed the chipset drivers, extracted and looked about. Attached is the folder contents of the text mode drivers. I notice that the txtsetup.oem is not in the driver file. I assume you moved it into the x86 folder. I am not sure what the ahcix86 file is for (contains only sb7xx), but I think I would also move it into the x86 folder. Has this machine been used before? With XP? With RAID0? Have you formated the RAID using the BIOS RAID utility? What BIOS version are you running? ASUS recently release [0602] - using this one? Do you have your BIOS set properly? I assume your HDDs are attached on SATA ports. I am surprised that the driver set did not contain a separate SATA driver. Perhaps Fernando 1 can comment on this. Good luck, John.

Miguel_k, it is well known that MS decided that IE8 would integrate into Vista but not XP. There are many threads here discussing this issue. AddOns, both real and INF, are available in the AddOns forum above and on RyanVM Forum. If you cannot find a Danish version, please let us know. Enjoy, John.

Spinner, I see you are using Vista to create an XP ISO. This is going to cause problems. Can you run nLite under XP? If not, try running nLite.exe in SP2 XP Compatibility Mode, and please let us know the outcome. Good luck, John.

vgsangiuliano, you can extract cabinet files with the Expand command (Command Prompt) or many other utilities (I use 7-Zip). I would suggest you extract the .exe you found and see if you find .inf there. Some of the installers have extract switches. From a command prompt use the /? switch on the installer and the .exe and see if there is an extraction switch (like /X:path). Please let us know what you learn. Enjoy, John.

Degrees, it's hard to say what is causing your problem because you took out so much. I suggest you look through your Last Session and see such things as Ethernet (LAN), Outlook Express, Windows Messenger and parts of TCP/IP. I would recommend that you put a few of these back in, then do some testing under a virtual system. Enjoy, John.

alcatraz678, please attach (not paste) your Last Session.ini. Make sure to always start with a fresh copy of your CD files/folders, do all your work in one nLite session and integrate only one SP. Please report when you have a solution, so others can benefit. I assume you realize that most likely you will need to rebuild your ISO. Enjoy, John.

cockroachrhea, you can also use USSF (Universal Silent Switch Finder, found on these forums) to help you find switches. Windows Post Install (WPI) uses it and I have found it very good. I do not use VirtualPC (I use VMware Server), but the message you got may mean the size of the memory for the the VM you defined was too small. Try setting your VM memory size to at least 768 MB. Enjoy, John.

Spinner, welcome to the forum. Also welcome to my standard inculcation: Please attach (not paste) your Last Session.ini. Make sure to always start with a fresh copy of your CD files/folders, do all your work in one nLite session and integrate only one SP. Please report when you have a solution, so others can benefit. Enjoy, John.

docmorris-17, one of the things I was trying to determine was how the [TO] section was getting run. It obviously did because the key is in place. It stays there, I assume, because the proper user never logs onto the system. It is possible that [TO] gets run directly from a script. The default section gets run out of cmdlines.txt - I assume this means the [nLite] section which is the bulk of it. NLite.inf also gets called out of SYSOC.INF, but I do not understand this call (OCgen.dll). I think someone else commented about 20,000 line nLite.inf and I think if you remove most of the languages and keyboards yours will be that large also. The key you pointed out the error on (I missed) exposes a Windows bug and probably needs to be removed. If you open Network Connections and right click an adapter and select Status, you will see nothing will happen. Going to Folder Options and turning off the Launch Explorer in Separate Process will correct this problem. I do not understand the time that certain keys need to be processed, so I did not pick up on the way the sections were constructed - still learning in many areas. The tweaks I don't apply directly via nLite I do through .reg or .bat files out of the GUIRunOnce exit. The main thing is I am really glad you found the source of your tweaks not being applied. Thanks much for your report. Have fun, John.

zZolaa, I don't even have the key you mention. I do have HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Ole\AppCompat and some other similar, but no DisableEngine. I may not even have the function (XP x64.) Therefore, I recommend you convert to XP x64 - just kidding. I found one Google entry about Application Popup error 877 and it concerned a firewall. Are you running a firewall? How about trying leaving Application Compatibility and setting the DisableEngine to stop it's running? Would this satisfy your needs? I don't have Application Compatibility in my nLite Components list. How many MBs are you saving by removing it? I'll continue to think about this problem. Enjoy, John. Edit: RegShot looks like a great utility, but it supports only 32 bit Windows. John.

Degrees, don't know what WLM is. Please attach (not paste) your Last Session.ini. Make sure to always start with a fresh copy of your CD files/folders, do all your work in one nLite session and integrate only one SP. Please report when you have a solution, so others can benefit. Enjoy, John.

b-man, you are welcome to do as you please with nLite. I recommend you do this because I have seen so many people, including me, have myriad and bizarre problems running nLite multiple times against the same source. Since several have complained about my recommendation, I have started asking users to please tell us that they are running nLite multiple times against the same source so we can respond appropriately. A search of these forums will yield many examples of strange problems caused by this. You can actually get away with some, but which ones, I suspect no one knowns. Enjoy, John. Melus, I have not given serious consideration to your old problem and know nothing about VTP. I recommend you do not remove IE before integrating IE8. In fact, if you use the Real AddOn for IE8 (from Sereby), nLite will not allow you to remove IE components. If you're curious about this, then DL the AddOn, extract and look at the entries_ie8.ini. You will see IE listed as [NeededComponents]. I run XP x64 and there is no Real AddOn, but I certainly leave IE and use the SVCPACK AddOn that I created. No problems. But as I have said before, do as you like. Try it (especially if you are running a virtual system) and see what happens. Enjoy, John.

Azu Shina, "drives", do you mean drivers? If so, the answer is no. You are not required to use any Task you don't want to use. If you have other questions or problems, please attach (not paste) your Last Session.ini. Make sure to always start with a fresh copy of your CD files/folders, do all your work in one nLite session and integrate only one SP. Please report when you have a solution, so others can benefit. Enjoy, John.

DMahalko, your post made me curious. I looked at the NLDRV folder. It is in my AMD64 folder but I assume it is in the I386 folder for 32 bit XP. It contains the .INF, .SYS and .CAT files from the Text Mode driver I included via nLite. I want to look some more, but perhaps this leads to a way to do this without nLite. I am also curious why you seem to be inclined to not want to use nLite? In your last sentence you said "STOP 7B - inaccessible boot device." Do you have a SATA attached optical drive you are trying to install FROM? Some have reported problems with this - search this forum. I do agree with you that MS (and box manufacturers) are making it extremely difficult to install XP over Vista. I would expect it to get even worse when 7 is out. Enjoy, John. EDIT: Here is a good tutorial on manually integrating text mode drivers into a Windows CD. John.

Melus, welcome to nLite. You do not want to remove Internet Explorer just because you want to include IE8. Leave it in place. You will need to use an AddOn for IE8 since MS decided it would not integrate directly into XP. See the AddOns sub-forum above and the RyanVM forum. I think if you will read the note at the top of the Compatibility window, you will see this is simply nLite's method to prevent you from removing components that are needed for the functions you select. Have fun and if you have questions, or problems, please attach (not paste) your Last Session.ini. Make sure to always start with a fresh copy of your CD files/folders, do all your work in one nLite session and integrate only one SP. Please report when you have a solution, so others can benefit. Enjoy, John.

Asmo, text mode drivers. The first phase of Windows install is called text mode because there is no graphics support - just primitive text mode. When Setup first starts (to install Windows after booting CD), it will issue a message to press F6 if you need to install mass storage drivers. Windows does not come with text mode drivers for SATA drives, so you need to find them and load them using F6 (or nLite.) Normally you would go to your MB's site and find the F6 drivers and DL them. Then you write them to a floppy and hit F6 during install. Some MBs have a utility to create the floppy. If you do not have a floppy drive, then you need to integrate them into your CD and this is where nLite comes to the game. Perhaps this is why tech support recommended nLite. Do you have a floppy drive, or at least a connection on your MB so you can borrow of buy one? The SP3 you DL from MS DL Center is not an ISO. Go to the Center and DL a copy. Enjoy, John.