Jito463

The concept behind MRAM has been around for a long time (1974) but was overshadowed by cheaper - though more volatile - SRAM and DRAM. The following (and some of the previous ) is a quote from Computer Technology Review magazine, in an article by Aaron Reardon. I wanted to link to an article on their website, but couldn't find it there. So instead, I'll quote some from their article in the print mag, then link to another website that explains it. The article I found explaining it online is here: http://computer.howstuffworks.com/mram.htm --------------------- Science fiction is once again becoming science fact.

Yes, 256 is the BARE minimum I recommend to our customers. 512 is the best choice without going overboard. 1GB or more is ideal. I don't think I could bear pulling one of my 512MB sticks out and running on less than 1GB anymore.

chee: Check out this little proggy. It's very well defined as is, and can be extended through scripting. http://www.proxomitron.org

What I was trying to get across is that it sounded like you didn't understand. And by "non-default account", I was referring to any account not created by Windows during setup (e.g. any user account besides All Users and Default User).

Just FYI, I didn't read anyone else post this so here goes. I used our custom background for work on my preinstall Then I changed it to a 24-bit BMP (not 256, 24-bit). And edited the winntbbu.dll file. Which, btw, I had no compressed version of that file in my i386 directory. Only the expanded version, which is what I used. Then loaded it into my VirtualPC and this is how it turned out (mind you, it's a work in progress still): So you're not limited to 256 colors on the bmp images. Hope this helps someone else. *EDIT* Oops, first image was a little too big at 1024x768. Reduced to 640x480

Error Code 5 is corrupt boot image. I got a similar error when I was playing around with hex-editing the 3-in-1 boot image from the MSDN CD's to add a 4th (I forgot to reduce it back down to exactly 2048 bytes...oops). Try re-extracting the boot image, or download one from someplace like http://www.nu2.nu/bootcd/#wxp.

If you really wanted to, yes it could. I used it to find a partial on the SMBus HID ( PCI\VEN_10de ) from my nVidia board: @echo off :detect nVidia board devcon find PCI\VEN_10de | find "NVIDIA" >NUL if not errorlevel 1 goto nvidia goto none :nvidia echo found nVidia goto end :none echo Found Nuttin' goto end :end pause Tbh, I'm still learning the structure of it so I may have put more in there than I needed to make it work (not sure about the second "find "nvidia" >NUL" part, if I need it or not), but it works nevertheless.

MHz: Scorpy already explained above what caused his problem. He created a $OEM$\$DOCS\Hunter\Desktop directory that - during the file copy phase - created the Hunter profile under Documents And Settings. This had the unfortunate side effect that when he went to create the actual Hunter account, the directory already existed so it appended the machine name to the end (Hunter.CustomPC). I've experienced this myself and know all about it. Now, I can't say this will happen using Default User or All Users in the $OEM$\$DOCS setup, but I do know for a fact it happens when you send to a non-default account using that method.

The way you have it would work if you want to delete it all the very next time you boot the computer. Myself, I have files in there I like to use until it's time to ship it out to the customer, so I use the GuiRunOnce to setup the batch files on the desktop, and then from there I use those batch files to setup the cleanup on next reboot. This is my GuiRunOnce: Which, as shown above, copies my bit.bat (Burn-In-Test batch file) and sysprep.bat to the All Users desktop. The OEMClean.bat file is run from the registry after you use sysprep.bat to add it in. And yes, it should work fine using OEMClean.cmd, I'm just old school and used to making batch files instead of cmd files Technically, all of those files could be copied to the C:\OEM directory with everything else, but I wanted to make it easy to launch the files without having to specify the location. Just a personal preference. If you stick them all in C:\OEM, then you only need one line to delete all the files: Deltree /Y C:\OEM Meh, I may do this still tbh. Still working out how to make it best. A preinstallers work is never done, heh.

This is the batch file on the desktop that's run to setup the whole cleanup process: The above two files were already copied from the $OEM$ directory. This sets up the RunOnce key to call the necessary batch file: All the above files, including the deltree used during erasure, were copied from $OEM$. This runs on the next boot and cleans up everything, including itself. And in case you're wondering about the desktop icons, I used OEMPrep.bat called from the GUIRunOnce in winnt.sif: Hope that helps someone.

I have OEMPreinstall=Yes in all my Winnt.sif files, unfortunately it doesn't seem to recognize my $OEM$ dir no matter where I put it if I don't specify the drive letter. I actually don't even need to let it finish installing to find out. During the file copy phase, when it does recognize the $OEM$ (using traditional structure) it gets to 100% then I see it copy my additional files. If I don't see them copy, then I know it failed. I'm going to try now to specify D:\Setup\Preinstall and see if that works.

I ran into a similar issue when copying some batch files to the All Users desktop. Here's what I did. I copied them first to a directory called OEM on the root ( C:\OEM ). Then, in my GuiRunOnce in winnt.sif, I call a batch file - that was previously copied to the System32 dir - that copies my files to the All Users desktop: Hope this helps.

Did you try the CD Shell website? http://www.cdshell.org/files/contributions...tolog/bcdw.html

Well, the boot sector can load other bootsectors, but if you want to launch floppy images, that's something different However, I did get around to editing the above boot loader, and manged to add a 4th option to the list (after finally realizing if it's larger than 2048 bytes it won't load), which means it should be possible to implement multiple boot options. The only limit is the maximum file size.

Well, I finally got my answer from MS. Erik (SBST - System Builder Support Team) told me in order to specify a location that's not through the network, I have to give a drive letter. So, I'd have to specify D:\Setup\Preinstal and make sure that there was only one HDD and one optical drive. I may still do it, but I'm not sure if it's worth the hassle. We'll see.

Umm, I already know how to do multiple versions of WinXP on the same disc. What I'm referring to is using one $OEM$ directory for all the preinstalls. *EDIT* I suppose, looking at my chart above, I may not have been fully clear. The two $OEM$ directories were one for Preinstall and one not preinstall. The two $OEM$'s could then be shared between XP Home OEM, XP Pro OEM, XP Home Retail and XP Pro Retail without having 8 different $OEM$ directories between them.

There is another option. I setup my preinstall to copy two batch files to the All Users desktop (which could also be applied to do what you want). The actual batch files are in $OEM$\$1\OEM\*.bat. To copy them, I created another batch file that I placed in $OEM$\$1\Windows\System32 that is called from [GuiRunOnce] in winnt.sif. I know there are better ways, but this works for me. Below is the code: The first two copy bit.bat (Burn-In-Test) and Sysprep.bat to the All Users desktop (this could be modified to copy to the Default Users profile). The third line creates a runonce command to execute a file that let's me modify the Customer's name/org when logging in for the first time - nothing that relates to the project at hand, just explaining the commands. Mind you, a zip/rar file that contains the path to the all users desktop (or default users favorites) would work just as well, but this does what I need it to.

Look for anything in the Run, RunServices, RunOnce, RunOnceEx, etc that could be calling the fax installer.

Try deleting the VCdRom.sys file from C:\Windows\System32\drivers and reboot. Theoretically, it should disable it.

What I did, and I don't know if this will work for what you use it for, is to create a batch file on the All Users desktop that A) installs a reg entry to call a batch file that cleans up all the OEM installation files on next login and B) Runs Sysprep on the machine to reseal it for the customer. The next time it's booted up by the customer, it deletes all OEM installation files and is ready to go. Mind you, you could do that without using the Sysprep part if you don't need it. *RANT* SOMETIMES I HATE EMOTICONS! *RANT*

Just go to Options for VirtualPC and under Performance select: Run Virtual PC at maximum speed Note that this MAY SEVERELY reduce performance for the rest of your PC while VPC is running, but it will run faster. It all depends on your system config. I used to think it would lag any system run at full speed, but it seems to work rather well on my system configuration: AthlonXP 3200+ 1GB PC3200 Corsair LL (dual-channel) nForce2 Ultra (GA-7N400 pro) WinXP Pro 440GB of HDD space (between 4 HDD's)

Works fine for me, too. Though I didn't use Webjunkies files. I just hex-edited them myself. But now I'm wondering if it was even worth it. Ghost 9 won't do disk cloning. At least, I couldn't get it to work from VirtualPC. I tried with two VHDD's specified and with two partitions on the same VHDD. No go. The only useful part is the AV scan, and that can be done other, better ways.

Ah, gotcha

That's odd. I use: TimeZone="20" in mine to set to Central and it works, so I don't understand why it's not working for you. I just ran my winnt.sif through the Setup Manager and changed the timezone to Eastern. This is what it output: [GuiUnattended] OEMSkipRegional=1 TimeZone=35 OemSkipWelcome=1 The OEM stuff is stuff I had put in there previously. If it's not working, then I honestly don't know what to tell you.