jaclaz

My wasn't a suggestion for you to follow now, it was a suggestion to follow when re-formatting/re-partitioning, and a (needed) clarification about the fact that you can format and repartition all the times you want, but still some data (that may actually prevent an install of some picky OS on some particular hardware/BIOS) will remain untouched. Now, in order to help you in troubleshooting and hopefully solve the problem: Can you tell us WHICH BSOD STOP code do you get? Can you check with a disk editor/viewer whether sectors 2-63 are all 00's or not? jaclaz

@Andromeda43 You should get your figures straight before accusing someone else of dropping zeroes. Read this: http://www.harddrivereport.com/pata_vs_ata...ata_vs_ide.html then read this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serial_ATA Then, disregard all the above and do your own tests. Get a 133 IDE (actually ATA) drive and test it. Get a 150 SATA drive (SATA I) and test it. Is the second over 10 times faster or a mere 13% faster? Now try a 300 SATA drive (SATA II) and test it, does it result in roughly doubling the speed or is it over 22 times faster? Ideally you should actually also take into account the other added features that newer SATA drives have, that can speed noticeably the actual throughpout. Now, read this: http://bluecouch.com.au/?p=49 where a comparison between similar drives (PATA, SATA and PATA through adapters) has been made. jaclaz P.S.: It's all right if you say that fastest ATA tops at 1330 mb

Not to gatecrash anything (as usual .)) but you should actually be aware that the use of nlite in a Commercial environment is NOT allowed, read here (and given links): http://www.msfn.org/board/Petition-Nuhi-t119463.html jaclaz

GOOD news. jaclaz

Can I sit at your right hand? jaclaz

ANY brand will do. Just get the cheaper you can find, there is so much difference in speed between a IDE device and the SATA that even a slowish (read worst) adapter won't be noticed, IDE tops at 133, SATA starts at 150. Here are a few on a UK based resource: http://www.span.com/catalog/index.php?cPat...016fdce8dcc9dcf If you are going "cheapo" this should be perfect: http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/IDE-to-SATA-Converte...1713.m153.l1262 jaclaz

Please also note that technically, even if you remove your serial, if you give a pre-made CD you are distributing copyrighted software in violation of the MS EULA. jaclaz

Read here: http://www.multibooters.co.uk/ there is everything you need to know. jaclaz

Links removed. @yocarim Be VERY, VERY aware of Rule #1: http://www.msfn.org/board/Forum-Rules-Updated-Re-t18408.html jaclaz

I have formatted the whole drive. There was nothing left on it. And I was able to install Vista... Some suggest that because the laptop was supplied with and conceived for Vista, I might need a BIOS upgrade - but I've installed XP on it before! What do you think? What sbolton asked was NOT whether you formatted the HD or not, he asked if you wiped the first relevant sectors. LOTS of info remains after a simple format. Try wiping the first, say 100 sectors, READ this: http://www.boot-land.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=4015 jaclaz

Indeed, Yzöwl is The Master Here is his batch "translated in an easier to read form, FYI: @Echo off Setlocal Set "Counter=0" For /f "delims=" %%A In (SOURCEDIR.TXT) Do ( Set /a "Counter+=1" Call :SubRoutine1 %%Counter%% "%%A" ) Set "Counter=" Goto :Eof :SubRoutine1 REM Parameter 1 is "Counter" REM Parameter 2 is an entry of SOURCEDIR.TXT Set "AnotherCounter=0" For /f "delims=" %%B In (DESTDIR.TXT) Do ( Set/a "AnotherCounter+=1" Call :SubRoutine2 %%AnotherCounter%% "%%B" %1 %2 ) Set "$=" Goto :Eof :SubRoutine2 REM Parameter 1 is "AnotherCounter" REM Paramater 2 is an entry of DESTDIR.TXT REM Parameter 3 is "Counter" REM Parameter 4 is an entry of SOURCEDIR.TXT If %3 Equ %1 Robocopy "\\JEREMY\SOURCE$\%~4" "\\JEREMY\DESTINATION$\%~2" /mir jaclaz

Sure, the batch will create identical entries. You need to change the BCD description directly from Command Line. (or modify the batch) You see the difference between the create command that is in the batch and the set command in the given example, do you? jaclaz

Actually the explanation of WHY it cannot work is here: http://www.boot-land.net/forums/index.php?...=3287&st=52 At the moment it is NOT possible, but hopefully someone with the right attitudes/capabilities will write the needed driver and prove me wrong soon in the future. jaclaz

The agp440.sys error is UNRELATED to the BIOS issue, and most probably UNRELATED to the booting problem. The line where booting stops indicates LAST already booted driver, so the one giving proble is the one that will be loaded next (which name is not displayed). Pretty smart way of configuring the booting in case of problems implemented by the good MS guys, if I may. This might help you for a possible procedure of troubleshooting: http://www.computing.net/answers/windows-x...sys/130448.html jaclaz

Maybe, if only you could tell us HOW you are booting the two PE's! (unfortunately my crystall ball is in the shop for maintenance and tuning and Tarots are SO inaccurate) My guess is that you edited the BCD, if this is the case, simply re-edit the description: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc721886.aspx http://ranjanajain.spaces.live.com/blog/cn...0!277.entry jaclaz

Yep , but it won't give you ANY more info than mountvol for Removable devices like SD card readers when there is no media in them..... A more useful app is the dd for windows version by John Newbigin: http://www.chrysocome.net/dd try running dd --list jaclaz

Sure it does. And as said this line: Can be removed. by the way it is wrong as it should read: to work, IF the variable SOURCEs is to be used. jaclaz

and that's exactly what the posted code (based on yours) does. WAHT is the problem? jaclaz

What's this, a joke? What do you mean by "it didn't even launch"? jaclaz

Sure, it is a possibility, or maybe it's because of DDR2 type of RAM. jaclaz

Good point. It seems pretty useless, however.... You need to understand a bit about tokens and delimiters (and skip): http://www.robvanderwoude.com/ntfor.html http://www.robvanderwoude.com/ntfortokens.html The first line of your output can be skipped (or you can use the FIND pipeline to exclude it). Set mykey="HKLM\SOFTWARE\Intervade Software\Audit\Network" set myvalue=Destination FOR /F "tokens=3" %%A IN ('reg query %mykey% /v %myvalue% ^|FIND "REG_SZ"') DO ( SET myvalueDATA=%%A ) ECHO reg add "HKLM\SOFTWARE\Intervade Software\Audit\Network" /v %myvalue% /t REG_SZ /d %myvaluedata% /f PAUSE this should work as well: Set mykey="HKLM\SOFTWARE\Intervade Software\Audit\Network" set myvalue=Destination FOR /F "skip=3 tokens=3" %%A IN ('reg query %mykey% /v %myvalue%') DO ( SET myvalueDATA=%%A ) ECHO reg add "HKLM\SOFTWARE\Intervade Software\Audit\Network" /v %myvalue% /t REG_SZ /d %myvaluedata% /f PAUSE By default delims are already [sPACE] and [TAB] so you do not need to specify them. jaclaz

I am not sure to understand the problem you are having. in first loop you assign to n SOURCEDIR variables some values. in second loop you assign to m DESTDIR variables the values in a .txt. You whould check how many n's and m's you assigned to make sure that they are balanced and then loop through them. Something like this: @echo off setLocal EnableDelayedExpansion SET SOURCEROOT=D:\TEST SET DESTROOT=D:\TEST2 set /A n=0 set /A m=0 for /f "tokens=* delims= " %%A in ('dir %SOURCEROOT% /A:D /B') do ( set /a n+=1 set SOURCEDIR!n!=%%A set SOURCEs=!SOURCEs! !m! ) IF NOT EXIST DESTDIR.TXT ECHO Missing file& GOTO :EOF for /f "tokens=*" %%A in (DESTDIR.TXT) do ( set /a m+=1 set DESTDIR!m!=%%A set DESTs=!DESTs! !m! ) IF NOT %n%.==%m%. ECHO Unbalanced data &GOTO :EOF FOR %%A in (%DESTs%) DO ( ECHO robocopy "%SOURCEROOT%\!SOURCEDIR%%A!" "%DESTROOT%\!DESTDIR%%A!" /MIR ) You can make the comparison both between the indexes m and n or through the DESTs/SOURCEs (actually you do not need the SOURCEs as the final loop is done with DESTs) jaclaz P.S.: personally I would create the DESTDIR.TXT file with PAIRs of values, and parse it through a delimiter, something like D:\TEST\Dir1,D:\TEST2\Dir1copied or Dir1,Dir1Copied

If you use as base WinPE 2.0, you could use a "multiple" BCD: http://www.deployvista.com/Default.aspx?ta...&EntryID=27 http://www.boot-land.net/forums/index.php?...amp;#entry31670 But cannot say how and if it will work with BartPE. grub4dos has newish PXE capabilities, but there is not yet much documentation/examples AFAIK, some hints are given here: http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?showtopic=20152 This is from readme_grub4dos: ****************************************************************************** *** PXE device *** ****************************************************************************** If PXE service is found at startup, GRUB4DOS will create a virtual device (pd), through which files from the tftp server can be accessed. You can setup a diskless boot environment using the following steps: Client side You need to boot from PXE ROM. Server side You need to configure a dhcp server and a tftp server. In the dhcp server, use grldr as boot file. You may also want to load a different menu.lst for different client. GRUB4DOS will scan the following location for configuration file: [/mybootdir]/menu.lst/01-88-99-AA-BB-CC-DD [/mybootdir]/menu.lst/C000025B [/mybootdir]/menu.lst/C000025 [/mybootdir]/menu.lst/C00002 [/mybootdir]/menu.lst/C0000 [/mybootdir]/menu.lst/C000 [/mybootdir]/menu.lst/C00 [/mybootdir]/menu.lst/C0 [/mybootdir]/menu.lst/C [/mybootdir]/menu.lst/default Here, we assume the network card mac for the client machine is 88:99:AA:BB:CC:DD, and the ip address is 192.0.2.91 (C000025B). /mybootdir is the directory of the boot file, for example, if boot file is /tftp/grldr, then mybootdir=tftp. If none of the above files is present, grldr will use its embeded menu.lst. This is a menu.lst to illstrate how to use files from the tftp server. title Create ramdisk using map map --mem (pd)/floppy.img (fd0) map --hook rootnoverify (fd0) chainloader (fd0)+1 title Create ramdisk using memdisk kernel (pd)/memdisk initrd (pd)/floppy.img You can see that the menu.lst is very similar to normal disk boot, you just need to replace device like (hd0,0) with (pd). There are some differences between disk device and pxe device: 1. You can't list files in the pxe device. 2. The blocklist command will not work with a file in the pxe device. 3. You must use --mem option if you want to map a file in the pxe device. When you use chainloader to load file from the pxe device, there is a option you can use: chainloader --raw (pd)/BOOT_FILE Option --raw works just like --force, but it load file in one go. This can improve performance in some situation. You can use the pxe command to control the pxe device. 1. pxe If used without any parameter, pxe command will display current settings. 2. pxe blksize N Set the packet size for tftp transmission. Minimum value is 512, maximum value is 1432. This parameter is used primarily for very old tftp server where packet larger than 512 byte is not supported. 3. pxe basedir /dir Set the base directory for files in the tftp server. If pxe basedir /tftp then all files in the pxe device is related to directory /tftp, for example, (pd)/aa.img correspond to /tftp/aa.img in the server. The default value of base directory is the directory of the boot file, for example, if boot file is /tftp/grldr, then default base directory is /tftp. 4. pxe keep Keep the PXE stack. The default behaviour of GRUB4DOS is to unload the PXE stack just before it exits. 5. pxe unload Unload the PXE stack immediately. Get latest here: http://nufans.net/grub4dos/ jaclaz

NOT what you are asking, but maybe a workaround. Would this work? http://members.shaw.ca/bsanders/printfromdos.htm There are a few Shareware/Commercial apps that should be able to do that, but I don't know of any Freeware/Open Source one. The "old" method of making a .prn file and sending it to a network shared printer through COPY /B, though not "nice", should work. Some details: http://geekswithblogs.net/dtotzke/articles/26204.aspx Using this (Freeware): http://www.lerup.com/printfile/ should make the process almost "transparent". Read "between the lines" on these pages: http://www.columbia.edu/~em36/wpdos/winprint.html#usbprint http://www.columbia.edu/~em36/wpdos/ropsprint.html There is a very old program that you should be able to find by googling lpx700.zip that may work to capture LPT1 prints and redirect them to a file. jaclaz

I hope you are not offended if I do not trust you on this particular claim. After all I am not asking that much : ANY evidence but hearsay or apodictical claims. jaclaz