Atari800XL

Thanks. I did do a quick Regshot compare, but looked at the result with the standard texteditor (didn't have my favorite editor installed on the preview yet). Must have overlooked it, sorry. (I mentioned your new addition at MDL, hope you don't mind...)

JFX, you've got to be kidding, nobody, NOBODY is that fast How did you do it !? (I really would like to know!) Now, you KNOW you're spoiling us, right? I LOVE WinNTSetup

Well, a quick regshot comparison didn't turn up an easy, quick, single registry toggle (yet) to Boot To Desktop, but I'm sure something will come up soon. Other solutions could be a setting in autounattend.xml, or a WinNTSetup tweak. Then it's byebye Metro for me...

I just downloaded the Windows 8.1 preview from: http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-8/preview-iso I booted Win8PESE, mounted the new iso, then started WinNTSetup (with all my usual tweaks and commandline options), using my normal autounattend.xml (only changed the product key). I'm glad to say everything went off without a hitch! My compliments to JFX (once again). I don't really care about any of the new Windows 8.1 features, only thing I wanted was the new (sigh..., 18 months overdue) "Boot To Desktop" option. And indeed, the bugger now can boot straight to the desktop (so, even faster than the 0.2 seconds of Metro I still saw with my previous Windows 8 using Classic Shell). I haven't tested anything else yet, just wanted to report success with WinNTSetup. Next is finding out how I can add the "Boot To Desktop" to autounattend.xml, would that be possible/ easy, you think? Or else maybe a (command-line!?) option in WinNTSetup? Maybe we could even name it Windows 7.1 then, instead of 8.1...

Woah... that was fast... Thanks, you never cease to amaze me.... Now I'm curious about what happened with the dialog box. Was there supposed to be a Easter message there? ("Happy Easter from JFX"). That would be a true Easter Egg... But my guess is, it was some kind of "flag" box for you in testing mode? Anyhow, thank you very very much, you are faster than a speeding bullet. I hope your fingers will not freeze up again soon, let's hope for a warm summer! (not too warm- mind those PC fans [pun intended]) And before I forget: YES, version 2.3.5.2 fixed the empty dialog box! In the time it took to type this message, the W8 setup on another PC has finished!

JFX, I was trying out the new 2.3.5 version, and noticed the strange message box right before "Integrating drivers". I then tried 2.3.5.1, no change. Any ideas what this could be? If I click OK, everything proceeds normally, and the setup seems to be OK. I used a new .wim file, but don't think that's it. Still, I will do more testing, first with an older .wim file, then with an older WinNTSetup version. But if you have any ideas in the meantime, please share... [EDIT: Attachment removed, not needed anymore, it was just an empty dialog box]

Thanks for the new version. I still use WinNTSetup almost every day. As an example: Today somebody gave me an Acer TravelMate 4150 (from 2004-2005) with a busted DVDRW. "I guess it's a total write-off, right?" he told me . I booted from USB (Win8PESE) (he never saw OS setup from USB before...), installed XP, W7 and W8 (all updated versions, from same USB), after two hours he had XP (which he needs for his scanner), W7 (for daily use with Office 2010), and W8 (for testing) all on 1 PC. Never saw a bigger smile!!! ("Hey, this one now boots quicker than my 2009 desktop PC!) I'd like to pass that smile on to you, JFX!!!!! (What are you planning for version 3? Could it really get better still?)

OK, I've "edited away" my previous message that was at this spot. It was about "6-Common Files.script" missing from the full download, but there has been an update to the full download, so that comment is no longer valid. I just want to thank everybody once again, and to be honest I don't understand why there aren't 100x as much "thanks" messages here. I mean, isn't Win8PESE just about the best invention since sliced bread? Or is there even a better PE solution, where everybody is hanging out? Then please tell me where that is Seriously, Win8PESE is a great tool (as is Win7PESE of cource), thanks...

I would like to particularly thank you for the fact that WinPESE8 even builds on XP (great job on the beautiful GetWAIKTools utility!!), and the resultant ISO even runs on my old HP nc6320 (512mb). Now I know that's the absolute minimum, but still, it works! And it's fast, too (it boots 20% faster than WinPESE7 on my testsystem). I have been playing with a standard WinPE4 for a little while, but I did miss the standard Explorer shell (just for the shell, because I use XYPlorer as a filemanager) and also missed the Diskmanagement GUI. Great to see they're back in WinPESE8! I was just thinking about this: It must be close to 25 years ago when I had my MSDOS floppy with a 200kb full "emergency boot" (with Q- The Quick Editor, 4Dos, etc). Now, 25 years later, we have a USB thumbdrive with a 200mb WinPESE8 "emergency boot"

ChrisR, JFX, and everybody else: Thank you very much for WinPESE8!!! I've used WinPESE7 for a while now, I use it almost every day (as a basis for JFX's brilliant WinNTSetup). These tools are just so amazingly great, I can't begin to express my respect for all your work. You're the BEST!!! I made a very basic WinPESE8, to which I add a simple script to have an autorun Autohotkey (because I like to use the keyboard as much as possible, not the mouse, when I use WinPESE on systems I need to repair/ setup), The autohotkey.ini file then has a simple "autorun"/ "runonce" part on top, where I mount my (existing) Portable.iso, which holds my favorite aps (TCCLE, Semware Editor, WinNTSetup, etc. etc.). I was actually very surprised to see that I could use my existing (WinPESE7) Portable.iso with WinPESE8 with hardly any modification! I only needed a few extra dll's, eg. msvbvm60.dll for XYPlorer (free GiveAwayOfTheDay version 11.90) and the less-obvious asycfilt.dll (XYPlorer as well). It was actually a lot of fun finding out about the new things in WinPESE8, I can hardly believe everything's working so good already! Last time I checked (december 2012) there was nothing, last week I checked again and the whole project is as good as complete!!! At least for me, there's hardly anything to wish for, only thing I would like is a way to get rid of the last two desktop icons ("Computer" and "Trash"). I use BGInfo as a way to display system info straight on the desktop at boot, along with a "cheat-sheet" with Autohotkey keyboard shortcuts, so those desktop icons are not very useful to me. But as I said, those are just tiny little things, totally unimportant to the working of the system itself. Thank you guys, you are brilliant!!!!!!!!!!

Thanks JFX. I finally ended up here in the general PE section. GetWAIKTools is another one of your geniusly perfect tools. I also built my first WinPESE8, so I'll continue thanking you there

I guess it wouldn't be a very big problem if you decided to "reduce" the possibilites to run WinNTSetup from XP, as long as using it to install XP is still possible. Speaking of which: I always run WinNTSetup from WinPE_SE, which of course you also have (had?) a lot of involvement in. Do you still recommend that as a platform (or even the best platform) for WinNTSetup? Or are there better alternatives? I did some testing with PE4.0 (just the standard Windows 8 PE, with XYPlorer as a shell and Autohotkey for running my most used utilities with a single keystroke, no real need for a normal shell with menu etc). WinPE_SE is wonderful, but there may come a time to "upgrade" the base for WinNTSetup to PE4? I have no complaints at all about WinPE_SE, it's just strange that sometimes it freezes at boot time ( I always use USB), it looks like there's a problem with some processes waiting for other processes to initialize, which ends up in a freeze. A reboot/ reset usually solves this, but it would be nice to know who is waiting for who... That's the only (tiny) blemish on this perfect system!!!!

OK, thanks for your reply, but it leaves one thing open: You mention that "driver integration for W8 was buggy when running under XP". So when you say support for XP is getting tougher, is that: (1) Running WinNTSetup from XP (which I never use, I use WinPE_SE = W7) (2) Using WinNTSetup to *install* XP ...or both?

Thanks for the new version. I can't say that I noticed any "bugs" lately, so now I wonder which bugs you fixed in the new release.... Also, are you saying that disableSFC was not working with XP setup before? So I should test XP setup again with the latest version? Sorry for asking, but it's just that the previous version was working OK for me, and the only reason for a new test would be the DisableSFC thing... Thanks for WinNTSetup!!!!