doveman

Thought you might You're quite right though and it's rather obvious (now that you've pointed it out!) Then again, using the first menu entry I listed, without the -mem switch, with a BootSDI PE will do the job won't it? Obviously this isn't an option for a pre-built ISO made without using the BootSDI option. Is there any advantage to building the PE without BootSDI and using Firadisk instead?

Most of my problems were because of the wrong case in filenames (XP_RAM.ISO, WINNT.SIF, DOSNET.SIF, TXTSETUP.SIF) so I'd check they're all upper-case as a first-step.

Someone may well correct me, but I'm not sure you need to go through all this just to boot a PE ISO in RAM. I've had success using the following menu.lst entries. I think you just need to make sure your PE build includes the BootSDI plugin. title PE iso find --set-root /iso/PE.iso map /iso/PE.iso (hd32) map --hook chainloader (hd32) title PE.iso - mem find --set-root /iso/PE.iso map --mem /iso/PE.iso (hd32) map --hook chainloader (hd32)

Just wanted to report that thanks to TigerWhite's post #26, I've successfully installed from an Nlited Driverpacked XP_RAM.ISO contained in an ISO mounted in VMware's VCD-ROM. I was getting an error about unable to find firadisk in TXT-mode, until I added the line to mount the IMA to (fd1). Only downside is it isn't installing the stuff in the I386\SVPACK folder for some reason, but pretty good job nonetheless.

I didn't have any problems with that, the problem was purely with XP_RAM.iso . Yeah, it turns out that Grub4dos was actually finding the XP_RAM.iso on my VHD third partition, so was set root and loading XP_RAM.iso from there, which was an old, incorrectly built one, which wasn't loading WINNT.SIF. I've got round that problem by changing the first line to "find --set-root /XPRAMCD.lst" and making that file in the root of the CD. Very confusing, but I've finally managed to successfully install from USB, CD and HD, in VMware at least

Thanks, but I'm not trying to do a multiple unattended-mode installation, so all that tells me is that it goes in the root of the IMA, which I've already tried. I tested by copying the XP_RAM.iso and XP_INST.IMA to a usb stick and booting from that, starting the RAM install with drive mapping, and that worked fine. It turns out that it's just a problem with my test CD ISO, to do with case. I don't even have to put WINNT.SIF in the IMA, it works fine from the XP_RAM.ISO once the problem's fixed. After a lot of testing, it turns out that XP_RAM.iso needs to be XP_RAM.ISO for the WINNT.SIF to work from a CD ISO in Vmware. I've got no idea why it should work with a lower-case extension from a USB stick but not a CD ISO but there you are.

To try and troubleshoot, I thought I'd just make an ISO, containing only XP_RAM.iso, XP_INST.IMA, grldr and menu.lst, to boot in VMware's VCD-ROM. It seems to be working OK, but I can't get it to respect my unattended settings in winnt.sif. I've tried putting it in the root and in setup\I386\ of the IMA, but I still get the EULA every time. Where exactly am I meant to put this file?

After reading travis_san's message, I thought "maybe I shouldn't be building my ISOs with Nero" (although it seems to make ISOs that work in the VCD-ROM) and recalled what I'd learnt about mkisofs only last week (and mostly forgotten already ). Anyway, I rebuilt my "Vanilla" XP ISO with the below command, but it didn't help mkisofs -v -volid XPPSP3 -R -l -iso-level 4 -J -joliet-long -duplicates-once -b boot.ima -no-emul-boot -boot-load-size 4 -boot-load-seg 0x07C0 -o XPPROSP3Un.iso "XPProSP3-Vanilla-Unattend"

Actually neither of the ISOs I'm using contain the SetupSourceDevice line either. I just noticed that when I had the wrong settings in that line, whilst trying to do an install from the XPCD files copied to HD, that I got the same errors that I'm seeing with the ISO install. I'm not using the HD swap when installing from the same HD either. I had another problem in that the XP install was assigning C: to the third partion, but that turned out to just be because that partition was active. Setting the first partition active fixed that.

Oh well, at least now I know it's something I'm doing wrong! I've been doing some testing with XP install files on the HD and it seems the errors I'm getting in Vmware are caused by an incorrect "SetupSourceDevice = " line in TXTSETUP.sif. So, what should I set this to before making the ISO?

Well I'm not sure exactly what I did, but I've made some progress. I use a dual-boot and I've made a third (primary) partition to store the ISO and IMA on, so that I can format the other two partitions if I feel like it. TXT-mode setup goes OK but after rebooting, it says: "Couldn't open drive multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1) NTLDR: Couldn't open drive multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)" This is after trying to install to the first partition, so those parameters seem correct. Any idea what's going on there? I'm also trying to test this in Vmware. Again I've made a third (primary) partition to store the ISO and IMA on but trying to install either "Vanilla" XPSP3 (558MB) or nlited-XPSP3 (381MB) to either the first or second partition in VMware, after selecting Quick Format I get: "Setup cannot format the partition Your computer may not have enough memory to perform this operation or your Windows XP CD-ROM may contain some corrupted files." I've given the VMachine 1GB RAM, so lack of memory shouldn't be a problem. Installing with either of the ISO's mounted to the V-CD-ROM works fine. If I format the partition manually and select "Leave the current file system intact (no changes)" in XP setup, I get: "Setup was unable to verify drive C: Your computer may not have enough memory to examine the drives or your Windows XP CD-ROM may contain some corrupted files. To continue, press ENTER" and pressing Enter gets me: "Setup cannot access the CD containing the Windows XP installation files" Has anyone had any success testing this in a Virtual machine?

You say: e. copy whole asms folder to c:\I386 but the image "after mapping and copy the files set the files (steps 2/3)" doesn't show a I386 folder. You might like to update this image to avoid confusion

Is it right that I don't need to expand the files copied to I386 (IMS.CAT, NTPRINT.CAT and SP3.CAT are already expanded but the rest are .CA_)? Is there any need to delete the TXTSETUP.SIF in $WIN_NT$.~BT after copying it to the root?

I've got one SATA HD and one IDE DVD drive. After extensive testing I've found the following: XP setup (whether on CD, HD or USB) get's stuck at the "Setup is detecting your hardware configuration" unless I disable my SATA HD. If I disable it, it works fine (but of course then I've got nothing to install XP on!) My USB keyboard doesn't work in XP setup or in grub4dos 0.4.4 booted from USB stick. It does work in grub4dos 0.4.4 booted from HD. USB Keyboard support is enabled in BIOS. I tried all 4 ports on the backplate. Also, booting grub4dos from USB stick requires me to send a break at the grub4dos menu by pressing the power button momentarily, as it won't even respond to the PS/2 keyboard otherwise. This is not necessary when booting grub4dos from HD. So basically, my motherboard sucks! XP_RAM.ISO still won't work from SATA HD even with the IDE DVD drive disabled. It does work from USB stick with SATA HD disabled (but takes too long to load even a cut-down 170MB SP2). The only XP setup that's worked with the SATA drive enabled is the USB_Multiboot_10 created one on the USB stick, so I'm wondering what's different about this that allows it to work.

I installed the nlite unattended XP files on my USB stick with USB_Multiboot_10 and it asked me to confirm username, product key etc but when I was installing XP, it stopped and asked me for these details again. I think something went wrong with creating the boot.ini, because the one on my stick contains these lines: multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINDOWS="Microsoft Windows XP Professional" /noexecute=optin /fastdetect C:\grldr="Grub4Dos" C:\btsec\RMLD1.bs="PE 1 - Boot BootSDI.img from RAMDISK"C:\btsec\XPSTP.bs="1. Begin TXT Mode Setup Windows XP, Never unplug USB-Drive Until Logon" C:\btsec\XATSP.bs="Attended Setup XP, Never unplug USB-Drive Until After Logon" Because the XPSTP.bs line has got stuck on the end of the RMLD1.bs line, it never displayed and I assumed I should select Attended Setup, which was no doubt the problem. I notice that \$WIN_NT$.~BT contains winat.sif and winnt.sif and only the latter contains the details I entered. Is it the case that XPSTP.bs will use winnt.sif and thus do an unattended install, whereas XATSP.bs uses winat.sif and so requires manual entry of these details?

OK. I replaced grldr with 0.4.4 dated 20-06-09 and it does work better now, although the XP setup only shows "Setup is checking your hardware config" at the top of the screen before going to a blank screen and giving up. Actually, trying to install from CD/DVD doesn't work any better but I put that down to a dodgy drive/IDE port. The only way I've got to work so far is from a USB stick using USB_MultiBoot_10 (using the same files as I burnt to DVD and used to make XP_RAM.iso).

Hi Which menu.lst sections does work at existing menu.lst? Do you use find already? Which boot configuration do you use? Do you boot from USB? Do you boot from internal hard disk? How do you start grub4dos? I have grub installed on my HD MBR and the menu.lst on (hd0,0), which is normally just used to allow me to dual-boot between two different XPs. I don't normally use find and just boot from internal HD. Which directory and files did you add? I expanded setup.exe from my nLited I386 folder to setupORG.exe and put that in the IMA. Then I made a folder Inst on my (hd0,0) and put the IMA and ISO in there. Which hardware: motherboard and BIOS do you use? Motherboard is Gigabyte GA-8I848PM. BIOS F5 How do you build the ISO image? With nLite. In addition: /I386/SETUPLDR.BIN is case sensitive. Does exist a file \I386\SETUPLDR.BIN ? Yes I'll try a newer grub4dos and see if that helps. Shows v0.9.7 at the moment

I tried this and didn't have much luck. I don't use boot.ini, so I just added those lines to my existing menu.lst. My ISO is slightly tweaked with nLite, with the XUpdatePack-SP3, a few individual drivers and some program addons. The first line "ls || find" didn't seem to work and I had to manually enter root (hd0,0) for the rest of it to be able to find the files. After mapping XP_RAM.ISO I got: Autodetect number of heads failed: Use default value 255 Autodetect sectors per track failed: Use default value 63 but perhaps that doesn't matter. After map --hook chainloader (0xFF)/I386/SETUPLDR.BIN I got Error 19: Cannot mount selected partition and that was the end of that!

Just to clarify, Search is exactly as you've described with my nlite (with Search Assistant removed) build, which I believe is referred to as "Classic Search". I'd be surprised if Search in an nlite build with Search Assistant left in looks or behaves in any way different from a standard build, but of course I can't be certain till I've tried it.

Well, on non-nlited builds (so with Search Assistant), Search doesn't show a tick box for "Advanced Options" but if I click on the expand arrows next to "More advanced options" it shows the options that I used for the last search already ticked and regardless of whether I expand "More advanced options" or not, it observes the ticked parameters when I search. I can't be bothered to do a new build just to see if leaving Search Assistant enabled fixes this but I'll certainly leave it in next time I use nlite.

I've recently installed XP SP3 using an nlited disc with Search Assistant removed. The thing is, now I can't get Search to default to have Advanced Options ticked and it's rather annoying having to remember to tick it every time I use it. I've tried all the registry tweaks I could find: [HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer] "SearchSystemDirs"=dword:00000001 "SearchHidden"=dword:00000001 [HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Search Assistant] "SocialUI"=dword:00000000 "UsageCount"=dword:00000001 "UseAdvancedSearchAlways"=dword:00000001 [HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\CabinetState] "Use Search Asst"="yes" I've even tried re-installing Search Assistant using srchasst.inf and manually registering the two dll files associated with it, but I still get the classic Search with Advanced unticked everytime. I don't particularly want the Search Assistant back, but I'm puzzled why it isn't after doing all that. I definitely would like Advanced to stay ticked!

Thanks for the info. If you do remember anything else, it would be great to have to hand in case it ever happens again. Whilst it doesn't occur that often (probably last saw it about a year ago) and I do have Ghost backups to hand if all else fails, it's always nice to be able to fix something and know what caused the problem in the first place.

Just some further info that hopefully might point to the cause of the problem. Although I've just had a corrupt system32\config\SYSTEM file which was preventing me booting XP and I had to replace it with an old one which has fixed the problem now, so unfortunately I won't be able to test anyone's ideas out. I deleted some of the non-standard fonts, which didn't make any difference. After reading around, I checked the settings in IE and for some reason, under Internet Options - Fonts, Language Script was set to Cyrillic. I could change it to Latin based but it wouldn't stick (IE was back on Cyrillic when I went back to check) and made no difference to my problem. In notepad, the problem was present using any font with an O or TT preceeding it. I did notice that the Script setting for these was set to Cyrillic but although changing it to Western did stick, it didn't make any difference. Only using the few fonts (Courier, MS Sans Serif) that didn't have an O or TT preceeding them, did the £ display OK. These happen to be fonts for which the only Script setting is Western.

I've got a problem where the pound sign isn't displaying properly. I've had this once before and I think I ending up reinstalling XP (Pro SP2) because I couldn't find any way to fix it. I really don't want to have to do that again. I've only just reloaded from a True Image backup and whilst there isn't a vast amount of software installed, it takes time to tweak everything to how I like it. The symptoms I'm seeing are: 1. If I create a new text document and enter some characters (including £), when I go to save it, it says "The file contains characters in Unicode format which will be lost if you save this file as an ANSI encoded text file." If I save in ANSI format, it changes any £ to ?. It didn't used to do this, so either it must have been saving in Unicode format by default or a problem's developed with ANSI format. 2. Some webpages show J instead of £. For instance, Amazon's homepage shows £ okay but if I go to a product page, all the £ now show as J. 3. Some e-mails show in Eudora with J instead of £ I've checked the Regional and Language settings and Standards and Formats is set to "English (United Kingdom)" and Location is set to "United Kingdom" and Language for non-Unicode programs is set to "English (United Kingdom)". The Default input language is set to "English (United Kingdom) - United Kingdom" and the only things shown under Installed services are "English (United Kingdom) - Keyboard - United Kingdom". I've listed the fonts installed below in case one of those is causing the problem but I don't know which ones are safe to uninstall. It would be great if anyone can help me fix this and it would be good to know what's causing it in case it ever happens again. arial.ttf arialbd.ttf arialbi.ttf ariali.ttf ariblk.ttf comic.ttf comicbd.ttf cour.ttf courbd.ttf courbi.ttf couri.ttf estre.ttf framd.ttf framdit.ttf gautami.ttf georgia.ttf georgiab.ttf georgiai.ttf georgiaz.ttf impact.ttf kartika.ttf l_10646.ttf latha.ttf lsans.ttf lsansd.ttf lsansdi.ttf lsansi.ttf lucon.ttf mangal.ttf micross.ttf modern.fon mvboli.ttf pala.ttf palab.ttf palabi.ttf palai.ttf raavi.ttf roman.fon script.fon shruti.ttf sylfaen.ttf symbol.ttf tahoma.ttf tahomabd.ttf times.ttf timesbd.ttf timesbi.ttf timesi.ttf trebuc.ttf trebucbd.ttf trebucbi.ttf trebucit.ttf tt7268m_802.ttf tunga.ttf verdana.ttf verdanab.ttf verdanai.ttf verdanaz.ttf vrinda.ttf webdings.ttf wingding.ttf wst_czec.fon wst_engl.fon wst_fren.fon wst_germ.fon wst_ital.fon wst_span.fon wst_swed.fon

I've just finished making a AIO DVD by following flyakite's guide and one thing that I couldn't work out is whether it's possible to have more than one Bart PE on the same disc. The second I386 folder is no problem 'cos that can be renamed to BPE2, but what would I do with the second Programs folder? Also, one of my BartPE's has both an (empty) ETC folder and a SYSTEM32 folder with a couple of files in. Assuming I'm dealing with a BartPE that has files in both these folders, should they be copied to the AIO disc?