Daemonforce

Yeah. Run DISKMGMT.MSC. You should NEVER be getting that error!

Your friend needs to do a low-level format before XP will accept an NTFS partition for a system boot. I used to use FAT32 all the time until I did a low level format. Then I could use NTFS and I find it useful as a file system for the operating system. I had my data drives stick with FAT32 for the past 4 years that I've had a computer. Until last year I finally got a DVD drive and there was a sudden need for NTFS(I couldn't make DVD sized ISOs, large files, very large videos). Everything needs to get pushed forward. The faster everything moves away from FAT, the happier I'll be.

That's right. Since when has it been a problem? o.O I had my 80GB Maxtor formatted as one big FAT32 partition for the past two years.

NTFS partitions stop somewhere but I don't believe it's based on the version(NT/2K/XP/LH...). Isn't it some unrealistic number like 16 exabytes? o.O Where are we going to need to make the jump into 64-Bit hardware?

Show us your WINNT.SIF file. o.O

Uhmmm...Sure. o.O I do it after getting a new build. I find the build 4051 to be the most dynamic though. 4074 and 5219 didn't do very much for me. =/

What the hell is PSExec and BeyondExec? o.O I'm having a similar problem here. I deploy Windows XP SP2 to several machines and I have a nasty habit of not checking the remote desktop connection switch for remote tasks. The remote registry service is running but outside of that, I can't connect remotely and I can't get it working. I used to be able to do this without a problem when we used SP1. I commonly use WMI to make changes like this and it's not working anymore. The technician box is running XP SP2 as well.

In the beginning I've found it easiest to stick to FAT32. FAT32 was the most supreme format my old K6 could use for a while until I did a low level format. Afterwards, I could finally use NTFS when installing Windows 2000/XP. What really screwed me was encryption in Windows .NET Server. I wound up locked out of all my stuff, the admin finally went insane and I decided NTFS was something for those that only know everything happening to their computer. I'm a guy that likes keeping images around. Big images. I stuck by FAT32 for the past 5 years until I got myself a DVD burner. Now I recognize the need to store files composed of 4GB+. Right now my 300GB SATA is just one big NTFS6 partition.

I have been looking forward to making this for a while. Lets see if the next Vista build uses new features. Winpeshl.

It's at the five year stage where support for it(should) starts to drop off. You don't see the latest hardware and software being supported on NT4. o_O That's how Microsoft makes their money. You buy an operating system for one period of time...It expires after 10 years...You buy a new one with new licenses and features. VMware!

When you run a cab script(makecab) over explorer.exe, you're going to get the file generated in a cab format with a _ at the 3rd character in the extension. It's named Explorer.ex_. Rename that to EXPLORER.EX_. Unless you automatically burn your CD images in ISO9660, you need to be doing this. The Windows BSOI is very picky because it can only read files listed in the manifests in an uppercase format. Anything joliet or different than the 8.3 filename format will be rejected by the BSOI. BURN IN UPPERCASE! o_O

The point is support. Hell I would go back to OS/2 if it could support everything I want. =/ Windows 2000 needs to retire like NT. Windows XP has been out for so long that it's reaching the mid-point of its life. Windows Server 2003 is still going strong. I see what you're saying though. I used to have just one computer and it was full of legacy hardware. I still go back to it when something on this computer gets fubar'd. Vista p***es me off.

Read my posts very carefully. I didn't put emphasis on the rename because of the extension...

You weren't around at the Longhorn PDC were you? It was an alpha stage at the time. The build number was 4051 and it was one of the better builds and the shell was probably one of the worst. The sidebar was integrated into explorer at the time. It took upwards of 2 minutes for me to fully load Explorer. The desktop loaded instantly but the sidebar was taking forever(along with the start bar). I looked in the taskmanager at one point to find it eating between 200-400MB during load. Disabling the sidebar feature fixed that but on a new installation, the sidebar was on by default. I like to focus on extracting PE from these builds to see what I can do. Fully loading explorer just wasn't an option. =/ I could probably get it done with the Vista 5xxx releases.

This is actually something bothering me about the x64 build. I can't really do anything with it. I can do a manual extraction and build a 64-Bit PE, but there are so many new references that it would probably break. I use a 32-Bit machine and I want to include the x64 build in my master boot disc along with all the other multiboot settings. I think you may have a local reference problem in TXTSETUP. If that's not it, it could be something in the AMD64 directory that it needs to see and it's not doing that. =/

These things are a pretty common size. They need to be small so that they don't get in the way. What I don't understand is how I can be overclocking and suddenly I can hear this thing gripe at me for clocking a bit high. Unless the onboard audio is travelling to my 2.1's...This is one loud little speaker.

Is your problem that the modded and compressed file will not read at the BSOI? I just open reshacker(I know it's crude but it works), do the modifications I need, run makecab on explorer and rename it EXPLORER.EX_. If it still doesn't work or setup gripes about a copy/protection problem you'll probably have to change the checksum. I still haven't found a proper way of doing this.

You mean hitting install from a Win32 environment? o.O Add an unattend script to the end of the syntax when running setup. I think it's something like winnt32 /u:unattend.txt ...................... Go nuts. o.O

*stabs thread* That Enterprise better be a server model. o_O *clicks link* Aw crap.

I hate that **** sidebar. >.<' It's associated with explorer and the #1 cause of memory leaks that forced 400MB+ memory usage when it first appeared. O_o Please tell me the sidebar process isn't default or at least that sidebar.exe is really a result of them dividing Explorer priorities. >.<' I won't be getting this build but it actually appears to be.....Solid. o_O How well does it perform?

Make it stop! It's like a gurl followed me off teh Internets! :'( I believe it would compile less than that, but yeah. That would....Work.

One of the greatest drawbacks of this forum is that you can't delete your own posts. Also you cannot lock your own threads. Common sense goes a long way and apparently this forum is designed to overwork the mods/admins with some sort of psychological warfare. NOTE: I have been warned for badmouthing vB before. IPB and all the other forum designs are great and the faults usually have to do with these different forum structures. Caveat hacks and optimized code make forums fun.

I also have to state that building an x64 version of a 32bit application shouldn't be hard for most vendors - assuming they aren't using direct access to functions and are using the default exposed Win32 APIs, a relatively simple code review and recompile using an x64 compiler should be all that is needed. The Win32 wars....Begun it has. I'm glad I try to keep things simple.

I am actually pushing for the 64-Bit builds. There is simply no point in torturing yourself with outdated garbage. My only regret is that minimum requirements go up in order to simply crunch numbers in an office with more "security." Working on it. Right after I build a 64-Bit machine capable of building this crap let alone understanding it. The 16-Bit software needs to run in an emulator just to run properly. A Win64 OS does not support this function. A Win32 is no better at this point because it will be the same case as trying to run a 16-Bit app with what I have now. I can officially state that everything I have at this point(Win32) is utter garbage and will be quickly replaced when the important vendors start spitting out 64-Bit binaries. These will run seamlessly with the operating system and it's far better than running the NTVDM for compatibility. I have so many issues about using NTVDM that I won't clutter this thread on why it needs to go. It just does. This is the brick wall I'm facing with Vista. Depending on the hardware, I usually go for anything between 1 and 2GB memory while using the least amount of modules possible. While the ability to go over is there, the reason for this choice is performance. I'm an overclocker and I need to state that adding module after module appears to hinder the machine because it's focused on using more and more precision hardware at once. Same thing when adding drives and power hungry peripherals. Oversized modules seem to create some performance problems(unstable) with the hardware I mess with and over time I find it better to use as few modules as possible if I hope to squeeze as much performance as I can. Trying to keep performance from being a slow crawl is the next problem. My solution? Overrated ram. It pulls through for my workstations and my Intel 3.00E can crunch numbers at a pace that competes with an Athlon FX53. Now the problem is price. Either you shell out $$$ to complete a build that keeps you at peace from the aggrevation of waiting on tasks, or the end result is just a pile of garbage that p***es you off because you can't do what you want at the pace you need. Unfortunately, like we all realize, the decisive move you make here determines the period of time it takes for your new unit to fall into the later category. All machines have a lifespan and you're spending quite a bit of cash, so make it count. =/ The trick is building a computer intended for a set of roles that will function for a very large period of time so that you don't have to worry about it every few weeks. With each new feasible build, it appears that the speed that these boxes hit retirement is increasing at an exponential rate. When I first took a look at 64-Bit computers I expected these to be around for a long time. They will be. They still are. It's also making junk out of everything made before 64-Bit technology became feasible to the end-user. This is my biggest problem right now. Moral: When you see an impact in the computer market that easily forces 75%+ of all previous builds to retire within a matter of months, it's time to wait for a while for the new hardware to take off and start over with the newest hardware available. You don't want to keep pushing for something where most of your production applications become unworkable upon the next operating system change. Now lets talk about Windows XP. It was introduced and targeted to most if not all users by 2001. All the current flavors of it have been established as of last year. XP is a very stable operating system and compatible with the several unique applications produced. One exception to this is the x64 build. Windows XP 64-Bit Edition is the only XP flavor in its class and appears to be the missing link when looking for the Web Edition of the 64-Bit Windows Server 2003 series. I have concluded that Windows XP64 absolutely will not install in any environment outside of DOS. I can't even run the setup autorun inside of Windows. If you boot the disc, setup needs to examine your hardware before entering the BSOI(This fails if your machine doesn't meet the requirements). The preinstallation data is a bit scattered across the CD, but runs like a clone of the other flavors. Driver support is minimum. By minimum I mean none. o_O Some applications are made to take advantage of XP64, but none of significant importance. Hardware utilization is a bit interesting since you can add and use about as much hardware as a server OS is willing to detect(with the right drivers if needed and available...o_O). Other than that, performance is pretty good on a machine designed to handle it. Then there's Vista... Vista is the most horrible operating system I have seen at the current mark. To start, it's packed about 1GB bigger than it was at the PDC03 stage and expands about 3x bigger than the PDC03 builds. It doesn't play nice with virtual machines(video and disk). Installation takes upwards of 4 hours where PDC03 and XP average 20-30 minutes. The overall functions when finished are medicore at best. The start menu has gotten a few cosmetic revisions and functions seem to stay under one solid menu for scrolling programs(EW!). Icons look nicer than I've ever seen but hog resources. Drive descriptions are so complete that the most simple X86 PC noob can understand. It looks like server tools are broken at this point(no IIS 7.0). The machine "hiccups" every few seconds as if it's reading/writing random spots on the drive. The repository eats upwards of 2GB and the system is using half of it all the time for God knows what purpose(blame indexing service). Now here is the good part: The boot manager. Remember when you used to get a black screen with errors about missing files/directories followed by a reboot when you hit a key? Doesn't happen anymore. Vista uses a local boot manager located on the system root. You add winload to your system directory and add an entry to your boot.ini called USENEWLOADER and you magically get a pretty boot manager complete with operating system boot assignments and even listed hex errors with nice little details in English! Hitting a key at this point? No more reboots, it just goes back to the boot manager so you can quickly make another choice. This is by far the most useful. I plan on adding this to a CD/DVD soon to force-load HALs, PAE or loading everything in ram. This is going to be a lot of fun and it will be even more fun if I can utilize it for the Vista preinstallation environment. Overall the performance is crap on pretty much any system you use. God forbid I load it onto a computer powered by some K6 or equivalent. You're definitely going to want a lot of push and shove after you deploy Vista. There is talk of 64-Bit builds in the making and I will definitely be pushing for it. I hate to say it but this just isn't 32-Bit territory anymore. For anything other than the newest hardware, it's a total warzone where you're struggling when just browsing directories. I'm hoping the RTM builds will work better than this garbage, but it's very unlikely. We'll have to see if and when it finally gets to that stage.

Actually that was wrong. You need a drive that has something like NCQ available to take care of this mess. The speed helps but the drives themselves can't push for efficiency with speed alone. You don't see me using a SCSI controller/drive right now do you? I have seen how the PDC05 build acts on my 5400RPM EIDE drive and a 7200RPM SATA drive. At presentation it ran close to flawless on a SATA raptor. It runs somewhat like my workstation when I turn off DirectX, but I never experience a "hiccup" from this box. Vista does that at startup! O_o No files moved over the network, no load, it's just getting to the desktop and flooding every directory with custom configuration settings like all NT6 builds do after installation. Coming from a guy that didn't expect to see 4xxx builds at PDC/HEC03, I would say it's just as likely we see a 7xxx build by the end of all this. I'm sick of the garbage it's going through right now. The end user doesn't need 2GB+ of crap that slows down the system and we don't need all of these problems that come with it. Like the rest of us, I want this fixed and wrapped up...Now! o_O It appears my half gig of PC4000 isn't going to make the cut. =/ *gets a manifest ready for building a 64-Bit machine*