Arneh

You should use the one which you have a key for.

Never said there's anything wrong with SP1. What you did, I'm presuming, is a completely different way of doing it, ie. doing a Reverse Integration type install (where you install the OS first) but just to install stuff in it (Dreamscene, IE8, Nero, Vista Codecs etc.) and then sysprep/imagex to make a new .wim. What they wanted to do was integrate it directly (using vlite or manually with pkgmgr) to the original install.wim from MS and the issue was it wasn't getting installed (even though it integrated fine) when installing the OS. I haven't tried it personally so I don't know the specifics but my guess about that issue was in my previous post.

Heh, I've got a nearly identical spec'd system as a mostly media computer. I'd personally use an nLited XP SP3 on it. Although 1GB Ram and a 9600 will work on Vista and provide Aero Glass etc., I think it's best to have at least 2GB for Vista to use. This config is a borderline sort of thing. While it may be sorta fine for a vLited Vista, it'll really be great with an nLited SP3. Gaming wise Vista and XP drivers may be nearly identical these days, but again you'll probably get better performance in that area too on XP SP3.

Yeah, although I haven't tried integrating IE8, that behavior can happen. ie. If you try to integrate the Dreamscene .cab using pkgmgr into for example Vista Business, it will integrate with no issues, but, when you install the OS, it won't be there since the SKU does not support Dreamscene. It's probably not the exact same thing with IE8 but I expect something similar (some compatibility check) is going on.

No, unless you intend to run it as a very stripped down server with no GUI, Core is not for you. Stick to the regular versions of S2008. Standard Core and Core? Are you sure you're reading that right? You should see something similar to Windows Longhorn SERVERSTANDARD and Windows Longhorn SERVERSTANDARDCORE. The regular version of S2008 Standard does not/should not have the "Core" word in it.

There is no desktop to install for the Core version. The Core version is meant to be exactly that, a no-GUI command prompt only OS for specific server roles: http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2008...stallation.aspx

That's Windows Starter Edition. WinFLP is a mostly full OS that behaves like XP Pro built from XP Embedded. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Funda..._for_Legacy_PCs

Correct, there is no way to mod a WinFLP install prior to the install however there are plenty of guides on how to make a Windows install smaller after the install which would work for WinFLP. It's nothing compared to what you could do with nLite prior to an install but those guides are out there anyway. aviv00, WinFLP offers 5-6 or so simple but very large/important options during setup, a quick selection for what bits you want to install. WinFLP doesn't even include many of the "bloated" stuff that comes with a regular XP in the first place and you can use an unattend script with it. Granted, it has nowhere near the number of options of nLite (nLite is still the the better option for highly customized solutions) but it is much much smaller and less "bloated" than a regular XP install and has the full support of MS and you're guaranteed that nothing will break whereas with nLite you might remove something and lose functionality that you didn't mean to remove. Again, I'm *not* saying you shouldn't use nLite in any way (I still think it's a great app for highly customized solutions) but I'm sure many users would appreciate having that kind of option to customize during Windows setup however MS doesn't seem to think so for its versions of Windows aimed at the general population of Windows users.

I'm not really here to debate which takes longer or shorter to install, as that doesn't really matter to me since both don't take a long time to install anyway. I'm just saying that the approach/customization that MS took for WinFLP is really nice and would perfectly fit Vista too but unfortunately they didn't include it in Vista as a "Customize Setup" option.

Yea, nLite will allow you to have a smaller install, nothing surprising about that, however it's the approach to WinFLP that MS took that I really like. They based the product off XP Embedded, didn't add unnecessary bits without losing much if any functionality, gave an option during setup to select which bits to install and not to install, and used a Vista style image based setup/deployment. Unfortunately, there's really not much support for it, even from MS, since it's a very unique product aimed at a small population of users. It's a shame there's no "Vista Fundamentals" as that would be a perfect candidate for vLite.

The problem with supporting WinFLP is also that there is no way to slipstream SP3 into it and there's no way to tell whether MS will make a new WinFLP ISO with SP3 integrated. And, the standalone SP3 update will be a unique version for WinFLP (ie. the regular SP3 .exe update since Build 3282 cannot be used with WinFLP anymore). So, even *if* there was support in nLite for WinFLP, the only way you can install SP3 to it is after you install the OS, and looking at what happened with Vista and SP1 when folks tried that with a vLited Vista RTM, I don't think it would go well. Nevertheless, WinFLP is in my opinion the best version of XP that MS has released and it really is unfortunate that they didn't target a larger audience with it.

Well, here's how I like to look at it. Vista SP1 = S2008 in codebase. There really is no fundamental difference between them in the core. That could not be said for XP and S2003 since MS didn't merge the codebases of the two with a service pack. MS however used the same S2003 codebase for XP64 so in a way, VistaSP1/S2008 is the same thing as S2003x64/XPx64. So I don't see why many people are trying to use S2008 as a desktop unless they need to use some of the Server functions in S2008 that aren't available in Vista. If that's your reason for doing so, then it's perfectly understandable. But besides that, it's a bigger pain to get all the Vista stuff working in S2008 after a vLite than it is to just vLite a VSP1 ISO.

I've vlited WS2008 RTM and it installed fine... What issues did you have?

Edit: Double post.

Yes, integrating SP3 to an original XP disc will be just fine since it'll contain all the previous fixes of previous service packs. I've personally done it with an XP RTM disc (no sp's integrated) and integrated SP3 with no issues. You said you had an SP1a disc, not an XP RTM disc. So between the two, SP1a and an SP2 disc, I doubt it'll make much if any difference which one you use. If you have an original XP RTM disc with no sp's integrated, I'd personally using that.

Yea, you have to extract the contents of SP1, then place it in the Updates folder. Sticking the big .exe in won't work.

Weird, try this one, I made a quick TinyURL: http://tinyurl.com/2uj3vj

There's a guide here: http://kurtsh.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!...!1665.entry Basically, you're not supposed to xcopy the ISO file (if that's what you did) but rather the contents of the ISO.

"They're not affected because they are not yet available to the public." is not a part of the quote from Tim Rains' statement. It was something CNET added themselves and did a pretty poor job at wording it in my opinion. Nevertheless, if you actually read the bulletins, you'll see that MS lists Vista SP1 and S2008 as Non-Affected software to those vulnerabilities. For example: http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/...n/ms08-008.mspx etc.

That's because none of the updates for February affect SP1 or S2008.

LOL yea, I probably should add that to the guide as an FYI. The example I put in the guide was Business which probably doesn't clearly explain it all. Thanks for the reminder.

The AIK will have updated SP1 WinPE images and other tools however MS have stated numerous times that SP1 cannot be slipstreamed and is in fact blocked from being slipped offline using the regular tools one might use to integrate hotfixes. As they've stated in their latest docs: "This "online" update method is the only supported method of updating images with SP1—you cannot install or uninstall SP1 to an existing image offline without booting into it. "

Thanks underxp, it's been added to the guide.

Yes, all you need is 2 OS installs. One is the Vista RTM install which you'll be updating to SP1 and running vsp1cln in it and the other is the XP install which you'll use to capture/imagex the Vista install.

Almost correct, but a clarification on point 3: this should be done from another Vista installation (as should running imagex to create the install.wim). No, vsp1cln can be run from inside the SP1 Vista install. vsp1cln is both an online and offline tool meaning it can be run in the install or from another install as stated in the Vista SP1 deployment docs: "Typically, you should run Vsp1cln.exe if you want to reclaim this disk space after applying SP1 and if you will not need to uninstall SP1. You can use this file both online and offline, but you must have SP1 installed."