razormoon

I just use a bootable OS emergency disk and format from there or better yet, a bootable HDD utility/maintenance CD that comes with any hard disk package. In most cases it doesn't matter if the utility/maintenance software is from a different manufacturer than the HDD. Give it a try.

I am having to agree with graf, Back before Vista (but just a little bit) I was trying my damnest to inject those strange little longhorn/vista AVI into 'downloading from internet' dialogs @ shell32.dll. Them were some badass AVI (at least compared to the same ole' little sheet jumping from earth and into a manilla folder with the outline turning red). If I have ever figured out anything with MS OS, it wasn't how to apply those beautiful AVI. P.S. I agree with you too Ero. Why change what's beautiful? We just want to add to it.

The answer to all of your problems can be found in the Vista Unattended forum. Some things have to be done to the image/wim itself before satisfactory results. If you want a perfect system you're going to have to jump under the hood.

I have not tried running from usb drive. However, I think it'd be quite easy so...instead of posting that question try doing a search across the different forums here. As for your command window. SHIFT-F10 (or was that CTRL-F10 or ALT-F10?)

@Kel Stop being weird. It's bad enough his Wife is running Vista and needs help on the transfer from XP, which means he's not sticking with XP for obvious reasons. I think the answer may be under your nose. Ask the Wifey.

If this happened only after swapping out HDD then I'm figuring that the hard disk that you swapped TO was put into Standby on the originating PC...? Unless, of course, it was a supplemental HDD as opposed to an OS boot disk.

Need more info: What firewall are you running? Is your laptop on the same WORKGROUP? Have you set up the Network and Sharing Center? What are your settings?

SP1 seems to be working. Wasn't there a recovery image feature of sorts imbedded into service pack? Could I have possibly removed that with vlite? haha

Maybe try not using paradox OEM crack?

I started at 9pm and finished somewhere around 3am. Go figure. I'm going to say that I did not give it enough RAM, but stranger things have happened. I just noticed that my WIM has a funky temp dir and perflog dir and it won't let me delete them. I guess it could be worse. Well, I'm about to test.

@Dokugogagoji: No. Can't you just rip it from your original DVD?

Nice link!

Nuhi, This is excruciatingly slow (on VM), but I have a question. When you ran the SP1 exe, did you let it reboot or should I just untic "Reboot automatically" and generalize when done without reboot? EDIT: I'm going on my 4th hour (MS vPC) and am up to the ten million reboots (Installing Service Pack: Stage 1 of Eternity). I guess the above question doesn't matter anymore, I think I fell asleep during a crucial moment? Anyway, I'll post my own answer for whoever decides to torture themselves with this...........

It says: 5. After the SP1 setup is complete, you'll find yourself back at the main Vista desktop with the Sysprep window open and SP1 will be installed and ready to go. From the Sysprep selection window, select OOBE, Generalize, and to Shut Down the system. 6. Boot the system into a WinPE disk or another OS install (ie. XP), do NOT boot back into that Vista install, and run the following imagex command (imagex can be found in WAIK): imagex /compress maximum /flags "Business" /capture d: c:\install.wim "Windows Vista Business" where d: is the drive Vista is installed on and c:\install.wim is the location to store the new install.wim. Replace "Business" with whatever edition of Vista you installed and replace the drive letters (d: and c:\install.wim) with your own. How did you accomplish this inside VM? EDIT: Nevermind, I'm well on my way...

One of the best things about WAIK? Removing stuff. Like those two icons on the quicklaunch bar (show desktop and switch desktop?)......grrr. Glad it worked out!

Do a better search. The answer is in this forum. It's in the autounattend.xml!

Yeah well, I sold my soul in a 15m transaction, downloaded the software and just stared at the setup.exe on my D: drive. Needless to say, I'm backing up my personal docs and reinstalling tonite. All without launching that **** thing. Can you believe I like Bill Gates?? Yes. I do. I don't like M$ tactics though. Kiss my a$$. How's that for demographics?

Sorry 'bout that... in \sources\$oem$\$$\setup\scripts\ SETUPCOMPLETE.CMD @echo off CMD /C secedit /configure /db %systemroot%\security\database\unattend.sdb /cfg %systemroot%\security\templates\unattend.inf /log %systemroot%\security\logs\unattend.log /overwrite /quiet EXIT Of course, you can add more commands here if you'd like.

SpecV, Try following the instructions here. They are for cmedia audio, but you can bypass the driver install.exe at the very least. Give it a try! Otherwise you can also look for an *.inf file in your driver package, right-click and install. I found that most of my driver problems have stemmed from the driver install programs and not the drivers themselves. Hope this helps and good luck.

It's like you've made it through one of those McDonald's tray liner maze games, only you got nowhere and everybody is laughing! Fantastic pic! (on my wall)

I've had nothing but grief from Windows Mail. Try Live Mail. It looks the same. More features. Less of a pain in the a**.

Myself...I use firstlogon.cmd to set my wallpaper. FirstLogon.cmd REG ADD "HKCU\Control Panel\Desktop" /v Wallpaper /t REG_SZ /d %systemroot%\Web\Wallpaper\whatever.jpg /f REG ADD "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Desktop\General" /v Wallpaper /t REG_EXPAND_SZ /d %%systemroot%%\Web\Wallpaper\whatever.jpg /f REG ADD "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Desktop\General" /v BackupWallpaper /t REG_EXPAND_SZ /d %%systemroot%%\Web\Wallpaper\whatever.jpg /f EXIT It works pretty well for me. I don't try the theme thing since it seems too buggy, but I hope this will help your wallpaper issue.

Disable Security Center: delete "HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{FD6905CE-952F-41F1-9A6F-135D9C6622CC}"

If you're concerned about loading drivers, software and such try Run >> msconfig, disable everything and start enabling one by one.

Try REG LOAD "HKU\CUSTOM" "%SystemDrive%\User\Default\NTUSER.DAT"