Albuquerque

I know there are some machines that allow for firmware updates while still within Windows; but I don't exactly know how they work nor do I know if the machines you specified allow such a thing. For compatibility (and safety) reasons, all the BIOS updates on machines here at my office are done in DOS. I actually ghost down a second tiny partition that contains the necessary scripting to identify the machine type, flash the bios appropriately, and then remove itself completely from disk and erase it's own partition upon the first reboot. We update that second tiny partition whenever we get a new BIOS to put out...

DRVSPACE.BIN isn't required unless you plan on eventually using Microsoft's DriveSpace utility to compress that disk. I wasn't able to find a way to make it work through a command line just by doing raw file copies and setting attributes. I'm of the mind that you'll need to use some sort of third party utility to get this done; more than likely Ghost will be easiest to implement in my opinion.

What operating system are you using? Does any other process have that file open?

What is the error you receive when trying to open the default file with Regedit?

You can move it to another batch file if you want, or make it run in the background while something else soaks up your processor time. But the net result is, it is absolutely required that those DLL files be registered before windows script host components will work. I am unaware of any *working* method of "pre-registering" those files to increase boot times. Os a side note, the registration of all the HTA and WSH files on the hardware I work with is really quick -- I think it takes about 10 seconds at most to finish. However, I'm booting it by ramdisk and not direct from the CD, which may result in faster load times. The slowest of our machines here will fully boot PE within about two minutes, three quarters of which is simply waiting for it to load the SDI file from the CD into ram... The remainder of the plug-n-play and network enumeration and registration of those DLL's takes around 30 seconds in worst case.

Sure; one of two ways: Method One: Manual process Open up REGEDIT on your computer, click on HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE, click on the File menu, click on Load Hive... Browse to the folder where you have your PE files, go into the I386\System32\Config folder. Double click on the "Default" file, give it a name of zzz_default when it prompts. Expand the zzz_default key, click on the Environment key, double-click the TEMP value in the right pane and fill in your requested path. When finished, go back to the left pane tree view, click again on zzz_default, and now you can click File and Unload Hive. Method two: Automated process Go into your actual PE build files where all the ODK stuff is actually stored. Double-click on the file named "Winpedef.inf" and it should open in Notepad. Under the [AddReg] section, copy in the following line: HKCU,"Environment", "TEMP", REG_EXPAND_SZ, "<temppathyouwant" Save the INF file. Next time you build a PE image with your MKIMG command, that registry key will automatically insert itself. Obviously this doesn't "fix" any existing PE images you've already built.

I know someone is going to laugh, but to tell you the truth, I did it the most simplistic way possible... I keep a copy of GHOST32.exe on my PE image folder structure, along with an absolutely tiny image of a DOS bootable partition. The ghost image for a DOS boot is like ~200kb when compressed. This saves me from having to create partitions, format, blah blah blah -- I just "ghost and go". If Ghost isn't an option, maybe make sure you're using DISKPART to set that primary partition active. Your diskpart script should be something like this: SEL DISK 0 CLEAN CRE PAR PRI SIZE=2000 SEL PAR 1 ACTIVE ASSIGN LETTER=C: Now you can format C: /q /x /fs:FAT Now you can copy in IO.SYS, MSDOS.SYS, and Command.Com (in that order) and set the first two for attributes +S +H +R. That should fix you up. Edit: I just tried my second method and it didn't work. Not sure exactly how you could do it manually, although I'm sure there's a way that I'm just not thinking of. I *think* you can do it that way, but I just don't recall how...

I do a lot of that sort of scripting here. Easiest answer is to build a "sysprep" image that you always ghost down, and then if you need HAL changes, put in a script to detect your hardware and drop the appropriate NTOSKRNL and HAL files onto the drive before rebooting into the minisetup. The things you're asking for (detecting hardware, ejecting CD) are not built into PE by default. You will need to create a PE image with WMI support enabled from the MKIMG.CMD command line argument. You also need to add in WSH support through BUILDOPTIONALCOMPONENTS.VBS from your PE ODK files. Once you have WMI and WSH functionality in your PE image, you can build a very simple WMI query to enumerate what kind of PC you're on. I'm not going to give away all my secrets, but I'll help you by giving you the contents of a very basic VBS file to query the proper WMI component: set oSvc = GetObject("winmgmts:root\cimv2") wqlQuery = "select Version from Win32_ComputerSystemProduct" for each oTEMP in oSvc.ExecQuery(wqlQuery) wscript.echo oTemp.GetObjectText_ next Copy-n-paste that into a blank Notepad doc, give it a VBS extension and double-click it from your normal OS that you're on right now. You'll notice the "Version" field will be the hardware model of your PC. You can now tweak that VBS file to branch out based on individual cases... As for your Eject request? I use a simple tool called EJECT.EXE; a freeware utility that allows you to simply specify "eject.exe <driveletter>" to eject a CD rom tray. I combine it with another VBS that enumerates mounted volumes to see which (if any) CD tray my CD is in and then eject it if found (I use a standardized naming convention for all my bootable PE CD's that lends itself to easily being found) Keep in mind that you can't eject the CD from within PE unless you're operating in a ramdisk environment (with the /INRAM option, or ramdisk-from-iso option, or ramdisk-from-sdi option).

You don't need a drive letter to use Ghost32, just for your information. set GhostPath=\\ImageServer\Ghost Net use %GhostPath% /user:xxxxx "password" Start /wait "%ghostpath%"\Ghost32.exe I use a huge pile of scripting to detect the local subnet, assign a "parent server", detect the hardware of the machine I'm on, drop the appropriate ghost image automatically, drop additional files if needed, eject the CD and reboot. It all just depends on your creativity

I do two things: Delete a big huge pile of files, and then compress some other ones with UPX (freeware EXE/DLL/COM compressor) First, here is the batch code that I use as the "parent" for the whole process: @ECHO OFF set scriptpath=c:\winpe2005\samples set pe_path=%1 if not defined pe_path goto usage if not exist "%pe_path%" goto usage if exist "%scriptpath%\logfile.txt" del logfile.txt >nul if exist "%scriptpath%\delete.txt" call :DeleteFiles if exist "%scriptpath%\compress.txt" call :CompressFiles goto DeleteDirectories :DeleteFiles ECHO Deleting files for /f "eol=;" %%i in (%scriptpath%\delete.txt) do if exist "%pe_path%\i386\%%i" del "%pe_path%\i386\%%i" >>logfile.txt goto :EOF :CompressFiles ECHO Compressing Files for /f "eol=;" %%i in (%scriptpath%\compress.txt) do if exist "%pe_path%\i386\%%i" upx -9 -f -q "%pe_path%\i386\%%i" >>logfile.txt goto :EOF :DeleteDirectories if exist "%pe_path%\i386\help" rd "%pe_path%\i386\help" /s /q if exist "%pe_path%\i386\Registration" rd "%pe_path%\i386\Registration" /s /q goto :EOF :Usage ECHO. ECHO Usage: cleanup.cmd pe_path ECHO Where "pe_path" is the root of your customized PE image (ex: C:\WinPE) ECHO. Usage from a commandline is "cleanup.cmd c:\pe_path" where pe_path is the root of your customized PE image (don't specify c:\pe_path\i386) THen, I have two individual files that contain a list of things to either delete or compress. Here is the delete.txt file: ;Delete.TXT file -- Last updated 2006-03-14 ;Jason xxxxxx, Operations Lead, CSS ;Yum Brands INC ; ;To be used in conjunction with WindowsPE Cleanup script file ;This listing is for WindowsPE 1.6 (2005) based on NT 2003 SP1 operating system ; ;Unused files from I386 Root ; bootfix.bin spcmdcon.sys startrom.com winbom.ini spcmdcon.sys biosinfo.inf setupldr.exe ; ;Unused fonts ; fonts\8514fix.fon fonts\8514oem.fon fonts\8514sys.fon fonts\ahronbd.ttf fonts\andlso.ttf fonts\angsa.ttf fonts\angsab.ttf fonts\angsai.ttf fonts\angsau.ttf fonts\angsaub.ttf fonts\angsaui.ttf fonts\angsauz.ttf fonts\angsaz.ttf fonts\app850.fon fonts\arial.ttf fonts\arialbd.ttf fonts\arialbi.ttf fonts\ariali.ttf fonts\ariblk.ttf fonts\artrbdo.ttf fonts\artro.ttf fonts\browa.ttf fonts\browab.ttf fonts\browai.ttf fonts\browau.ttf fonts\browaub.ttf fonts\browaui.ttf fonts\browauz.ttf fonts\browaz.ttf fonts\cga40850.fon fonts\cga40woa.fon fonts\cga80850.fon fonts\cga80woa.fon fonts\comic.ttf fonts\comicbd.ttf fonts\cordia.ttf fonts\cordiab.ttf fonts\cordiai.ttf fonts\cordiau.ttf fonts\cordiaub.ttf fonts\cordiaui.ttf fonts\cordiauz.ttf fonts\cordiaz.ttf fonts\cour.ttf fonts\courbd.ttf fonts\courbi.ttf fonts\courf.fon fonts\couri.ttf fonts\david.ttf fonts\davidbd.ttf fonts\davidtr.ttf fonts\dosapp.fon fonts\ega40850.fon fonts\ega40woa.fon fonts\ega80850.fon fonts\ega80woa.fon fonts\estre.ttf fonts\framd.ttf fonts\framdit.ttf fonts\frank.ttf fonts\gautami.ttf fonts\georgia.ttf fonts\georgiab.ttf fonts\georgiai.ttf fonts\georgiaz.ttf fonts\impact.ttf fonts\latha.ttf fonts\lucon.ttf fonts\lvnm.ttf fonts\lvnmbd.ttf fonts\l_10646.ttf fonts\mangal.ttf fonts\modern.fon fonts\mriam.ttf fonts\mriamc.ttf fonts\mriamfx.ttf fonts\mriamtr.ttf fonts\mvboli.ttf fonts\nrkis.ttf fonts\pala.ttf fonts\palab.ttf fonts\palabi.ttf fonts\palai.ttf fonts\raavi.ttf fonts\rod.ttf fonts\rodtr.ttf fonts\roman.fon fonts\script.fon fonts\seriff.fon fonts\shruti.ttf fonts\simpbdo.ttf fonts\simpfxo.ttf fonts\simpo.ttf fonts\smallf.fon fonts\sseriff.fon fonts\sylfaen.ttf fonts\symbol.ttf fonts\tahoma.ttf fonts\tahomabd.ttf fonts\times.ttf fonts\timesbd.ttf fonts\timesbi.ttf fonts\timesi.ttf fonts\tradbdo.ttf fonts\trado.ttf fonts\trebuc.ttf fonts\trebucbd.ttf fonts\trebucbi.ttf fonts\trebucit.ttf fonts\tunga.ttf fonts\upcdb.ttf fonts\upcdbi.ttf fonts\upcdi.ttf fonts\upcdl.ttf fonts\upceb.ttf fonts\upcebi.ttf fonts\upcei.ttf fonts\upcel.ttf fonts\upcfb.ttf fonts\upcfbi.ttf fonts\upcfi.ttf fonts\upcfl.ttf fonts\upcib.ttf fonts\upcibi.ttf fonts\upcii.ttf fonts\upcil.ttf fonts\upcjb.ttf fonts\upcjbi.ttf fonts\upcji.ttf fonts\upcjl.ttf fonts\upckb.ttf fonts\upckbi.ttf fonts\upcki.ttf fonts\upckl.ttf fonts\upclb.ttf fonts\upclbi.ttf fonts\upcli.ttf fonts\upcll.ttf fonts\verdana.ttf fonts\verdanab.ttf fonts\verdanai.ttf fonts\verdanaz.ttf fonts\vga850.fon fonts\vga860.fon fonts\vga863.fon fonts\vga865.fon fonts\vgafix.fon fonts\vgaoem.fon fonts\vgasys.fon fonts\webdings.ttf fonts\wingding.ttf ; ;Unused Keyboard localization files ; system32\kbdbe.dll system32\kbdbr.dll system32\kbdca.dll system32\kbdda.dll system32\kbddv.dll system32\kbdes.dll system32\kbdfc.dll system32\kbdfi.dll system32\kbdfr.dll system32\kbdgae.dll system32\kbdgr.dll system32\kbdgr1.dll system32\kbdic.dll system32\kbdir.dll system32\kbdit.dll system32\kbdit142.dll system32\kbdla.dll system32\kbdmac.dll system32\kbdne.dll system32\kbdnec.dll system32\kbdno.dll system32\kbdpo.dll system32\kbdsf.dll system32\kbdsg.dll system32\kbdsp.dll system32\kbdsw.dll system32\kbduk.dll system32\kbdusl.dll system32\kbdusr.dll system32\kbdusx.dll ; ;Unused Network components ; system32\azroles.dll system32\azroleui.dll system32\eqnclass.dll system32\eqndiag.exe system32\eqnlogr.exe system32\eqnloop.exe system32\fltmc.exe system32\hkcmd.exe system32\ntsd.exe system32\oakley.dll system32\peer.exe system32\spxcoins.dll system32\spxports.dll system32\xlog.exe ; ;Spooler service ; system32\spoolss.dll system32\spoolsv.exe system32\localspl.dll system32\win32spl.dll ; ;Control panels ; system32\desk.cpl system32\firewall.cpl system32\igfxcpl.cpl system32\intl.cpl system32\mmsys.cpl system32\netsetup.cpl ; ;Misc components ; system32\autochk.exe system32\autofmt.exe system32\ksproxy.ax system32\ksuser.dll system32\odbc16gt.dll system32\odbc32.dll system32\odbc32gt.dll system32\odbcbcp.dll system32\odbcconf.dll system32\odbccp32.cpl system32\odbccp32.dll system32\odbccr32.dll system32\odbcint.dll system32\odbcji32.dll system32\odbcjt32.dll system32\odbcp32r.dll system32\odbctrac.dll system32\pentnt.exe system32\query.dll system32\setup.exe system32\sysdown.exe system32\wdmaud.drv system32\xmlprov.dll system32\xmlprovi.dll system32\oc.bat system32\oc2.bat ; ;International Localization files ; system32\c_037.nls system32\c_10000.nls system32\c_10006.nls system32\c_10007.nls system32\c_10010.nls system32\c_10017.nls system32\c_10029.nls system32\c_10079.nls system32\c_10081.nls system32\c_10082.nls system32\c_1026.nls system32\c_1250.nls system32\c_1251.nls system32\c_1253.nls system32\c_1254.nls system32\c_1255.nls system32\c_1256.nls system32\c_1257.nls system32\c_1258.nls system32\c_20127.nls system32\c_20261.nls system32\c_20866.nls system32\c_20905.nls system32\c_21866.nls system32\c_28592.nls system32\c_28593.nls system32\c_28598.nls system32\c_28605.nls system32\c_500.nls system32\c_737.nls system32\c_775.nls system32\c_850.nls system32\c_852.nls system32\c_855.nls system32\c_857.nls system32\c_860.nls system32\c_861.nls system32\c_863.nls system32\c_865.nls system32\c_866.nls system32\c_869.nls system32\c_874.nls system32\c_875.nls system32\c_932.nls system32\c_936.nls system32\c_949.nls system32\c_950.nls ; ;Unused Driver Files ; system32\drivers\etc\lmhosts.sam system32\drivers\adptsf50.sys system32\drivers\aec.sys system32\drivers\ali5261.sys system32\drivers\an983.sys system32\drivers\arp1394.sys system32\drivers\asyncmac.sys system32\drivers\atmarpc.sys system32\drivers\atmlane.sys system32\drivers\atmuni.sys system32\drivers\b1.t4 system32\drivers\b1cbase.sys system32\drivers\b1tr6.t4 system32\drivers\b1usa.t4 system32\drivers\bcm4e5.sys system32\drivers\bioprime.bin system32\drivers\bxnd51x.sys system32\drivers\bxvbdx.sys system32\drivers\cb102.sys system32\drivers\cben5.sys system32\drivers\ce3n5.sys system32\drivers\cem28n5.sys system32\drivers\cem33n5.sys system32\drivers\cem56n5.sys system32\drivers\changer.sys system32\drivers\cnxt1803.sys system32\drivers\cpqtrnd5.sys system32\drivers\crusoe.sys system32\drivers\defpa.sys system32\drivers\dfe650.sys system32\drivers\dfe650d.sys system32\drivers\dgsetup.dll system32\drivers\diwansrv.sys system32\drivers\dm9pci5.sys system32\drivers\dp83820.sys system32\drivers\ds4bri.bit system32\drivers\ds4bri2.bit system32\drivers\dsbri2f.bit system32\drivers\dsbri2m.bit system32\drivers\dspdload.bin system32\drivers\dspdqsig.bin system32\drivers\el556nd5.sys system32\drivers\el575nd5.sys system32\drivers\el656cd5.sys system32\drivers\el656ct5.sys system32\drivers\el656nd5.sys system32\drivers\el656se5.sys system32\drivers\el90xbc5.sys system32\drivers\el90xnd5.sys system32\drivers\el985n51.sys system32\drivers\el98xn5.sys system32\drivers\el99xn51.sys system32\drivers\el99xrun.out system32\drivers\emu10k1b.sys system32\drivers\eqn.sys system32\drivers\fa410nd5.sys system32\drivers\fetnd5.sys system32\drivers\forehe.sys system32\drivers\ibmtok.sys system32\drivers\ibmtrp.sys system32\drivers\ip5515.sys system32\drivers\islp2nds.sys system32\drivers\kmixer.sys system32\drivers\ks.sys system32\drivers\ktc111.sys system32\drivers\lmndis3.sys system32\drivers\lp6nds35.sys system32\drivers\mdgndis5.sys system32\drivers\msmpu401.sys system32\drivers\mxnic.sys system32\drivers\n1000325.sys system32\drivers\n100325.sys system32\drivers\ne2000.sys system32\drivers\netwlan5.img system32\drivers\netwlan5.sys system32\drivers\nwlnkipx.sys system32\drivers\nwlnknb.sys system32\drivers\nwlnkspx.sys system32\drivers\nwrdr.sys system32\drivers\otc06x5.sys system32\drivers\otceth5.sys system32\drivers\pc100nds.sys system32\drivers\pca200e.bin system32\drivers\pca200e.sys system32\drivers\pcibios.bin system32\drivers\pcifep.bin system32\drivers\pcntpci5.sys system32\drivers\pcx500.sys system32\drivers\portcls.sys system32\drivers\q57xp32.sys system32\drivers\ql2100.sys system32\drivers\ql2200.sys system32\drivers\ql2300.sys system32\drivers\redbook.sys system32\drivers\rocket.sys system32\drivers\rootmdm.sys system32\drivers\rt8169xp.sys system32\drivers\sdp0.2q0 system32\drivers\sdp1.2q0 system32\drivers\sfmatalk.sys system32\drivers\sisnic.sys system32\drivers\sk98xwin.sys system32\drivers\skfpwin.sys system32\drivers\sonydcam.sys system32\drivers\splitter.sys system32\drivers\stlnata.sys system32\drivers\stream.sys system32\drivers\swmidi.sys system32\drivers\sysaudio.sys system32\drivers\tape.sys system32\drivers\tbatm155.sys system32\drivers\tjisdn.sys system32\drivers\usbcamd.sys system32\drivers\usbcamd2.sys system32\drivers\w840nd.sys system32\drivers\wdmaud.sys system32\drivers\wlluc48.sys system32\drivers\xem336n5.sys ; ;Unused INF files ; inf\battery.inf inf\bxnd.inf inf\bxvbd.inf inf\intl.inf inf\ks.inf inf\mf.inf inf\monitor.inf inf\msports.inf inf\net1394.inf inf\net3c556.inf inf\net3c985.inf inf\net5515n.inf inf\net557.inf inf\net575nt.inf inf\net650d.inf inf\net656c5.inf inf\net656n5.inf inf\net713.inf inf\net83820.inf inf\netaarps.inf inf\netali.inf inf\netamd2.inf inf\netan983.inf inf\netana.inf inf\netatlk.inf inf\netauni.inf inf\netb57xp.inf inf\netbcm4e.inf inf\netbeac.inf inf\netbrdgm.inf inf\netbrdgs.inf inf\netcb102.inf inf\netcbe.inf inf\netce3.inf inf\netcem28.inf inf\netcem33.inf inf\netcem56.inf inf\netcis.inf inf\netclass.inf inf\netcmak.inf inf\netcpqc.inf inf\netcpqg.inf inf\netcpqi.inf inf\netcpqmt.inf inf\netcps.inf inf\netctmrk.inf inf\netdav.inf inf\netdefxa.inf inf\netdf650.inf inf\netdgdxb.inf inf\netdhcps.inf inf\netdhoc.inf inf\netdm.inf inf\netdns.inf inf\nete1000.inf inf\netel90a.inf inf\netel90b.inf inf\netel980.inf inf\netel99x.inf inf\netepvcm.inf inf\netepvcp.inf inf\netf56n5.inf inf\netfa410.inf inf\netfore.inf inf\netforeh.inf inf\netfw.inf inf\netfxocm.inf inf\netgpc.inf inf\netias.inf inf\netibm.inf inf\netibm2.inf inf\netip6.inf inf\netiprip.inf inf\netlanem.inf inf\netlanep.inf inf\netlm.inf inf\netlm56.inf inf\netloop.inf inf\netlpd.inf inf\netmacpr.inf inf\netmacsv.inf inf\netmadge.inf inf\netmhzn5.inf inf\netnb.inf inf\netnm.inf inf\netnmtls.inf inf\netnovel.inf inf\netnwcli.inf inf\netnwlnk.inf inf\netoc.inf inf\netosi2c.inf inf\netosi5.inf inf\netpc100.inf inf\netpgm.inf inf\netprism.inf inf\netpsa.inf inf\netpschd.inf inf\netrasa.inf inf\netrass.inf inf\netrast.inf inf\netrndis.inf inf\netrqs.inf inf\netrtxp.inf inf\netrwan.inf inf\netsap.inf inf\netserv.inf inf\netsis.inf inf\netsk98.inf inf\netsk_fp.inf inf\netsnip.inf inf\netsnmp.inf inf\nettb155.inf inf\nettiger.inf inf\nettpsmp.inf inf\nettun.inf inf\netvt86.inf inf\netw840.inf inf\netwlan.inf inf\netwlbs.inf inf\netwlbsm.inf inf\netwv48.inf inf\netwzc.inf inf\netx500.inf inf\netx56n5.inf inf\wdmaudio.inf ; ;Unneeded INTEL video driver files ; system32\ialmuARA.dll system32\ialmuARB.dll system32\ialmuCHS.dll system32\ialmuCHT.dll system32\ialmuCSY.dll system32\ialmuDAN.dll system32\ialmuDEU.dll system32\ialmudlg.exe system32\ialmuELL.dll system32\ialmuESP.dll system32\ialmuFIN.dll system32\ialmuFRA.dll system32\ialmuFRC.dll system32\ialmuHEB.dll system32\ialmuHUN.dll system32\ialmuITA.dll system32\ialmuJPN.dll system32\ialmuKOR.dll system32\ialmuNLD.dll system32\ialmuNOR.dll system32\ialmuPLK.dll system32\ialmuPTB.dll system32\ialmuPTG.dll system32\ialmuRUS.dll system32\ialmuSVE.dll system32\ialmuTHA.dll system32\ialmuTRK.dll system32\igfxcfg.exe system32\igfxext.exe system32\igfxpers.exe system32\igfxrara.lrc system32\igfxrchs.lrc system32\igfxrcht.lrc system32\igfxrcsy.lrc system32\igfxrdan.lrc system32\igfxrdeu.lrc system32\igfxrell.lrc system32\igfxresp.lrc system32\igfxrfin.lrc system32\igfxrfra.lrc system32\igfxrheb.lrc system32\igfxrhun.lrc system32\igfxrita.lrc system32\igfxrjpn.lrc system32\igfxrkor.lrc system32\igfxrnld.lrc system32\igfxrnor.lrc system32\igfxrplk.lrc system32\igfxrptb.lrc system32\igfxrptg.lrc system32\igfxrrus.lrc system32\igfxrsve.lrc system32\igfxrtha.lrc system32\igfxrtrk.lrc system32\igfxsrvc.exe system32\igfxtray.exe system32\igfxzoom.exe system32\igldev32.dll system32\iglicd32.dll Keep an eye on the things I've entered into the INF and DRIVERS sections, as you may have different hardware needs than my company does. Here is the compress.txt file: ;Compress.TXT file -- Last updated 2006-03-14 ;Jason xxxxxx, Operations Lead, CSS ;Yum Brands INC ; ;To be used in conjunction with WindowsPE Cleanup script file ;This listing is for WindowsPE 1.6 (2005) based on NT 2003 SP1 operating system ; SYSTEM32\attrib.exe SYSTEM32\bcwipe.dll SYSTEM32\bcwipe.exe SYSTEM32\chkdsk.exe SYSTEM32\cscript.exe SYSTEM32\defrag.exe SYSTEM32\dfrgfat.exe SYSTEM32\dfrgntfs.exe SYSTEM32\diskpart.exe SYSTEM32\dxtmsft.dll SYSTEM32\dxtrans.dll SYSTEM32\eject.exe SYSTEM32\factory.exe SYSTEM32\format.com SYSTEM32\iedkcs32.dll SYSTEM32\iepeers.dll SYSTEM32\ipconfig.exe SYSTEM32\jscript.dll SYSTEM32\mshtml.dll SYSTEM32\mstime.dll SYSTEM32\notepad.exe SYSTEM32\ping.exe SYSTEM32\process.exe SYSTEM32\prounstl.exe SYSTEM32\reg.exe SYSTEM32\regedit.exe SYSTEM32\scrobj.dll SYSTEM32\scrrun.dll SYSTEM32\taskmgr.exe SYSTEM32\vbscript.dll SYSTEM32\wscript.exe SYSTEM32\xcopy.exe SYSTEM32\ximage.exe Be careful with applications or DLL files that you compress. For example, while you CAN compress SHELL32.DLL, the result is your PE image will use up ~40mb more memory. The reason is because any app or DLL you compress with UPX will result in that app or DLL not being able to be "instanced" within memory... Many DLL files are loaded once but then "instanced" over and over again for various pieces that need to be reused by apps. If you UPX one such DLL, for every "instance" the OS needs, it will reload the DLL one more time instead of just being allowed to reuse code already in ram.

It does, but it's just really fast. When Ramdisk finishes loading, there's another progress bar thereafter. You can VERY QUICKLY hit the F6 key when that second progress bar shows up.

The original question was not about adding an "external" ramdisk; the question was about using system ram as a ramdisk. On a machine with 2gb of system memory, when doing video encoding, there are better uses for that ram. Ramdisks are good when addressing severe disk performance bottlenecks when dealing with a working set of files that are small enough to be contained within the ramdisk you provide. If you're dealing with more than ~10 minutes of raw video, your file will be bigger than his proposed 1gb ramdisk. Furthermore, outside of transferring the raw video from the camera, you aren't necessarily disk-bottlenecked when encoding the video to an MPEG / AVI / DIVX codec -- you're CPU-bottlenecked, and memory (bus!) bandwidth bottlenecked. A ramdrive is NOT going to address a CPU or bus-bandwidth bottleneck, and in fact would likely make the latter even worse.

Are you playing this on a laptop? The original Unreal games based their game ticks off a CPU-intensive calculation done at startup. If your laptop is dynamically adjusting speed, it may "figure" the game ticks WAY too small for your CPU's actual speed. The original Unreal and Unreal Tournament games play quite fine on my P4/3.6ghz + x800xtpe + 1gb memory at 480mhz in the D3DRenderer (and OpenGL renderer too). Not sure why it would give you grief...

Yes, ramdrives are "faster" than 10,000 RPM drives, and even 15,000 RPM drives. That does not answer the question of how much "faster" it will be for a given application. If the application you're wanting to speed up is ATTO, then a ramdisk will do quite well. If the application you want to speed up is video encoding, there are better ways to use your ram.

Hitting "over" 2.6ghz isn't really a specific overclock, is it? How far over? 1mhz over? 10mhz over? 100mhz over? 1,000mhz over? You can start generating a bell-curve statistical analysis for plotting maximum, minimum, median and mean overclocks on a given component, but the end result is still the same: there is no way you can tell someone how far their device will overclock. The moment that "oh yeah, that chip will do 2.6ghz easy" comes out of your mouth (or flows from your fingertips into this forum) will be the moment when Jane Doe gets a chip that won't POST any further than 2.53ghz. Did you mention they need a quality power supply? They need ram that can do 1T timings? They need a motherboard that has a high quality voltage regulator? They need a room temperature not to exceed 75F? They need a minimum of 25ft/min unrestricted airflow? No two parts overclock the same. And for more reasons than one.

No two parts overclock the same. Ever. Each assembled component (in this case, a video card) has TONS of traces, integrated components and individual chips that all will have slightly different characteristics from each card to the next. Your voltage regulator MOSFET might have a very slightly misaligned thermal grease stamp so it doesn't disappate heat as well, or three of the contact pads on the BGA array that holds one of your memory chips aren't 100% and thus will cause "flutter" at high signalling rates. All these things aren't "maybes", they DO happen on every single board. And as such, as I've already stated, no two parts overclock the same. I know what you're trying to say, but generalities aren't factual statements. No two parts overclock the same; end of story.

First rule of overclocking: No two parts overclock the same. Second rule of overclocking: No two parts overclock the same. Your part will overclock as much as it can, and no further. The only way to find out is to begin testing for yourself, and stop when it wants to. You might try a piece of software called ATI Tool to make your life easier in that regard, but the basics still apply: Pick one item (GPU or RAM, NOT BOTH AT THE SAME TIME) Begin incrementing the speed of that one item slowly upwards Between each increment, run a full series of tests. At some point it will cause artifacts / lockups / hiccups. Now you know what is too high. Work your way back down until you find a level that doesn't result in errors. Now start work on the other component in the exact same way. It may take you several days to find the optimum overclock, and quite regularly the maximum overclock of a video card will be a balance... You can often sacrifice a bit of GPU speed for additional RAM speed, or vice versa, simply because of the limited power draw abilities of the onboard voltage regulators. So, that's the answer to your question. Now go get started

Sounds like there aren't any old-school folks in here. Not *that* long ago, video was (for the most part) driven by your processor and/or the PC's BIOS. However, that was also during a time when machines were maxing out at 8-12mhz and used a maximum bus width of sixteen bits to transfer data to a "dumb framebuffer" card. Essentially all the computations were done by the processor, but the video card served only as a memory holding cell for the data being displayed on the screen -- and of course to house the connector. The problem was usually horrible update speed and horrible compatibility. As GUI-based interfaces (such as Windows) came onto the scene, video card manufacturers began building video coprocessor chips that could accelerate GUI functions such as building windows and clearing the screen. These evolved into "2D accelerators" and began pushing more of the work away from the BIOS and CPU and instead into the dedicated processor(s) on the video card. And as you can imagine, that evolved over time into 3D accelerators, which began tackling more and bigger issues until where they are today. Why haven't we gone back to CPU assistance? In some smaller cases, certain things are still processed by the CPU even now. But most of those items are "backwards compatible" things that really aren't used anymore and weren't used much to begin with, such as ATI's Truform abilities (which hasn't been video-hardware accelerated since the 8500). Audio has, interestingly, gone from hardware only, to software optionally, and is now somewhere in the middle. Originally sound hardware was entirely responsible for making sound, but later advances in CPU power without similar advances in sound quality gave developers the ability to generate the sound-card-equivalent of a "dumb buffer" sound card: the CPU (ie windows driver) does most of the work, while the audio chip serves mostly as a buffer and hardware support of source control (mic / line in / CD in / etc). Later, as more features are added to sound cards (higher quality 24bit / 96khz output, 3D maniupalation of sounds, etc) newer soundcards have given rise to moving the acceleration back onto dedicated processors on the card. But there are still "software driven" audio options, just like there are still "software driven" modems. Most of it is a performance tradeoff. Video will probably never go back to the CPU, just because we're demanding so much from it these days. Audio will probably straddle the available options for much longer until we get into some serious audo quality upgrades to push more processing to the card; a prime example of which will be apparent with Vista's new "HD Audio" strategy. Hope that answers your question

Is your file named WINPEX86.ISO or is it named winpex86.iso? Notice the difference? Capitalization does matter in the WINNT.SIF file. Also, did you insert the leading backslash in your OsLoadOptions line like I suggested in my example above?

Can't do that for multiple reasons; the biggest of which is possible legal consequences for distributing Microsoft ODK components without MS's authorization. Our SA agreement forbids me to do this. I'd also be giving out automation code and service account login credentials that are proprietary to my company which would be quite severe too. So, the best I can do is answer your questions and point you in the right direction. The FAQ I linked you to has everything you need to create an SDI image from scratch.

Looking back through the forums, ramdisk within a standard Windows PE created from the ODK never is 100% reliable. The most I was able to get reliably out of the ramdisk driver in my own Windows PE 2005 image was 4mb. Any more than 4mb and it would fail randomly; the larger the ramdisk, the more often it would fail, until about 32mb where it almost never worked. I "fixed" this by using the SDI image method. Rather than loading a ramdisk from ISO file like you're doing now, I load a ramdisk from an SDI file. SDI files are actually complete harddisk images that will also give you the ability to non-permanently "write" to the free space just like a ramdisk. The downside is obviously the memory usage penalty you'll incur, but the upside is plenty of useable room. However, I think it may be possible that the SDI disk has a limit on how much is writeable, I'm thinking it may be near 32mb. Something to consider. Want to give it a try? Follow this guide here: http://www.myitforum.com/articles/8/view.asp?id=8832

Edited I'd check to make sure you don't have any spelling mistakes in your WINNT.SIF, especially looking for differences in capitalization. You might also try putting a slash in your OSLOADOptions at the beginning of your ISO file name, like this: OsLoadOptions = "/noguiboot /fastdetect /minint /rdexportascd /rdpath=\winpex86.iso"

No prob. If it doesn't work, drop a note in here... Makes me curious I really don't have a way to test any of this, as I don't have a piece of hardware that will run it (try starting it in VMWare or on one of my home machines and you get an error about "this isn't a Proliant Server")

I don't know what else to tell you... Think about it for yourself. If the bootsector was missing or corrupt, it wouldn't EVER get to Windows, period -- you would instead get errors about "No operating system found". You're getting the OS, it's trying to load, but it fails because the boot device goes missing as soon as it enters protected mode. What options are left? The drive failing? Probably not, since it's multiple drives. The image corrupt? Likely not, as it wouldn't be corrupt every single time. Windows missing or not loading the appropriate driver? "DING DING DING DING" I'm telling you it's a driver problem, and it is. Your image needs BOTH the SATA driver and the IDE driver, but it might not be possible to install both since your "source" machine may not have both devices simultaneously. Your options are to sysprep the image and build the drivers into the $OEM$ mass storage section or try forcing the drivers to install on the old machine and hoping for the best... That's your problem; how you solve it is up to you

Your machine booted fine; that's not a bootsector issue. You are missing the mass storage driver for your SATA controller, and thus Windows cannot load. Common mistake among rookies You need to make sure you've installed your SATA drivers into your Windows image before you move the image from an IDE drive to a SATA drive. Otherwise, as soon as Windows tries to start in protected mode, it will lose access to your local disk and bomb with a BSOD.