Idea to speed up windows setup?!.....

[Guest tfczgv]

Well, I just had a idea which might speed up xp setup. As you surely know, odds are much faster in outer areas then in inner ones. so what about creating a 3- 3.5GB dummy-file at the beginning of the dvd to place setup files on outer area - has anybody ever tried that? if so, i dont need to waste a blank dvd for testing ^^

regards

[derniwi]

Hi,

I don't think that you will feel the benefit. Copying files from DVD is just a small percentage of the installation process. You may speed up if you put all needed files in an zip archive and extract this to your hard disk and run your installations from the hard disk. So you don't have the long seeks of your DVD. And if your are able to put the archive in the inner part of your dvd, you may have your benefit, too.

Regards, Nils.

[jaclaz]

additional/alternative to derniwi's suggestion, a way to speed up CD/DVD reading is creating the .iso with files in the SAME order they will be accessed by SETUPLDR.BIN and the windows install, this technique is used in BartPE to speed up things a bit:

http://www.boot-land.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=6041

(AND links within)

jaclaz

[Guest tfczgv]

very interesting - thought Iso forced files to be stored in alphabetical order.....

the question is: how to find out the order files are read in, espiacially with additional (textmode) drivers integrated....

the zipping-idea sounds great, too - but we'd need a all-new bootsector to do so, dont we?

and what about "And if your are able to put the archive in the inner part of your dvd, you may have your benefit, too."

- well, inner part is default, so I dont really understand what you mean.....

Edited January 23, 2009 by tfczgv

[derniwi]

Hi,

the zipping-idea sounds great, too - but we'd need a all-new bootsector to do so, dont we?

You can unzip the archive on T-39 minutes, or using RunOnceEx. But I don't think it's easy to put the windows setup files into an archive and extract this. But maybe this can be done using Linux.

and what about "And if your are able to put the archive in the inner part of your dvd, you may have your benefit, too."

- well, inner part is default, so I dont really understand what you mean.....

No, we mean to first have the archive on the DVD, and after the archive the setup files.

Regards, Nils.

[Guest tfczgv]

ah so you want to use the zip as the dummy file i talked about... ok, got it

[cdob]

so what about creating a 3- 3.5GB dummy-file at the beginning of the dvd to place setup files on outer area

File read speed maybe fast.

However:

File and Directory Descriptors are at begin of a session.

If you add a big file: User data are at end of media.

File access time is pretty slow.

Acessing a lot of files require a lot of full stroke.

This result to a slow drive.

thought Iso forced files to be stored in alphabetical order.....

I doubt this. Which Iso does force the file sort order?

http://www.ecma-international.org/publicat...ds/Ecma-119.htm

This Ecma publication is also approved as ISO 9660

Section '9.3 Order of Directory Records' set sort rules.

This is similar to the table of contents of a book.

This are not the files.

File sort order itself is not ruled. You may change file order.

how to find out the order files are read in

A general PE example http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?showtopic=6869

At least textmode part should be similar.

I don't know a full example for a windows installation.

Dosn't setup parse dosnet.inf ? Parse dosnet.inf too, add to the sort file.

espiacially with additional (textmode) drivers integrated....

Parse txtsetup.sif, adjust the sort file.

[TuMaGoNx]

In CDRTFE (x-cdroast equivalent), the order file is in pathlist.txt

and seek time is consuming

"I doubt this. Which Iso does force the file sort order?"

i think what jaclaz mean is the LBA order not TOC order, in TOC file mapped in LBA (a sector or cluster?) which is physical cd position in bytes.

"You may speed up if you put all needed files in an zip archive and extract this to your hard disk and run your installations from the hard disk"

Is that mean change the "SourceDisksNames"?

[jaclaz]

What jaclaz means is less "philosophic" than anything else in this thread.

Using the approach in the given links works.

I don't care if it's TOC related, LBA related or whatever related. (but it's LBA related ).

It is not strictly "ISO" related.

It works on CD and on "normal" filesystems, and on any media, of course on fast media (internal hard disks) difference is much LESS noticeable.

jaclaz