WINNT32 Compatibility Error from Vista

[forumlulz]

Hey all. New to the forums. I apologize if this is not in the right thread and would have no qualms if a mod needed to relocate it.

The jist of the story here is that I have a 40GB Laptop HDD enclosed in an external casing that I can connect to my pc via USB. The drive is formatted with NTFS. I have an old Dell Inspiron 1100, which cannot boot to USB and currently does not have a functional CDROM drive. I want to try, just for the heck of it, to install Windows to this 40GB HDD and then slap it into the Inspiron. I know it probably won't boot into Windows or may BSOD but even if that is the case I'd have Windows on an external drive that I could carry around with me.

I have an image of the install disc that I mount with Daemon Tools. The drive is G: and the HDD's drive is F:. When the image is mounted and the drive is attached I try to run

G:\I386\winnt32.exe /syspart:F: /tempdrive:F: /makelocalsource /noreboot

but receive an error from Vista stating that WINNT32 has known compatibility issues and that the version on this computer is newer than that on the disc. I guess I may be overlooking something here but I am not trying to install this OS onto my computers HDD but the HDD in the enclosure. I thought that stating F: is the target in the command line would have let Windows know this...

My fiance's laptop has XP on it but I wanted to do this here just in case anything goes wrong. I could just reinstall Vista as it is on it's own patition.

Any help or advice here would be appreciated.

[strel]

So you trigger vista intalling from installed vista in the internal HDD of the desktop PC, but after copying files I suppose it has to boot the new system from USB drive to complete...

Anyway, this may interest you.

[forumlulz]

So you trigger vista intalling from installed vista in the internal HDD of the desktop PC, but after copying files I suppose it has to boot the new system from USB drive to complete...

Anyway, this may interest you.

I am trying to install Windows ON the external drive not the computer it's connected to. Although, I don't know if that's what you're trying to say as your English is a bit too broken for me. :\

I looked over what you linked. Well, I am still looking it over to be exact. PLoP looks nice but I wonder if it'd work for me. I cannot get into Windows at all on the Inspiron 1100. The admin account and user account have become corrupted and I cannot login or boot to Active@'s Password Recovery tool because I do not know if I'll ever be able to boot to USB with the PC since it is not supported in BIOS.

Edited March 12, 2009 by forumlulz

[jaclaz]

Other thread started here:

http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=131041

You seem like having two problems.

First one, much bigger than the one you think you have is that XP by design is not meant to boot from an external USB device.

Second one is something in your Vista, which can easily be solved by simply using the Xp on the "other" laptop that you can borrow.

(it is simply not worth the time to troubleshoot this problem since, even if it worked, it WON'T produce a bootable from USB XP)

There is an automated way to install XP on a USB device, here (suggested):

http://www.usboot.org/tiki-index.php

besides a number of tutorials/manual ways

Read this thread (AND links therein):

http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=119963

there is more or less the full experience, problems and solutions of another user installing XP on an external USB device while running Vista.

jaclaz

[forumlulz]

Other thread started here:

http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=131041

Ya just can't escape trolling.

Ran through this http://www.ngine.de/article/id/8 to create an XP install. Have not burned it or tried it yet. The only down side is that of no page file.

I will read through http://www.usboot.org/tiki-index.php

Edited March 13, 2009 by forumlulz

[forumlulz]

I just want to reiterate that this is a hard drive. It's just in an enclosure at this time. It's primary function is hard disk storage and it is not a USB storage device. USB is just the interface here.

[strel]

I think your best option is to attach a CD drive and continue from there to maybe don't get sucess. Other way means pain.

Just a fugacious thought: I don't know if win PE 2.0 can help you to run XP 1setup from vista, another one would have to confirm it.

[jaclaz]

OK, I completely missed the point, let's see if I have understood it now.

You don't want to install the XP on the USB drive.

You want to use the USB enclosure attached to your "main" PC to transfer the XP install files on a HD that you will later put inside the "other" laptop, right?

This line:

G:\I386\winnt32.exe /syspart:F: /tempdrive:F: /makelocalsource /noreboot

should work allright from 2K or XP, and unless the HD controller in the laptop is "non-standard" or SATA, you shouldn't have problems when installing.

It is possible that WINNT32.EXE does not "like" the USB bus to which the target drive is attached, though.

If you can try on another PC running XP it would be better and easier, otherwise you may want to try building a small PE (using the same XP source files) or use the good ol' DOS way with WINNT.EXE.

You can take some ideas from the Install XP from USB Sub-Forum:

http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showforum=157

or from this oldish thread:

http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?showtopic=16713

AFAIK there isn't a complete "specific" guide to alternate ways to the use of /syspart /makelocalsource switches in WINNT32.EXE.

jaclaz

[forumlulz]

OK, I completely missed the point, let's see if I have understood it now.

You don't want to install the XP on the USB drive.

You want to use the USB enclosure attached to your "main" PC to transfer the XP install files on a HD that you will later put inside the "other" laptop, right?

This line:

G:\I386\winnt32.exe /syspart:F: /tempdrive:F: /makelocalsource /noreboot

should work allright from 2K or XP, and unless the HD controller in the laptop is "non-standard" or SATA, you shouldn't have problems when installing.

It is possible that WINNT32.EXE does not "like" the USB bus to which the target drive is attached, though.

If you can try on another PC running XP it would be better and easier, otherwise you may want to try building a small PE (using the same XP source files) or use the good ol' DOS way with WINNT.EXE.

You can take some ideas from the Install XP from USB Sub-Forum:

http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showforum=157

or from this oldish thread:

http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?showtopic=16713

AFAIK there isn't a complete "specific" guide to alternate ways to the use of /syspart /makelocalsource switches in WINNT32.EXE.

jaclaz

Thanks. I will look over that and see what I can make of it. I am concerned, mostly, that running that line from comman will mess up the windows install on the host computer though. Should I be?

[jaclaz]

Thanks. I will look over that and see what I can make of it. I am concerned, mostly, that running that line from comman will mess up the windows install on the host computer though. Should I be?

Not really.

As far as you get the RIGHT drive letters in the WINNT32.EXE parameters I cannot see how the running of WINNT32.EXE may affect the running system.

But of course having a backup is always recommended.

I was thinking, that although it might be really SLOW, you could setup in your Vista PC a Qemu VM, and then use the \\PHYSICALDRIVEn connection:

http://www.msfn.org/board/Adding-QEMU-func...sb-t112746.html

booting the VM from a PE CD of some kind and running the WINNT32.EXE to install the XP on the external drive.

Or possibly, with the above setup, you should be able to use this method:

http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=121446

jaclaz

Edited March 16, 2009 by jaclaz