barnai Posted December 18, 2009 Author Share Posted December 18, 2009 Still the message:I/O Error accessing boot sector file \device\floppy0Did you get the idea what we are changing?I dont understand what you mean. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ilko_t Posted December 18, 2009 Share Posted December 18, 2009 I mean do you understand the changes we are making, so you can experiment on your own? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
barnai Posted December 18, 2009 Author Share Posted December 18, 2009 Well I can figure out the logics, but I am not an expert in computer architecture.I cant find anything more to experiment for the moment. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Siginet Posted December 18, 2009 Share Posted December 18, 2009 If you still have accsee to boot into windows it would be great if you could test this:http://www.msfn.org/board/release-siginets...er-t140412.html Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
barnai Posted December 19, 2009 Author Share Posted December 19, 2009 @Siginet:I tried ur exe, but when I choose the USB boot option in the startup menu, I just get a black screen with "XO" at top left, and nothing more is possible except pressing ctrl+alt+suppr to reboot.Thanks for ur concern anyway @ilko_t:I tried something else after Siginet's tool: I added a line in boot.ini to try and locate the usb:multi(0)disk(0)X\grldr="USB boot"with different possibilities for X:1. rdisk(1)partition(1)2. fdisk(0)3. fdisk(0)partition(1)4. fdisk(0)partition(0)For 1 and 3 I just get the error message meaning the location does not exist. But 2 and 4 (which I suspect must be equivalent ) yield:Windows could not start because <Systemroot>\system32\hal.dll is corrupted or missingor so. I suppose it means that were hitting the right place, but with some ingredient still missing.Hope it helps. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ilko_t Posted December 19, 2009 Share Posted December 19, 2009 Lets go step-by-step.How is setup launched- grub4dos' grldr loads setupldr.bin, which looks on several places for ntdetect.com and txtsetup.sif. After ntdetect.com is executed and passed back the hardware information, txtsetup.sif is read.The directives BootDevice and BootPath tell setupldr where to continue loading files from, up to the EULA screen, or if disabled- to the partitioning screen. In your case we need to get past this point. After that SetupSourceDevice and SetupSourcePath tell Setup where to find the source files which will be copied, you have not reached this point yet, so those values should not be relevant.BootPath is the directory where I386 can be found, this is in the device, specified by BootDevice.For BootDevice we need to figure out what would be acceptable syntax. For USB disk seen as hard disks there is a proper ARC path created- multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(X), since its the first booted device, and it's a hard disk. Using grub4dos mapping we can "swap" places with the internal hard disk, so Setup places boot files on the internal disk, which after "swapping" Setup thinks it's the boot device. Basically we amend the ARC path with this mapping.http://support.microsoft.com/kb/102873For sticks seen as FDD, there might not be an ARC path created at all, or we missed the proper syntax, which should be something like these:multi(0)disk(0)fdisk(0)multi(0)disk(0)fdisk(0)partition(0)multi(0)disk(0)fdisk(0)partition(1)In this case, when seen as floppy, there is no need to "swap" hard drives, as our internal one is already the first internal hard disk, and boot files will go there.If you still have a working widnows on this machine, try WinObj, go to GLOBAL?? and find all symlinks to your USB stick, there will be several. Can you list them all here, even better with a few screenshots for complete view.Another shot- try changing all names, including directory names from WIN_SETUP to WINSETUP. Next change XP_Pro_SP2 or whatever you have to XP. You need to change directory names and BootPath and SetupSourcePath in TXTSETUP.SIF, also winsetup.lst.If none the above helps, we can try to put the first files windows loads on the USB stick, and try to boot them with various options in boot.ini, which would be on the USB stick.Another idea- try to create a single partition when formatting with RMPrepUSB or Bootice, if you created two.And another one- try launching PLoP first, the select USB, then try setup again, but with rdisk(1) values in txtsetup.sif and mapping in winsetup.lst. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jaclaz Posted December 19, 2009 Share Posted December 19, 2009 For sticks seen as FDD, there might not be an ARC path created at all, or we missed the proper syntax, which should be something like these:multi(0)disk(0)fdisk(0)multi(0)disk(0)fdisk(0)partition(0)multi(0)disk(0)fdisk(0)partition(1)The "right" one should be this one:multi(0)disk(0)fdisk(0)multi(0)disk(0)fdisk(0)\WINDOWShttp://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?showtopic=22716On floppy it is possible that files go into root (instead of a subdir), see cdob's post in the above.jaclaz Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
barnai Posted December 19, 2009 Author Share Posted December 19, 2009 (edited) - Concerning winobj, here is a screenshot of the usb devices:The device selected in the image is also appearing in front of the name corresponding to the drive letter (E:).- I shortened the directory name as advised, fell back to BootDevice=multi(0)disk(0)fdisk(0) (same for SetupSourceDevice) and guess what ? The install still stops immedialtely, the message still talks about biosinfo.inf which could not be loaded, but the error code is now 1 ! Talking seriously though, it could be helpful to know the exact meaning of those error codes. Otherwise were kind of shooting blindfold. I tried to find something but even on microsoft pages, theres not much about that kind of messages...- The solution with boot.ini could be interesting, but I wont be able to do anything by myself since I have no clue regarding which files would be needed. Anyway I have the feeling that the floppy detection business wont make things easy for us there either - I created a single partition with Bootice. Besides I made a few tries with 2 or more partitions when we started all this (when I could not boot on the stick) and it doesnt help the detection as USB-HDD if thats what u have in mind.- Finally concerning plop I suppose ur proposing to install it on the stick and not on my main HD. I tried to install through the windows boot menu, but the setup seemed unable to detect the stick: the choices offered to select the destination disk did not work (I did not try the default choice since it must correspond to the main HD). Edited December 19, 2009 by barnai Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jaclaz Posted December 19, 2009 Share Posted December 19, 2009 Very good. You just joined the club of blindfolded troubleshooters. It is OBVIOUS that MS has not documented anything about this , they have been bragging around for years saying it was IMPOSSIBLE. (just like Internet Explorer being a "core OS" file, running 2K/XP from a USB stick, etc., etc.)Of course to get some target when shooting blindfolded you need lots of patience and you need to shoot a lot. As always, the suggestion is to forget (for the moment ) the actual XP install from your USB floppy like device, and start finding the solutions.What I would do would be (if I get it right you now have a booting USB stick capable through grub4dos to chainload SETUPLDR.BIN) to leave just grldr and menu.lst on the stick, removing all the rest and add to it the contents of the boot floppies mentioned by cdob:http://www.911cd.net/forums//index.php?showtopic=22716Open the downloaded file with 7-zip, then from within it open .rsrc, then open RCDATA then open CABINET then open each of the floppy images and extract from it the files to root of the stick.Try booting from the stick, you should get past the errors you are getting now. (and stop to something else ).The TXTSETUP.SI_ in the floppy set has:Directory di C:\Downloaded\XPSETUPFLOPPIES\Root_of_stick19/12/2009 20.46 <DIR> .19/12/2009 20.46 <DIR> ..17/08/2001 14.06 28.558 1394BUS.SY_17/08/2001 14.06 6.259 1394VDBG.SY_17/08/2001 13.52 13.699 ABP480N5.SY_17/08/2001 13.57 91.441 ACPI.SY_17/08/2001 13.57 6.449 ACPIEC.SY_17/08/2001 14.07 50.331 ADPU160M.SY_17/08/2001 13.52 8.038 AHA154X.SY_17/08/2001 14.07 29.912 AIC78U2.SY_17/08/2001 14.07 30.488 AIC78XX.SY_17/08/2001 13.51 2.839 ALIIDE.SY_17/08/2001 13.52 7.277 AMSINT.SY_17/08/2001 13.52 15.258 ASC.SY_17/08/2001 13.52 13.211 ASC3350P.SY_17/08/2001 13.51 8.936 ASC3550.SY_17/08/2001 13.51 47.118 ATAPI.SY_17/08/2001 12.01 46.843 BIOSINFO.INF17/08/2001 13.49 6.232 BOOTVID.DL_17/08/2001 13.52 7.630 CBIDF2K.SY_17/08/2001 13.52 3.975 CD20XRNT.SY_17/08/2001 22.24 34.873 CDFS.SY_17/08/2001 13.52 24.094 CDROM.SY_17/08/2001 22.24 25.873 CLASSPNP.SY_17/08/2001 13.51 3.671 CMDIDE.SY_17/08/2001 13.52 8.537 CPQARRAY.SY_21/07/2001 14.20 1.479 C_1252.NL_21/07/2001 14.20 1.642 C_437.NL_17/08/2001 13.52 29.302 DAC2W2K.SY_17/08/2001 13.52 8.001 DAC960NT.SY_17/08/2001 13.52 18.935 DISK.SY_17/08/2001 23.20 2 DISK10117/08/2001 23.20 2 DISK10217/08/2001 23.20 2 DISK10317/08/2001 23.20 2 DISK10417/08/2001 23.20 2 DISK10517/08/2001 23.20 2 DISK10617/08/2001 13.58 121.923 DMBOOT.SY_17/08/2001 13.58 69.563 DMIO.SY_17/08/2001 13.58 2.859 DMLOAD.SY_17/08/2001 14.07 10.997 DPTI2O.SY_17/08/2001 14.26 8.104 DRVMAIN.SDB17/08/2001 22.24 76.742 FASTFAT.SY_17/08/2001 13.51 14.958 FDC.SY_17/08/2001 13.51 11.193 FLPYDISK.SY_17/08/2001 13.52 60.791 FTDISK.SY_17/08/2001 13.48 53.060 HAL.DL_17/08/2001 13.48 46.309 HALAACPI.DL_17/08/2001 13.48 39.492 HALACPI.DL_17/08/2001 13.48 50.996 HALAPIC.DL_17/08/2001 13.48 47.895 HALMACPI.DL_17/08/2001 13.48 52.257 HALMPS.DL_17/08/2001 13.48 37.640 HALSP.DL_17/08/2001 14.02 19.169 HIDCLASS.SY_17/08/2001 14.02 12.269 HIDPARSE.SY_17/08/2001 14.02 5.265 HIDUSB.SY_17/08/2001 14.07 15.648 HPN.SY_17/08/2001 13.52 23.251 HPT3XX.SY_17/08/2001 13.56 3.862 I2OMGMT.SY_17/08/2001 13.56 10.086 I2OMP.SY_17/08/2001 22.24 25.795 I8042PRT.SY_17/08/2001 13.52 8.560 INI910U.SY_17/08/2001 13.51 2.587 INTELIDE.SY_17/08/2001 13.58 20.351 ISAPNP.SY_17/08/2001 22.34 5.632 KBDA1.DLL17/08/2001 22.34 5.632 KBDA2.DLL17/08/2001 22.34 5.632 KBDA3.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.656 KBDAL.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.120 KBDARME.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.120 KBDARMW.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.632 KBDAZE.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.632 KBDAZEL.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDBE.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.632 KBDBLR.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDBR.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.632 KBDBU.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDCA.DLL17/08/2001 13.47 12.049 KBDCLASS.SY_17/08/2001 14.55 6.656 KBDCR.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 7.168 KBDCZ.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.656 KBDCZ1.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.656 KBDCZ2.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDDA.DLL17/08/2001 22.34 5.632 KBDDIV1.DLL17/08/2001 22.34 5.632 KBDDIV2.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.120 KBDDV.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDES.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDEST.DLL17/08/2001 22.34 5.632 KBDFA.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDFC.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDFI.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDFR.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.632 KBDGAE.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.120 KBDGEO.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDGKL.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDGR.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDGR1.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.632 KBDHE.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.632 KBDHE220.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.632 KBDHE319.DLL17/08/2001 22.34 5.632 KBDHEB.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDHELA2.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.656 KBDHELA3.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 8.192 KBDHEPT.DLL17/08/2001 13.48 7.707 KBDHID.SY_17/08/2001 14.55 6.656 KBDHU.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.632 KBDHU1.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDIC.DLL17/08/2001 22.34 5.632 KBDINDEV.DLL17/08/2001 22.34 5.632 KBDINGUJ.DLL17/08/2001 22.34 5.632 KBDINHIN.DLL17/08/2001 22.34 5.632 KBDINKAN.DLL17/08/2001 22.34 5.632 KBDINMAR.DLL17/08/2001 22.34 6.144 KBDINPUN.DLL17/08/2001 22.34 5.632 KBDINTAM.DLL17/08/2001 22.34 5.632 KBDINTEL.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.632 KBDIR.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.632 KBDIT.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.632 KBDIT142.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.632 KBDKAZ.DLL17/08/2001 22.34 5.632 KBDKYR.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.656 KBDLA.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.632 KBDLT.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.632 KBDLT1.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDLV.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDLV1.DLL17/08/2001 22.34 5.632 KBDMON.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDNE.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 7.168 KBDNEC.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDNO.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.656 KBDPL.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.632 KBDPL1.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDPO.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.632 KBDRO.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.632 KBDRU.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.632 KBDRU1.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDSF.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.656 KBDSG.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.656 KBDSL.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.656 KBDSL1.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDSP.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDSW.DLL17/08/2001 22.34 5.632 KBDSYR1.DLL17/08/2001 22.34 5.632 KBDSYR2.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.632 KBDTAT.DLL17/08/2001 22.34 5.632 KBDTH0.DLL17/08/2001 22.34 5.632 KBDTH1.DLL17/08/2001 22.34 6.144 KBDTH2.DLL17/08/2001 22.34 6.144 KBDTH3.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDTUF.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDTUQ.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.632 KBDUK.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.632 KBDUR.DLL17/08/2001 22.34 5.632 KBDURDU.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.632 KBDUS.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDUSL.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDUSR.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.144 KBDUSX.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.632 KBDUZB.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.632 KBDVNTC.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 5.632 KBDYCC.DLL17/08/2001 14.55 6.656 KBDYCL.DLL17/08/2001 13.49 6.327 KD1394.DL_17/08/2001 13.49 4.184 KDCOM.DL_17/08/2001 13.50 79.744 KSECDD.SYS17/08/2001 13.51 14.354 LBRTFDC.SY_21/07/2001 14.20 847 L_INTL.NL_17/08/2001 13.47 19.213 MOUNTMGR.SY_17/08/2001 13.52 9.785 MRAID35X.SY_17/08/2001 12.42 45.124 NTDETECT.COM17/08/2001 22.24 533.504 NTFS.SYS17/08/2001 22.24 938.895 NTKRNLMP.EX_17/08/2001 14.06 35.701 OHCI1394.SY_17/08/2001 13.57 1.629 OPRGHDLR.SY_17/08/2001 22.24 10.256 PARTMGR.SY_17/08/2001 13.58 35.550 PCI.SY_17/08/2001 13.51 1.695 PCIIDE.SY_17/08/2001 13.51 13.478 PCIIDEX.SY_17/08/2001 13.58 54.287 PCMCIA.SY_17/08/2001 14.07 16.328 PERC2.SY_17/08/2001 14.07 3.363 PERC2HIB.SY_17/08/2001 13.52 22.761 QL1080.SY_17/08/2001 13.52 18.888 QL10WNT.SY_17/08/2001 13.52 25.938 QL12160.SY_17/08/2001 13.52 22.855 QL1240.SY_17/08/2001 13.52 27.359 QL1280.SY_17/08/2001 13.56 4.750 RAMDISK.SY_17/08/2001 13.52 21.479 SBP2PORT.SY_17/08/2001 13.51 50.517 SCSIPORT.SY_17/08/2001 13.50 8.226 SERENUM.SY_17/08/2001 22.24 29.943 SERIAL.SY_17/08/2001 13.56 198.488 SETUPDD.SY_17/08/2001 13.49 237.728 SETUPLDR.BIN17/08/2001 11.57 262.144 SETUPREG.HIV17/08/2001 13.52 6.092 SFLOPPY.SY_17/08/2001 14.07 5.519 SLIP.SY_17/08/2001 14.07 11.098 SPARROW.SY_05/10/2001 08.57 225.152 SPCMDCON.SYS17/08/2001 13.56 1.599 SPDDLANG.SY_17/08/2001 14.07 6.751 STREAMIP.SY_17/08/2001 14.07 8.352 SYMC810.SY_17/08/2001 14.07 18.304 SYMC8XX.SY_17/08/2001 14.07 16.761 SYM_HI.SY_17/08/2001 14.07 17.923 SYM_U3.SY_19/12/2009 20.46 <DIR> SYSTEM3217/08/2001 13.52 36.527 TFFSPORT.SY_17/08/2001 13.51 2.629 TOSIDE.SY_17/08/2001 12.04 71.155 TXTSETUP.SI_17/08/2001 13.52 15.864 ULTRA.SY_17/08/2001 14.03 11.490 USBCCGP.SY_17/08/2001 14.03 2.495 USBD.SY_17/08/2001 14.03 27.955 USBHUB.SY_17/08/2001 14.03 8.900 USBOHCI.SY_17/08/2001 14.03 54.560 USBPORT.SY_17/08/2001 14.03 12.620 USBSTOR.SY_17/08/2001 14.03 10.834 USBUHCI.SY_17/08/2001 13.57 10.088 VGA.SY_21/07/2001 14.40 2.437 VGAOEM.FO_17/08/2001 13.51 2.475 VIAIDE.SY_17/08/2001 13.57 33.045 VIDEOPRT.SY_17/08/2001 14.07 2.509 WMILIB.SY_ 218 File 5.402.669 byte Directory di C:\Downloaded\XPSETUPFLOPPIES\Root_of_stick\SYSTEM3219/12/2009 20.46 <DIR> .19/12/2009 20.46 <DIR> ..17/08/2001 22.21 674.304 NTDLL.DLL17/08/2001 22.37 469.504 SMSS.EXE 2 File 1.143.808 byte Totale file elencati: 220 File 6.546.477 bytejaclaz Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ilko_t Posted December 19, 2009 Share Posted December 19, 2009 It's quite likely when setup loads from a floppy, to ignore BootPath directive, which works for CD and HD installs, and to look for the rest of the boot files in root.You can try copying biosinfo.inf to root of USB stick and see if error message changes to another file name.If that's the case, we need to figure out how to successfully map fd0 to hd1. Using the apparently proper multi(0)disk(0)fdisk(0) would not help much, unless we use root for holding all files. Not quite sure how would we point to the source files once reach the file copy stage, no wonder if there is something else hardcoded again, just as msdosinitiated=1 behavior Looking at microsoft support wouldn't help, most of this is undocumented at all, actually the whole project for installing from USB was developed mostly by experimenting, very often using random shots in the darkness PLoP is included by default in the next beta, which I should be posting in a few hours in the main WinSetupFromUSB thread. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
barnai Posted December 19, 2009 Author Share Posted December 19, 2009 Open the downloaded file with 7-zip, then from within it open .rsrc, then open RCDATA then open CABINET then open each of the floppy images and extract from it the files to root of the stick.There is no .rsrc file in the exe file I downloaded. The image files are directly at the root, along with 2 other exe files. And when I open the images there is not that many files: e.g in cdboot3.img there is one file called fdc.sys, and in fdc.sys there are only 7 files. And similarly for most of the images.Am I missing something ? Or didnt I downloaded the right file ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jaclaz Posted December 19, 2009 Share Posted December 19, 2009 Open the downloaded file with 7-zip, then from within it open .rsrc, then open RCDATA then open CABINET then open each of the floppy images and extract from it the files to root of the stick.There is no .rsrc file in the exe file I downloaded. The image files are directly at the root, along with 2 other exe files. And when I open the images there is not that many files: e.g in cdboot3.img there is one file called fdc.sys, and in fdc.sys there are only 7 files. And similarly for most of the images.Am I missing something ? Or didnt I downloaded the right file ?Which files did you download?The ones I am talking about are the ones on the reference given by cdob:http://support.microsoft.com/kb/310994Files are Respectively SP0, SP1 and sP2:WinXP_EN_PRO_BF.EXEwinxpsp1_en_pro_bf.exeWindowsXP-KB310994-SP2-Pro-BootDisk-ENU.exeAre you using 7-zip or another app?I am using right now 9.07 Beta.In cdboot3.img there is a number of files, among which there is fdc.sy_ which contains (ONLY ) fdc.sys .jaclaz Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
barnai Posted December 19, 2009 Author Share Posted December 19, 2009 @ilko_t:I tried to put biosinfo.inf at the root of the stick but there wasnt any change. Bad news or bad news ? I am using right now 9.07 Beta.Precisely ! I was using v4.65 and apparently the result of archives decompression varies from one version to another... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jaclaz Posted December 19, 2009 Share Posted December 19, 2009 Precisely ! I was using v4.65 and apparently the result of archives decompression varies from one version to another... Yes , usually later versions have "better" capabilities and work "smoother", (the 7-zip developer likes to work this way, as opposed to the usual MS way ) jaclaz Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ilko_t Posted December 21, 2009 Share Posted December 21, 2009 @ilko_t:I tried to put biosinfo.inf at the root of the stick but there wasnt any change. Bad news or bad news ? Just another piece of puzzle, which is pushing me to find a similar machine and play a bit on it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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