Using mkimg.cmd with Win2003

[Br4tt3]

Hi

Question: Can I use a Windows 2003 Server CD to build the WinPE folder structure? And would this generate a Win2003 "based" WinPE as when building WinPE from a WinXP CD?

I am using WinPE 1.2 and was reading the winpe.chm document that states under mkimg.cmd:

"This command builds the file set for the Windows Preinstallation Environment (Windows PE, also known as WinPE) from any Windows XP or Windows .NET Server 2003, Standard Edition product CD.."

I have tried to build an .iso file which works but when I use it, it just fails with:

"File txtsetup.oem caused an unexpected error (18) at line 1814 in d:\srv03rtm\base\boot\setup\oemdisk.c."

Since I have not added any drivers to the image.. just taken it from scratch I dont know why it fails?

Regards Sausage Eater From .SE

[Br4tt3]

My bad when it comes to the error... forgot to remove a string in my old WinPE folder..

However, the main question still remains open.. what is the main idea about building WinPE of an Win2003 vs WinXP source if one can not get around the problem of adding native drivers to WinPE ?

Most Win2003 / Win2000 drivers can be plugged into WinPE(1.2) but not all.. I guess WinPE then mostly is suited for client distribution (rather then server) as one cannot guarantee native driver support to the distribution mechanism..

Any1 wanna take me up on that? Thx...

[likuidkewl]

I think to help you out we need more information, what do you mean by more suited for a client, I have not seen an issue with workstation versus server deployments with PE. What are you looking to inject into the build of PE?

[Br4tt3]

Sure thing...

Background scenario:

We are using WinPE (1.2) based on WinXP for kicking off installations of Win2003 Server. We are using Dell as hardware vendor for the servers. Until recently we have been able to find Windows 2003 drivers for masstorage devices that would plug in just fine into WinPE (1.2). Since we need to write to disk to acchieve installation features we need to prep the WinPE image with those specific drivers. A coupple weeks ago Dell released a new RAID driver for newly supported RAID devices.

I download the driver for Win2003 and plug into WinPE, I can support 2 out of a total 7 RAID devices all supported by the same family driver included from Dell.

This way I know the driver added to WinPE works, however, the same driver for Win2003 cannot support all the diffrent flavours of chipsets included in the family driver and the installation crasches... Dell of course wont support XP drivers for their server hardware so I am bound to use Windows 2003 that just work on some chipsets...

As a consequence, if I cant provide native driver support for the distribution mechanism (WinPE) for an installation I cant guarentee that it will work.

To verify that the drivers provided by Dell works for all the chipsets of the RAID devices, I plugged them into RIS and ran the installation from there... everything worked as a charm

tried to make WinPE based on Win2003 source but it turned out to be the same (n00bish me) and tried WinPe (1.5) which also is based on WinXP which gave me the same result....

So when will MS release WinPE based on Win2003 ?

[likuidkewl]

You can build 2003 PE from 1.5 but no guarantees on if it will work, and it is unsupported by MS. If you look at the make inage command you can negate the version check, i think it is something like /ver but don't quote me as I have not tried it. The next version of PE will be out in 2005 with SP1 for 2003/XP64.

Also did you use driverinst in 2004, and if so were there any errors?

[Br4tt3]

Thx man.. didnt get it working with the manual adding mass storage way. Tried the utility u mentioned and voila! Also tried to add the same driver using txtsetup.sif file in WinPE and that turned out to do the trick as well.. which leads me to wonder if there is any diffrence between adding a masstorage driver through winpeoem.sif or by using txtsetup.sif... well.. thx anyway, saved my day!

[ChrisBaksa]

You can build 2003 PE from 1.5 but no guarantees on if it will work, and it is unsupported by MS.  If you look at the make inage command you can negate the version check, i think it is something like /ver but don't quote me as I have not tried it.  The next version of PE will be out in 2005 with SP1 for 2003/XP64. 

Also did you use driverinst in 2004, and if so were there any errors?

Driverinst is not really needed. It only copies files to the proper directories.

PE 2005 (origionally know as PE 1.6) work almost identical to 2004. I have found a few issues with it so far... But thats why it is beta.

The PXE boot from Ram Disk is awsome. There are some memory limitations. I am trying to find out what they are. Ex... running winnt32 causes an Out Of Memory Error on a server with 2 gigs of ram.

Chris

[Br4tt3]

Hmm... and another question then when it comes to adding masstorage drivers to a WinPE (1.5) build this time. In the winpe.chm file it states:

Customizing WinPE, Adding masstorage drivers: ( txtsetup.oem file)

"Many driver packages today support a variety of mass-storage devices, and only those listed in the [Defaults] section will be loaded...."

Oki, I have confirmed that the first listed entry in the [Defaults] section in the txtsetup.oem file gets loaded correctly and works when I am accessing the disk from within WinPE, lets call it RAID1A.

[Defaults]

scsi = RAID1A

Since I want to support multiple chipsets of the same software driver as in RAID1B and RAIDC from within the same driver package I want to add multiple entries to the[Defaults] section as in:

[Defaults]

scsi = RAID1A

scsi = RAID1B

scsi = RAID1C This part doesnt work for me as I have tried it a coupple of times.

Alternative 2. Have multiple driver folders in WinPE ( with the same software driver in each driver folder, just diffrent entries to the [Defaults] section specifying a new chipset for every new driver folder to the TXTSETUP.OEM file )

This alternative seems foolish to me as I would quickly run out of space avail on the CD as I would increase the overhead for adding a driver for each chipset I want to support.

Any suggestions to solve the issue? Or is it by design ( I guess )?

Sorry for boring u with these booring driver questions....

[ribond]

ChrisBaksa: What build of Server Sp1 are you building your WinPE image from? And what build are you running winnt32 against?

Br4tt3: I'm sorry to say that your Alternative Two answer is the only one that will work; txtsetup.OEM does not support multiple DEFAULT driver entries.

However there is an easy way to eliminate the on-cd impact of multiple copies of this driver-package -- The tool used by WinPE (ok, MKIMG really) to create .ISO images is called OSCDIMG.EXE. Take a look inside MKIMG for an example command line when using this thing, as it is a bit archane.

The fix for the CD space is to use the "-o" switch with OSCDIMG. This will do single-instancing in your ISO, so duplicate filenames won't really get added to your image, or impact the on-disk size, but will be linked to transparently.