Jump to content

Unattended Secret: Reducing Size Of Source


Recommended Posts


I'd just like to say that I just tried making an AIO with XP Home SP2 and XP Pro SP2 (released from Microsoft) and it works perfectly. However, I suggest you make your Windows PE version using your SP1 CD since the SP2 files are still beta! :)

If anyone wants, I can post pics of my directory listing and boot menu... :rolleyes:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'd just like to say that I just tried making an AIO with XP Home SP2 and XP Pro SP2 (released from Microsoft) and it works perfectly.  However, I suggest you make your Windows PE version using your SP1 CD since the SP2 files are still beta! :)

If anyone wants, I can post pics of my directory listing and boot menu... :rolleyes:

please do I am working the on similiar right now. 2000/XPproSP2.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well this is like my first or second post, so go easy on me. hehe.

I have been able to setup everything with no errors until now, and I'm pretty much at a lost for words, I setup my cd using the msdn guide and all was well until i found myself running out of room and thought this would be a good way to gain some of that back. so here is a screen shot of my problem...

Any idea's? any anyone need anymore info like my config files let me know...

Well that was dumb. somehow the dx9 file did get corrupt in the ISO and i was using CDIMAGE and that never happend when i was using nero6, so i will have to test that out some more but i do have a working version and that is the problem with that.

as for the WFP error, i do have this....

;Disables Windows File Pertection
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon]
"SFCDisable"=dword:FFFFFF9D

so i dont know what that could be.

post-70-1072668226_thumb.png

Link to comment
Share on other sites

To disable SFC completely, follow the guide here: http://www.MSFN.org/unattended/xp/wfp.htm

'SFCDisable' never works, as Windows Setup will attempt to restore the key back to 'enabled' at the 8min stage. Setup doesn't know 'SFCSetting' so it won't touch it at all.

As for DirectX 9.0b, I had that problem once, it didn't appear when I ran setup again. The ISO was never modified at that time.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

You now have a bootable XP Pro SP1 cd.  When you boot from it, if you chose option 0, it's just a regular xp install.  You will be able to use recovery console, repair xp, and you can chose every option in xp seteup.  If you chose option 2, you will do an unattended install.  If you do option 3, it'll do whatever you want it to.  In my example, i made it an OEMPreinstall.

@Gosh :)

Hi there I feel like I know you already from reading your posts all over everywhere. Sounds like you got a real good handle on xp architecture. I have followed your guide here without having any problems and now have a "slimmed down", multiboot cd, that includes an Unattend XP and a Regular retail XP all with hotfixes and tweaks. My question.... Your second guide/post in this thread you comment that we will be able to access the recovery console and repair the xp install from the cd. But I want to install the recovery console and be able to access it without the cd. I have added winnt32.exe, and winnt32u.dll into the i386 folder (and Im willing to spend an time discovering which files individually need to be re-added to the i386) however after copying those two over Im now getting an error when trying to install the RC (winnt32.exe /cmdcons) that says somthing to the effect of "installation path invalid".

Any suggestions? I tried to just copy over the RC hidden folder, the cmdldr file, and modified the boot.ini to the computer but when I tried to boot to it, it error'd out on me. (I'm assuming the install of RC must write to the bootsector)

Do you have any suggestions at all for how I can use your slim down method, and copy over the few needed files and modify what I need to still have the functionality of installing the recovery console?

Thanks in advance Gosh. I've been enjoying your Xp insights!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

my XP pro install: (3 versions)

normal says didn't find the EULA

unattended says "this is an upgrade, insert your XP pro cd for setup to continue"

plain-but-auto-uses-winnt.sif says the same

--------------------

how did you solve the problem, if you had faced it before ? (you might know with your experience as to what causes this)

details of relevant things:

1. i haven't made the "BOOT" folder, since anyway it doesn't speed-up things at CD-boot text-mode setup.

2. i've properly hexed the boot-sector and setupldr.bin - these problems can't be relevant to these files because, then it wouldn't get to the point where it can complain this error.

3. i've edited txtsetup.sif - SetupSourcePath = "\PRO2\" is the only modification i made. I changed the path appropriately in each of these - PRO1, PRO2, and PRO3 are the former I386 directories.

3. there's no error with winnt.sif or svcpack.inf. Do I also have to edit "dosnet.inf" ?

An example of my CD structure:

MYCD-ROOT
|
|--autorun.inf
|--win51IP
|---OEM
|---PRO1
|---PRO2
|---DOCS
|---SUPPORT

and so on, this was just an example - all my files are in the right folders just as gosh said - dont point out that this/that file is missing. this is just a rough sketch.

i'm pretty familiar with unattended CD making - been following most of the posts on the forum since july 2k3. The problem is almost certainly in txtsetup.sif as it has many other references to I386 folder too, but i don't see anybody here talking about anything other than modifying SetupSourcePath = "\"

The entire setup and configuration works perfectly (as tested the normal way instead of PRO1,PRO2,etc.) and no modifications since then, except what the guide here says.

Please help me.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Sorry i didn't get a chance to reply earlier, MSFN won't allow me to post from work.

I don't understand, you're using 3 i386 folders, called pro1, pro2, and pro3? Where is the i386 folder, in the pro folders? It would be easier to use boot folders to boot the cd from.

If the CD can't find the eula then you probably have a problem with the setupsourcepath or cd idents. You say you edited txtsetup.sif but didn't say where. If you are using boot folders, you edit the txtsetup.sif in the boot folder, not the i386 folder. Make sure each pro folder has the cd idents (win51ip, win51...)

If setup thinks you have an upgrade it's because of the setupsourcepath or cdidents, so again check those.

-gosh

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I saw again your edited first post and saw your site - no info about this.

while you mention there to put the i386 directory under the PRO1 directory,

in my case the PRO1,PRO2, and PRO3 are *the* i386 folders.

[maybe that was a crucial difference and that's what is causing errors for all these people, but I see no reason why it can't be adapted to my directory structure]

I already said :

3. i've edited txtsetup.sif - SetupSourcePath = "\PRO2\" is the only modification i made. I changed the path appropriately in each of these - PRO1, PRO2, and PRO3 are the former I386 directories.

To describe what I did:

PRO1 is NOT containing any other files or the I386 folder. It is *the* I386 folder itself (renamed and no other mods except for txtsetup.sif).

So, for example, if E:\ is my cd drive, I edited E:\PRO1\txtsetup.sif as per above.

My cd idents are not corrupted and are in the root of the CD (just to remove ambiguousness, they aren't in a folder "ROOT" on the cd, they exist directly as files in the CD's root).

>> It would be easier to use boot folders to boot the cd from.

if you meant this -

C:\$WIN_NT$.~LS - rename this folder to install

C:\$WIN_NT$.~BT - rename this folder to BOOT (all capital letters)

I tried to keep modifications to a minimum, so I'm not using the "reducing source" at all.

if you mean that I can put the boot sectors of the CD in a single folder, i'm already doing that. I use EasyBoot. Before anybody says that the problem could be with using EasyBoot, see the relevant "point No.2" in my previous post here.

Some more details -

1. my setupldr.bin is in the PRO1,PRO2,PRO3 folders (which were previously the I386 folder).

2. That's the proper location, and it's properly hexed, that's actually why the text-mode install starts up at all. So that rules out any error with the setupldr.bin or the xpboot.bin

3. Just to clarify, I declare I don't have any other setupldr.bi_, txtsetup.si_,dosnet.in_ and such lying around on this CD - the only such files are the edited ones.

I tried editing dosnet.inf from

[Directories]d1 = \I386

to

[Directories]d1 = \PRO1

because PRO1 is my I386 folder now.

But dosnet.inf can't be the reason because as far as i know it's used only at the file-copy stage, and here, I haven't even got past the EULA.

I even tried leaving txtsetup.sif at default:

SetupSourcePath = "\"

It still doesn't work.

To be exact, this is the problem many of us here are facing:

1. Starting the normal install after booting from CD gets past the "press Enter to setup windows", "Press R to use Recovery Console", "F3 to exit setup" stage. Pressing Enter brings up the Agreement screen - it then searches a bit for the EULA, and gives up saying "eula.txt not found, press F3 to exit setup". That's the end of that route.

2. On the other hand, booting and choosing the unattended setup directly pops up a screen saying "this is an upgrade CD, please insert the retail CD, or press F3 to exit setup". No option works at that stage, except to exit. My opinion is this variance with unattended happens because the winnt.sif file was accessed and it tells setup to skip the initial screens and stop for input at disk partitioning. But right where it is supposed to show the EULA and "Press F8 to agree", it finds that it isn't able to even see the eula.txt file that's meant to be skipped. So it deduces somehow that it's got to be an upgrade CD and not a retail. I am puzzled seeing that if it is able to follow the winnt.sif file, why not also see the eula.txt.

In both cases, Setup loads as it normally would - with all the million RAID and SCSI hardware drivers.

I hope this post gives enough info for someone to detect the error, or for someone to duplicate the error, and tell us what's wrong.

Cheers !!!

Edited by prathapml
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I've found that it is impossible to use a directory other than i386 to put the install files in. You can boot from whatever you like--PRO2, XPBT, VOL1, whatever, but the actually setup files need to be in an i386 directory. I have my disc's directories setup in a manner similar to this:

cdsh

XPBT

WinXP

|--i386

|--$OEM$

Try something like that. :)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thanks bachus and gosh for your responses.

I guess i can't modify these things too much.

Would this work ? This is a pretty accurate illustration of my CD's folder structure:

Folder PATH listing for CD's root folder
H:.
|   AUTORUN.INF
|   README.HTM
|   SETUP.EXE
|   spnotes.htm
|   WIN51
|   WIN51IP
|   win51ip.SP1
|  
+---DOCS
|      
+---PRO1
|    |--I386
|
+---Extras
|              
+---ezboot
|      
\---$OEM$
   \--cmdlines.txt

Or do $OEM$,DOCS,SETUP.EXE, spnotes.htm, WIN51, WIN51IP, win51ip.SP1

need to be in the PRO1 folder too ?

If the dir structure was modified to:

CD root
|
+--PRO3
+--PRO2
+--PRO1
     |-- cd ident files
     |-- I386
     |-- $OEM$

what would "OemFilesPath=" in winnt.sif say ?

=\PRO1\$OEM$ ?

or is it =PRO1\$OEM$

Cheers !!!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...