Reading the valuable info from 9685 and 10445 I tried myself a few things.

I was surprised to find that only two files from w2k3-SP1 are needed to create a CD that loads a bartpe iso in RAM and boots it from there. SETUPLDR.BIN and RAMDISK.SYS.

The iso does not have to be based on W2k3-SP1 sources (needs only ramdisk.sys from W2k3-SP1).

For all those who want to try, the steps are:

• 1. Download MS Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1 (RC). It is a SFX CAB archive. You may use WinRAR to open it. Extract the SETUPLDR.BIN and RAMDISK.SY_. Expand ramdisk.sy_ to get RAMDISK.SYS.
• 2. Build a normal pebuilder.iso with any source you like but
  replace the driver RAMDISK.SYS with the one from W2k3-SP1 (keep however the size sufficiently small since the whole iso will be loaded in RAM)
• 3. From PEBuilder output directory take bootsect.bin and i386\ntdetect.com
• 4. Create a WINNT.SIF text file containing the code
  
  CODE
  [SetupData]
  BootDevice = "ramdisk(0)"
  BootPath = "\i386\System32\"
  OsLoadOptions = "/noguiboot /fastdetect /minint /rdexportascd /rdpath=pebuilder.iso"
• 5. Create a folder, say C:\rampe, UPPERCASE the 5 files above and use them to create within C:\rampe the following structure
  
  CODE
  BOOTSECT.BIN
  WINNT.SIF
  PEBUILDER.ISO
  I386\NTDETECT.COM
  I386\SETUPLDR.BIN
• 6. Create the new pebuilder_inram.iso with mkisofs. Use something like
  
  CODE
  mkisofs.exe -iso-level 4 -volid "BartPE" -A PEBUILDER/MKISOFS -sysid "Win32" -no-emul-boot -b BOOTSECT.BIN -hide BOOTSECT.BIN -o pebuilder_inram.iso "C:\rampe"

As one can easily see, it is very easy to include a RAM version in a multiboot CD.
Simply use the known method to add multiple OS (hex edit bootsect.bin, setupldr.bin and rename I386)

Regards

Edited: Added a missing , crucial step (shown above in RED)

Seems like GREAT news.

Need to find some time to try this!

Thanks,

jaclaz

Seems like great news indeed. Does this mean an ISO within an ISO/cdrom ?

pebuilder_inram.iso contains:
BOOTSECT.BIN (perhaps hidden, doesn't matter)
WINNT.SIF
PEBUILDER.ISO
I386\NTDETECT.COM
I386\SETUPLDR.BIN

It would be a great addition for Bart Lagerweij's 'PEbuilder-to-harddisk' script! You could even update the PEBUILDER.ISO on harddisk (I hope) while running WinPE from RAM

would the /INRAM switch make any sense any longer? I guess not.

I've actually been able to boot it, however some kind of blue screen of death. (STOP error)

Bernd Blaauw

as shown in http://www.911cd.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=10445
The method I used to boot into ram was puting an ISO image in a Hard disk image and booting the image. This method means you can have more than one WinPE build on a CD/DVD.


To boot from a Hard drive all you need is four or five files added to the root directory of the hard drive :

PELDR (NTLDR is no OS exists)
Bootsect.bin (Boot sector file if co-existing)
NTDetect.com (if it does not already exist)
pebuilder.iso
winnt.sif

to Co-exist with NT/2K/XP you need to :

1. rename a copy of Setupldr.bin to PELDR and put it in the root of the Hard drive
2. use Bart's mkbt.exe to create a Hard disk Boot sector file (Bootsect.bin)
3. use Bart's nt2peldr.exe to get the Boot sector file to point to PELDR
4. put the ISO image in the root of the Hard drive
5. Add an option in Boot.ini to point to the Boot sector file (c:\bootsect.bin="Windows Pe" )
6. Create winnt.sif and put it in the root of the Hard drive

To put on a blank hard drive/partiton :

1. Format the partition using XP
2. rename a copy of Setupldr.bin to NTLDR and put it in the root of the Hard drive
3. put the ISO image in the root of the Hard drive
4. put Ntdetect.com in the root of the Hard drive
5. Create winnt.sif and put it in the root of the Hard drive

Please Note : Winnt.sif needs the ISO file name in the dos 8.3 format (not a long file name)

eg. /rdpath=\winpe.iso works OK
eg. /rdpath=\pebuilder.iso fails to boot !!!


cheers

Chris

I also get a blue screen of death if I use XP (with Setupldr.bin from 2003 SP1),
It loads into RAM ok, Then shows the loading bar, then Blue screen.
I can confirm the above does work from CD and Hard disk (and via PXE) using 2003 SP1.

Chris

I have exactly the same behavior as chrisWood:



No difference between starting in VMWare and booting from CD. The Stop point:

Stop: 0x000007B (0xF7BC2584, 0xC0000034, 0x00000002, 0x00000000)

Any ideas?

philon

Maybe this will help:
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?...kb;en-us;324103

@philon

Are you replacing setupldr.bin from XP with that from W2k3-SP1 when
building your original pebuilder.iso? You should NOT do it. Just build in the usuall way.

The W2k3-SP1 setupldr.bin is only used to build the new pebuilder_inram.iso with the 5 files and the instructions given above. This bootable iso will only load the original iso in ram and then pass control over to it.

I have tested iso's build from XP-sp1, XP-sp2, W2k3, W2k3-SP1 sources, and all boot properly from RAM.

Make sure however that you don't run out of RAM.

Regards

@aec

Ok, now I am completely lost!

Sorry, but I don't get it.

Could you possibly post a step by step howto, better if with a dir of files?

jaclaz

@all

I was forgetting that in my test builds I was using a plugin to replace the RAMDISK.SYS driver with the one from W2k3-SP1.

I edited the first post. Please, re-read it.

I hope now I am not forgetting something.

That was the missing link! I just tried it and it works now, this is cool. I've been looking for a way to get my system to boot and do automatic backups on a weekly basis with out having to have a CD in the drive. My next step it to make my system dual boot allowing the RamDisk version of BartPE or XP. Hopefully I can get that to work...

Thank you very much for the step by step instructions aec!

Larry

@aec

After replacing RAMDISK.INF as you advised it works like a charm!!!!
Great!

It boots much (!) faster than Hilander999's RamLoader which I use from time to time.

But I got an other problem: There is no drive B:\ anymore where my RamDisk
is located normally. Have 1GB of RAM, the pebuilder_inram.iso is ca. 128 MB.
Build from XP SP2 with PEBuilder 3.0.32 , use ramdisk plugin which comes with PEBuilder by default, size set to 16 MB. Is this a general problem or do I have to use another plugin or ...?

regards
philon

@captngizmo, @philon

Nice to hear that now is working .

@philon
More or less I have the same setup but RamDisk drive B: is there as before.
I'll check if the version of PEBuilder ramdisk plugin plays any role.



RamLoader has the advantage that effectively loads the system in RAM as Read/Write. So it is still in the game .

Regards

@aec

Thanks Very much, It works perfectly - I have been trying to get an XP build working since December and had just about given up !

Cheers

Chris

@chrisWood



Without your work I would not have managed it either.

Regards

What is the difference or benefit of using this method as posed to using the /inram switch?

MrXP

Hello Chris

I followed your steps and when I reboot, I get an error 14 - PEBUILDER.ISO could not be loaded. Yes, it's in the root directory of my c:\ drive. I'm not sure if there's something else I could have done wrong.

I'm guessing I did most of it right as I now have a new option of choosing "Windows Pe" at boot (I didn't have any other boot choices before) and it appears to try and load PEBUILDER.ISO, but...

Any ideas or suggestions?

Thanks,

Larry

I'm trying to get it works via pxe on linux, using same procedure for normal pe,
but my tftpd server raises an error:


/* Verify that the file can be sent in 2^16 block of BLKSIZE octets */

the iso doesn't fit in 2^16 blocks

There is a way to specify blocksize to the client or I need to tweak the tftpd server?

Suppose i should go and find a copy of ramdisk.sys without having to spend the time downloading over dialup!

using a blocksize the client suggests (1432) the max file size is 93846120 (90mb) I've removed the check but I'm not sure it works... maybe I should pass ramdisk size to the loader so it can adjust block size

captngizmo

I have had this before, It is because the WINNT.SIF could not Locate ths ISO image. The ISO file name needs to be in the 8.3 DOS naming format (not a long file name) Try renaming the ISO file to winpe.iso or somthing shorter !

Winnt.sif example.

[SetupData]
BootDevice = "ramdisk(0)"
BootPath = "\i386\System32\"
OsLoadOptions = "/noguiboot /fastdetect /minint /rdexportascd /rdpath=\winpe.iso"


PS . The ISO does not need to be in the root of the HD, but needs to be specified correctly in the /rdpath parameter (eg. /rdpath=\i386\winpe.iso)


Chris

@philon



I had this problem while I was using a 2003 SP1 build, using QSoft Ramdisk 5.2.10.2 resolved this problem and the ramdrive (B:) loaded ok.
But I have not tried this on an XP SP2 build !

Chris

@philon



Have tested QSoft Ramdisk 5.2.10.2 with an XP SP2 build (supplied with PE Builder 3.1.3). and the Ramdrive (B:) is loaded and works fine !

Chris

You were right on target! I renamed my "Pebuilder.iso" to "Winpe.iso" and I got the loading "RamDisk" bar but now I'm getting an error "INF file txtsetup.sif is corrupt or missing" I assume it's corrupt, since it is in the .iso file. I'll do some more checking on my end here. I don't know if "just renaming" the .iso was the right thing or if it needs to be built using this name. As well, it may have something to do with my "ShrinkIso.cmd" file. I use this .cmd file to delete files (based on your post from the 10445 topic) but this may be causing some of my grief here too. I need to revisit my delete commands. Of course, if you have another suggestion I'm open to it.

Many thanks to you you and aec, this is just what I've been looking for and I'm so very close to getting it to work.

Larry

captngizmo


Renaming the ISO file is not the problem, it has no effect on the image itself. The fact you are loading it into ram means winnt.sif was ok with the ISO image name.

Setupldr.bin (from 2003 SP1) needs to be renamed to NTLDR or PELDR if it is co-exisitng with another NT/2k/XP/2003 based OS) and put in the root of the Hardrive or HD image as I discribed in an earlier post.

Note The setupldr.bin file that is within the ISO image needs to be from the source OS that was used to build it and not from 2003 SP1 !

Are you using the correct setupldr.bin in the route of the Hardrive/HD image and in the ISO image ?
please check, it is easy to get them mixed up, I know I have and got this error message.

Chris

@aec and @chrisWood



Can confirm that RAMDisk (B:) is generated correctly when using QSoft Ramdisk 5.2.10.2 which comes with PEBuilder 3.13 and using XP SP2 as source.
Thanks! Now it's perfect!

philon

yum I've made a 36mb winpe iso with nu2menu (only cmd and nu2menu are working anyway ...) so I'll try using small images

Would you be kind enough to share with the world how one can make a 36MB winpe? Like Core files needed.

Thanks,

MrXP

Please explain...
I'm really interested.

Well, I'm not sure what I did to fix it. I have a .cmd file I use to do all the steps, so I told it use winpe for the .iso name and burned it to a cd and it works as expected. So, I thought I'd copy the .iso file over to my hard disk and tested it booting from the HD. It works now! It's possible I had a defective .iso in the first place, but my point is that by using the .cmd file it takes out the human factor.

Again Chris and aec, thank you very much for all the help in getting this together!

Larry

Okay, I'll nibble too! This could be the ultimate for my needs. All I really need is ghost32 for making weekly backups on my systems.

Please enlighten us Sherpya!

Larry

I need to fix some stuff e.g. fonts, now I'm using only vga850.fon, I'll made my work public when I've organized all ;P

Sounds great Sherpya, I'll wait for your post. As far as font, it doesn't make any difference to me. I'm more interested in a small footprint and usability. So don't get too fancy with it!

Larry

A basic fonting is needed, I've reduced a lot using some dll from reactos, right now
the network is not enabled but the iso is 27002880 bytes (25mb), anyway I think I cannot remove more ;P

I have a working cmd prompt, nu2menu, taskmanager (from ros), it takes 12mb of memory (at least taskmgr says so).

A screenshot of the work in progress can be found here:

sourceforge reduced the size from 800x600 to 640x480 anyway I've added red circles to show also the memory and disk footprints (after killing smss.exe and winlogon.exe).
http://sourceforge.net/dbimage.php?id=15405

I'm not using upx to compress executables. (nu2menu is yet upxed)

I would call it MiniPE, but I suspect this name is yet used by a different project

HELP!!

I can get the image loaded no problem. However, when control is passed to the regular PE iso, I get error 14, ntoskrnl not found.

What now???

Mark.

Sherpya, does that actually mean that you can boot this on a system with ~32 MB ram? (40 is the minimum others have achieved IIRC).

check to make sure you are using the correct BOOTSECT.BIN with the correct mkisofs command such as below.

mkisofs.exe -iso-level 4 -volid "Windows PE" -A PEBUILDER/MKISOFS -sysid "Win32" -no-emul-boot -b BOOTSECT.BIN -hide BOOTSECT.BIN -o pebuilder_inram.iso "c:\rampe"

I had same issue come to find out I wasnt using the correct BOOTSECT.BIN when compiling the core/outer ISO

MrXP

@sherpya

You can call it SuperMini-PE or SuperMiniMi-PE

Would be good to have a basic BartPE along with SmallCDWriter and Ghost32 and a basic file manager.

@sherpya



What about TinyPE.

Is there any progress with pxe booting using small images?

@sherpya


I think MicroPE would be the best choice. Afterall, this sounds like it's going to be smaller the the "MiniPE".

@all

I don't know if anyone would be interested in my .cmd file. I have it fairly polished now, it could make creating the InRam MakeInRam.iso more consistent for anyone wanting to try this. Of course, it does require you to have the SETUPLDR.BIN and RAMDISK.SYS files from the 2003 SP1 service pack on hand. I would post it here, but I really hate to clutter this topic with long posts. This actually consists of two cmd files, one that creates the .iso and one that trims or removes the unnecessary files from the main iso file.

Perhaps someone with an ftp or web site could host it for me if there's enough interest?

Larry

rdist from tftpd causes bluescreen, out of memory with 32 mb (vmware) , maybe removing something or raising resolution (I'm using 1024x768)... 48mb is the minimum for me. I should try rdisk from an iso cd

I suggest "NanoPE", as I believe it's going to be the smallest we can achieve.

Other possibility: "PicoPE". I find "MicroPE" to be a letter too long

Zitu

What about ShrinkPE.

speaking of shrinks. Pe is driving me crazy.You know what I mean

@sherpya

I had a look at your screenshot and I have 2 questions:

- how did you manage to get this screenshot with the only font vga850.fon ?
Normally the nu2menu should display "8" instead of the arrow for submenus.
How did you manage this ?

- how did you kill smss.exe and winlogon.exe ?

Zitu

ps: can you give a complete directory listing of your minipe ? Thanks

@sherpya
Can you create us a guide that explains how you managed to create a "tiny PE"?
Would be great.

Thanks. I'll make sure. One other question, just so my thinking is right, you replace the RAMDISK.SYS in the actual pebuilder ISO, the one in i386\system32\drivers, right?? That part was not so clear in the original post.

It must me right, because I DO get it to start the boot process.

Perhaps a clarification for those of us out here that may be having problems.

Mark.

Yup, replace ramdisk.sys in system32\drivers before you build the iso

damn, now I need to buy more ram...

I am having a problem with this also. I can get the image transferred using tftp32 and it also works if i substitute a 2003sp1 iso, ( got frustrated with trying to make it work) but back on topic I get the error 14 once control is passed, I noticed the note about bootsect.bin but dont know where it is generated, I tried copying the one from the 2003sp1 build but of course it blew up. anyone else having any luck PXE booting this way?

Nope. Still it won't work.

I get all the way to the screen that says "Starting BartPE..." with the progress bar across the bottom of the screen and then Error 14.

I have triple-checked all the files, and the directory format.

Don't know where to go from here...

Mark.

Mark,

Are you trying to install this on a HD or burning to a CD? Is your image based on XP or 2003? I had the exact same problem (I'm using XP here) and meticulously went through it all. I made a check list to be sure I didn't miss any of the steps - it's confusing to say the least.

My steps are as follows:


I suspect you missed one of the above steps. Remember, you have to copy the 2003SP1 ramdisk.sys and 2003SP1 setupldr.bin files to the appropriate BartPE directory's and then create the BartPE.iso file. I was making the mistake of letting PEBuilder create the .iso and using that image.

Anyway, I hope this helps and I hope I didn't typo anything above!

Larry