Runing a Universal windows xp VHD from a usb stick

Runing a Universal windows xp VHD from a usb  stick

Just because I guess I'm not the only one that burned on it many hours I am happy to share all what I could finally understand and make it works for me...



From my experience I can say the most comfortable system for pc repairs/virus cleaning/portable os for internet/multimedia/mail/Quick work with files... is this xp.vhd .
* its small (lass than 1 gb)
* its boot very fast (11 sec with ewf - 19 sec without ewf)
* full multimedia support so you can Immediately play your media
* full printing support
* your anti virus always up to date (no need wait for updates like in pe builds )
* your anti virus real time protection work (Unlike pe builds)
* easy to install driver from driverforce or driver geek including all type of drivers (better than pe builds)
* with ewf you are protected - only when you need to update or install something you commit write to disk and return to ewf protection
* all portable apps are works (i has 8gb collection i made with Thinstall )



Of course our cool developers deserve thanks for there wonderful tools and deep explanations they give here all the time. Just a few steps I incorporated different guides to get the desired result
I can say I tried all the "usb xp" guides we have here in forum,I spent many hours on this

My conclusion until last week was the only way that really works is to go with wimb's Tool, step by step and create xp_ram.img and update it on many computers

But still it did not satisfy me because of the prominent faults
- You can not run on computers with little memory
- takes too much time on computers with slow usb boot
- I wanted to boot immediately to work rather than to dwell with the learning process, etc ...

Then thankfully I read here a few things and added a few things in my mind
Anyone who wants can try the great success: real universal xp.vhd without learning process needed work from winvblock file disk & g4d ram disk from usb without tne BSOD 0x7B i tried on 9 pc's only i get error But I fixed that too (see Part 13) Since I try it on every computer that I just met all work well!!

my steeps are:

1. make file cald xp.vhd on your local drive(fixed, not dynamic!) [i prefer .vhd instead of img for use with virtual pc if i want later ] {I disabled free space checking with nlite so i use 1gb .vhd}

2. make xpsp3.iso with full "chipset"+"mass storage"+"cpu" drivers integrate and Reduced size by removing Unnecessary components (my .iso is 410mb)

3. run this setup command

title start setup xp on img
map --mem /winvblock.ima (fd1)
map --mem (md)0x6000+800 (fd0)
map /xp.vhd (hd0)
map --mem /IMAGES/xpsp3.iso (0xff)
map --hook
dd if=(fd1) of=(fd0) count=1
chainloader (0xff)



title continue setup xp on img
map --mem /winvblock.ima (fd1)
map --mem (md)0x6000+800 (fd0)
map /xp.vhd (hd0)
map --mem /IMAGES/xpsp3.iso (0xff)
map --hook
dd if=(fd1) of=(fd0) count=1
root (hd0,0)
chainloader /ntldr

4. boot from the vhd from your local disk with this command

title Boot XP from image file 
map /xp.vhd (hd0)
map --rd-size=2048
map --mem (rd)+4 (0x55)
map --hook
write (0x55) #GRUB4DOS\x00v=1\x00xp.vhd\x000x80\x00
root (hd0,0)
chainloader /ntldr

5. connect your usb disk to the pc for the system to recognize it ..reboot when steel connect

6. use wim'b IMG_XP package to Reduced windows size & use all wimb's registry_tweaks (no need to create .img but use the tweaks.reg...) do not install firadisk! winvblock already installed!

7. open device manager and change all "ide&usb" drivers to "standard..." and computer to "Advanced Configuration and Power Interface"... reboot pc...

8. Optional, use "XPlite Professional 1.9" to Reduce your windows (Very significantly)

9. download UsbBootWatcher.zip from here:
Also download usb_xp_init.cmd from here:
Unzip UsbBootWatcher.zip and put usb_xp_init.cmd into the folder we have just extracted UsbBootWatcher. The directory structure should look like this:
amd64 - directory
x86 - directory

10. Boot into other Windows so you can edit your xp.vhd windows (you can mount the xp.vhd as local drive from windows7/Win7PE disk mangment or boot it on virtual pc)

11. Run usb_xp_init.cmd and type the path of system32 directory of the mounted vhd. (for examle D:\Windows\system32)
When it completed unmount the vhd

12. now you be able to boot this xp.vhd from your usb drive on different machines Without any additional actions (At least I can)

13. If you still encounter screen of death (happened to me once of 9 computers) Copy the .vhd file to the local drive and run it from there (or add --mem to map entry and run from ram disk)
after you boot to desktop wait for system finish the automatic drivers instantiation, then copy the vhd back to usb (or use IMG_XP_Update.exe to update your .vhd that placed on your usb) now its can safely boot from it

14. Optional, use ewfmgr To protect your disk and to improve performance Especially if it is a flash drive that his writing is very slow
how to install ewfmgr?

There may be other ways, my way is to boot the system with ewfmgr.iso (thanks to etboot project) its works in xp rc environment . (in our case we can boot it from virtualpc or from g4d + map vhd ) I brought up for you
select 1 to install ewf
select drive {c:}
select win folder {windows}
restart
after we boot into windows run cmd >
ewfmgr c:\ -enable = protection on
ewfmgr c:\ -disable = protection off
ewfmgr /all = all comand line




15. enjoy! 

some links

winvblock.ima

ewf.iso