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#31
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I'd like to boot Windows from an external drive.
On 2018-07-12 16:56, Frank Slootweg wrote:
Carlos E.R. wrote: On 2018-07-11 15:55, Frank Slootweg wrote: Carlos E.R. wrote: On 2018-07-11 04:24, Paul wrote: [...] Windows To Go is it. Can't. The procedure is designed to move existing and booting Windows on an internal disk to another disk outside. I do not have two disks, I only have one. And it doesn't boot, so I can not run anything on it. Can't install any software, unless using some rescue USB stick. I removed the disk from inside and connected it outside. If you're willing to - temporarily - swap the disks back, or you can temporarily use some other Windows system, you could download the Windows 10 software and make bootable USB memory-stick or DVD Windows 10 Install media. 'Download Windows 10' https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10 Yes, I can download on another computer an ISO bootable image to install windows. I did that recently to install a virtual machine on anoter computer. What do you suggest, that I install Windows from scratch on another external disk instead of using the original disk that was inside the laptop? If you have another external disk (or buy one, they're quite cheap these days), then it's preferred to install Windows from scratch on that drive. It seems that way. However I got the impression that you don't particulary value what's on the original disk that was inside the laptop. If that is true, you could install Windows from scratch on the original disk. On the contrary, I wanted to preserve it in case I need to request warranty coverage. OTOH, I see that in the meantime you have some more luck at least getting some messages from the original disk, so it's probably best not to overwrite it yet. You can see on another post that I found that Windows will not boot on this machine USB3, because apparently it is reset at one point. USB2 does "boot", but asks for recovery, which fails (hard disk not found). -- Cheers, Carlos. |
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#32
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I'd like to boot Windows from an external drive.
In article , Carlos E.R.
wrote: However I got the impression that you don't particulary value what's on the original disk that was inside the laptop. If that is true, you could install Windows from scratch on the original disk. On the contrary, I wanted to preserve it in case I need to request warranty coverage. then there's no need to boot from it or use it at all. in the event of a warranty repair, swap it back and don't break anything in the process. meanwhile, put another drive in the enclosure and use it however you wish. |
#33
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I'd like to boot Windows from an external drive.
On Thu, 12 Jul 2018 11:45:57 +0200, "Carlos E.R."
wrote: This laptop is tiny, no optical drive. I intend it for travelling, not serious use, so weight and size are important. Power is secondary ;-) I used to use a laptop for traveling, then I replaced it with an even smaller laptop (a "netbook"). But now I use an even smaller, lighter computer for traveling: an Android phone. |
#34
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I'd like to boot Windows from an external drive.
Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2018-07-12 05:52, Carlos E.R. wrote: On 2018-07-12 05:29, GlowingBlueMist wrote: Have you tried plugging the USB drive into a USB2 port? The USB3 drive adapters normally will work on a USB2 port, just a little slower. That's an idea. I'll try that, thanks. You were absolutely right! It tries to boot, and I get to an offer of repair options. I choose to try boot Win 10, says preparing automatic repair, but after a minute goes back to the same place: continue (booting W10) power off use recovery media solve problems. After two cycles, I selected the later. It fails to diagnose. It writes a log somewhere which I'll have to read from somewhere else, and offers "advanced" or power off. Advanced goes back to square one. Well, it is a fair advance, yes. The log file is "\Windows\System32\LogFiles\Srt\SrtTrail.txt". It seems to logs some tests with error code 0x0, and finally says "hard disk not found". Seems that Windows is hardcoded to use the internal disk, does not allow "movement". If that is so, I would have to install it fresh on another external enclosure. I'll see tomorrow, I have to sleep ;-) I got mine working :-) But, I cheated. So the idea was, I would start with the crummy "official" method first, just to prove it would actually work. For starting materials, I grabbed an unlicensed VM from here. This is a ~4GB download, so don't download onto a FAT32 volume. I happened to notice in the past, that the MSEdge machine is based on Win10 Enterprise. As otherwise, I wouldn't be able to download an Enterprise installer disc. https://developer.microsoft.com/en-u...dge/tools/vms/ I got the "MSEdge on Win10 (x64)" machine. When unpacking in VirtualBox, it complained about no end of file mark or some such. I did a little further unpacking with 7ZIP, and fed the component parts of the .ova into VirtualBox, and ended up with a 9GB .vmdk or so. Whatever the error was telling me, I managed to bypass it. In VirtualBox, you can use the USB filter to connect external USB devices to a VM. I put a SATA SSD on a USB3 to SATA adapter, and plugged that into a USB3 port on my Test Machine. Now, in VirtualBox, I had the 9GB C: drive, and I created two more virtual disks. I made a virtual disk for the sole purpose of "temporary cloning" of the C: drive. I wanted to run DISM while the OS was running, and cloning C: meant I didn't need to figure out how to use VSS. I installed Macrium Reflect (just the application part), and cloned C: to make a second OS which is F: . This was so I could do the following. The output is stored in a third virtual disk, not that this is important or anything. 1) Clone C: to make an identical F: 2) In an Administrator Command Prompt # E: contains the output # F: is a clone of C: , made with Macrium Reflect Free # Create E:\SCRATCH first... # And output is on E: for later. # Windows isn't case sensitive. dism /capture-image /imagefile:E:\install.wim /capturedir:F:\ /ScratchDir:E:\Scratch /name:"AnyName" /compress:maximum /checkintegrity /verify /bootable 3) Now that I have an install.wim, I go to Control Panels. control.exe I select the "Windows To Go" control panel. It first prompts for a device. I plugged a 32GB USB3 stick (100MB/sec), and it was rejected as "unworthy". I plugged in the USB3 to SATA cable and an Intel SSD, and it was "begrudgingly accepted". Fine. Next, it asks for an install.wim . I feed it the highly compress 6GB E:\install.wim . And go out to the kitchen and make a three course meal. 4) I shut down the VM, and save off any virtual disks for later. Then shut down the PC and remove the hard drive. Now the Test Machine only has the USB adapter with Intel SATA SSD plugged in. And... it boots. First, you see the banner, which warns you you're on a USB OS. The banner blocks, so I can't use snippingtool to take a picture, and have to use a digital camera instead. https://s33.postimg.cc/tm4hh0k7j/WTG_Banner.gif This shows my "storage". https://s33.postimg.cc/bgmxpdfxr/win...enterprise.gif For whatever reason, the process seems to want an install.wim, which you can make from an existing C: . If you clone the C: and make an identical F: , it will even clone the thing while you have the comfort of a GUI. However, in your current situation, you'll need to boot a Windows Installer DVD and use the Command Prompt window to issue the DISM command and convert the (quiescent) C: into an install.wim . That way, you may be able to cook up a way to do the whole thing with one disk. In Windows 10, you can mount both .vhd files and .iso files. If you have just one hard drive, you can mount a .vhd to make a second hard drive, and save your output (or whatever) in it. At least, when the OS is running. The same feature might not work in WinPE Command Prompt type environment. It's possible that freebie tool will work with an install.wim too. Without wasting too much time on it, 7ZIP has the ability to probe a .wim file and show the files inside. This will allow you to see whether any personal files were captured, or whether the Program Files structure got captured. For some reason, mine was 6GB (instead of 4GB) and I'll have to dig up the container now, and see what's in that WIM. I suppose I could just as easily boot my WTG again, and look in there... :-) OK, I checked, and both the WTG volume, as well as the install.wim, have evidence that personal information is being collected and transferred as well as OS stuff. So it does look like the dism "capture-image" method makes great starting materials. https://s33.postimg.cc/3o0vb2mgv/WTG...onal_stuff.gif That doesn't prove everything is preserved, but it's a start. Once you've assembled an install.wim, you can go shopping for a WTG Wizard solution. For example, even using a Linux VirtualBox and the Microsoft Enterprise VM, I don't see a reason right now why you couldn't feed your install.wim to that. Paul |
#35
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I'd like to boot Windows from an external drive.
On 2018-07-12 19:06, nospam wrote:
In article , Carlos E.R. wrote: However I got the impression that you don't particulary value what's on the original disk that was inside the laptop. If that is true, you could install Windows from scratch on the original disk. On the contrary, I wanted to preserve it in case I need to request warranty coverage. then there's no need to boot from it or use it at all. But no harm in making use of it. -- Cheers, Carlos. |
#36
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I'd like to boot Windows from an external drive.
Ken Blake wrote:
On Thu, 12 Jul 2018 11:45:57 +0200, "Carlos E.R." wrote: This laptop is tiny, no optical drive. I intend it for travelling, not serious use, so weight and size are important. Power is secondary ;-) I used to use a laptop for traveling, then I replaced it with an even smaller laptop (a "netbook"). I prefer netbooks over tablets because of their clicky keyboards. I never liked touch screens. But now I use an even smaller, lighter computer for traveling: an Android phone. Too small. Haha. -- Quote of the Week: "I got worms! That's what we're going to call it. We're going to specialize in selling worm farms. You know like ant farms. What's the matter, a little tense about the flight?" --Lloyd Christmas (Dumb and Dumber movie) Note: A fixed width font (Courier, Monospace, etc.) is required to see this signature correctly. /\___/\Ant(Dude) @ http://antfarm.home.dhs.org / http://antfarm.ma.cx / /\ /\ \ Please nuke ANT if replying by e-mail privately. If credit- | |o o| | ing, then please kindly use Ant nickname and URL/link. \ _ / ( ) |
#37
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I'd like to boot Windows from an external drive.
In article , Carlos E.R.
wrote: However I got the impression that you don't particulary value what's on the original disk that was inside the laptop. If that is true, you could install Windows from scratch on the original disk. On the contrary, I wanted to preserve it in case I need to request warranty coverage. then there's no need to boot from it or use it at all. But no harm in making use of it. use it all you want. nothing is preventing you from using the drive in an external enclosure. you just can't boot from it with the system currently on it, at least not without a *lot* of effort, because windows makes that *very* difficult for no good reason. if you want to preserve it for warranty purposes, then the easiest solution is to *not* use it, however, if you want to use it, then use it. the warranty is not voided if you erase the original system. |
#38
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I'd like to boot Windows from an external drive.
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#39
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I'd like to boot Windows from an external drive.
On Thu, 12 Jul 2018 15:12:40 -0400, Paul wrote:
I got mine working :-) But, I cheated. So the idea was, I would start with the crummy "official" method first, just to prove it would actually work. For starting materials, I grabbed an unlicensed VM from here. This is a ~4GB download, so don't download onto a FAT32 volume. I happened to notice in the past, that the MSEdge machine is based on Win10 Enterprise. As otherwise, I wouldn't be able to download an Enterprise installer disc. Heidoc has multiple download links for Win10 Enterprise. I don't think I've tried them, so I can't vouch for what you get. Check the Windows 10 section and the Insider Preview Section for the download links. https://developer.microsoft.com/en-u...dge/tools/vms/ I got the "MSEdge on Win10 (x64)" machine. That works, too. |
#40
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I'd like to boot Windows from an external drive.
On 2018-07-12 21:12, Paul wrote:
Carlos E.R. wrote: I got mine working :-) I saved this post and will try when time and hardware permits, thanks :-) Does it has to be the enterprise version? -- Cheers, Carlos. |
#41
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I'd like to boot Windows from an external drive.
Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2018-07-12 21:12, Paul wrote: Carlos E.R. wrote: I got mine working :-) I saved this post and will try when time and hardware permits, thanks :-) Does it has to be the enterprise version? My working theory at the moment, is we can use the Enterprise VM as an "engine" and capitalize on the presence of the Windows To Go control panel. I haven't tested this yet, but the idea would be, we capture a "regular" OS C: drive into an install.wim using the DISM command, then feed that to the Windows-To-Go armed Enterprise VM. With some cunning and craft, it may be possible to convince the WTG Wizard to process an ordinary OS. I think you could do it on just one disk drive. Using VM containers for storage. You could even boot Linux and use VirtualBox there to run the Enterprise Guest. That leaves running dism from the Command Prompt on a Windows 10 installer disc. (You can use the Troubleshooting section to reach a Command Prompt.) My theory at the moment is, you should be able to do this experiment with Linux inside the laptop and the source drive being outside the machine. Steps: 1) Make an install.wim from the disk outside the machine. Boot Win10 DVD and use command prompt, being careful to use the appropriate drive letters while making DISM do the work. 2) Run the Enterprise VM and make the new install.wim available to it. Now, the disk outside the machine is USB connected, and is the target of the output of WTG. The tricky parts: 1) When WTG Wizard runs, is it going to "reject" the drive outside the machine as a target ? It didn't like my 32GB USB3 stick that runs at 100MB/sec. And I thought that thing would be "easy". It did accept an Intel SATA SSD on a USB3 converter. 2) Will WTG Wizard process a Win10 Home or Win10 Pro image ? Dunno. So there are still some details to be worked. Paul |
#42
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I'd like to boot Windows from an external drive.
Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2018-07-12 21:12, Paul wrote: Carlos E.R. wrote: I got mine working :-) I saved this post and will try when time and hardware permits, thanks :-) Does it has to be the enterprise version? You can build up a nice environment for yourself with VirtualBox. For example, I could put a .vhd file on my RAMdisk, and use it via the "USB Controller" trick in the Storage section. But VirtualBox is a bottleneck on I/O, so there's no guarantee on what the speed will be. I have sufficient RAM on the computer, that quite often all the materials used are sitting in RAM. https://s33.postimg.cc/60a8uib7z/add...irtual_Box.gif On Linux, you could boot a LiveCD and half your RAM would be available as a TMPFS. Which from a performance perspective, would be in the same class as my Windows RAMDisk. What I can't predict at the moment, is how much WTG will "tolerate" when doing these experiments. It wouldn't take Microsoft much effort to observe everything I'm doing in a setup like this. Virtual Machines are absolutely no defense against anything. They're just "convenience" items, rather than "belt and suspenders". I have commercial products here, that won't install in a VM because they know it's a VM. You can't really hide what you're doing. It depends on how "generous" Microsoft wants to be, as to how easy this experiment will be. Paul |
#43
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I'd like to boot Windows from an external drive.
Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2018-07-12 21:12, Paul wrote: Carlos E.R. wrote: I got mine working :-) I saved this post and will try when time and hardware permits, thanks :-) Does it has to be the enterprise version? OK, I did some more testing. The Windows To Go control panel (wizard) is available in both Enterprise and Pro (I didn't test Home). In both cases, when I tested, it insisted the OS it was willing to install should be an Enterprise SKU. It's pretty weird for them to "waste" a control panel on the Pro version, for a function where the user is unlikely to have the materials. Let's pretend that's a dead end. I only tested the WTG control panel, in the interest of "seeing something work". I didn't really expect Microsoft to make it easy. ******* You still need to do this. To be able to do this with Windows 10 running... dism /capture-image /imagefile:F:\install.wim /capturedir:G:\ /ScratchDir:F:\Scratch /name:"AnyName" /compress:maximum /checkintegrity /verify /bootable F:\install.wim # output of the command (used with any WTG programs etc) F:\Scratch # A wee directory that holds assets while they're getting compressed G:\ # A copy of the OS partition. Quiescent. # No files busy etc. No VSS needed. The steps I used we 1) Backup C: using Macrium Reflect Free (uses VSS to handle busy file problem) 2) Use the Macrium menu item that converts .mrimg to .vhd container. Note: Use the "Reset Disk ID" box when making the .vhd container/partition. That prevents the attached VHD later from going "Offline" on you and defeating the whole purpose of these steps! 3) In Disk Management, there is a menu at the top with "Attach VHD". You can leave the partition read/write. I didn't test what happens if you tick the "read only" box. The result should be a partition with the same label ("Win10RLS") as C: . Mine happened to mount with the next available letter which was G: . So C: and G: have the same contents, except G: "has no busy files". 4) Run the DISM command. dism /capture-image ... [as above] 5) Go back to Disk Management and detach the G: VHD in Disk Management. The output of the above step is F:\install.wim. F: is a partition next to my Win10 C: or thereabouts. The DISM command is super-slow. It seemed to be compressing on only one core. It didn't always do that. I've done stuff before where it uses two or three cores. My 27GB C: partition, becomes an 11GB install.wim . ******* Now, grab a copy of WintoUSB 4.1. You'll be installing this on the currently running C: . https://www.easyuefi.com/wintousb/index.html Wintousb elevates to Admin level (in order to write to the physical layer of the USB storage device). Of the three icons on the left, click the top one. You'll be asked for an install.wim source folder. Next, the tool will ask for your USB device. Note - Windows Defender will stick a fork in Wintousb at around the 75% mark (I/O deadlock). Disabling Windows Defender before the run starts, will fix this (but means you've violated every security rule in the book). In powershell, as Administrator... Set-MpPreference -DisableRealtimeMonitoring 1 As you would expect Windows Defender is never really disabled. All that setting does is stop scanning ****. If an application tries to "hook" something it should not, the heuristics still work on Windows Defender. That's why it caused an I/O deadlock. Once Windows Defender was neutered a bit, the transfer completed. If you want, the DISM command could be modified to /compress:none While compression is slow, pulling files from install.wim is slow too. So this doesn't guarantee a speedy conclusion to either of the two steps. It was a "whole lot of work" to get here. Part of the excessive work, was my insistence on being able to make an install.wim while the main OS was running. Running the command against C: would also work, if using the WinPE Command Prompt of the Win10 installer DVD. Here is the running Win10 Pro, sitting on an external USB to SATA adapter plus a SATA SSD plugged into it. https://s33.postimg.cc/c6e1jw91b/wtg_win10_Pro.gif Paul |
#44
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I'd like to boot Windows from an external drive.
Carlos E.R. wrote:
On 2018-07-12 21:12, Paul wrote: Carlos E.R. wrote: I got mine working :-) I saved this post and will try when time and hardware permits, thanks :-) Does it has to be the enterprise version? I discovered what was making my install.wim a little difficult to make. It's the usual thing. I have a RAMDisk.img which is stored as a sparse file (most of RAMDisk images are zeros, and a sparse representation handles this nicely). And lots of programs have no special handler for sparse, so they expand the file to full size. That's especially important in this case. I set the compression to none, when making the install.wim (copy of a copy of the C: drive). By deleting the RAMDisk.img file (it can easily be recreated), the install.wim is just a bit smaller than the C: effectively being imaged. I expect the process ignores things like pagefile, but haven't checked with 7ZIP to see what files are in there. DISM has some error handling, but it also has lots of "I've fallen asleep" failure cases that don't help. Looking in dism.log doesn't always help. dism /capture-image /imagefile:G:\install.wim /capturedir:H:\ /ScratchDir:G:\Scratch /name:"AnyName" /compress:none /checkintegrity /verify /bootable The WinToUSB doesn't have a problem with that install.wim and transfers it to the external USB storage no problem. I think in this case, the image would have fit on my 32GB USB flash key, but it wouldn't be particularly healthy for it (lots of unnecessary writes I could do without). A conventional HDD hanging off a USB adapter should give years of good service. Paul |
#45
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I'd like to boot Windows from an external drive.
Paul wrote:
Carlos E.R. wrote: On 2018-07-12 21:12, Paul wrote: Carlos E.R. wrote: I got mine working :-) I saved this post and will try when time and hardware permits, thanks :-) Does it has to be the enterprise version? I found an article here (kind of a weird server for it to be hosted), that describes the essence of the technique. The first command is how you pack the install.wim . https://social.technet.microsoft.com...p-by-step.aspx dism /capture-image /imagefile:G:\install.wim /capturedir:H:\ /ScratchDir:G:\Scratch /name:"AnyName" /compress:none /checkintegrity /verify /bootable # ... various disk preparation steps, like having an NTFS target # for the operation, not shown here. dism /apply-image /imagefile:G:\install.wim /index:1 /applydir:W:\ In the case of the ones I've been making, they're not sysprepped. And, the OS is booting on the same computer as before. The implication is that the apply-image must be noticing the disk is on a USB adapter, and doing something to allow it to boot that way. The OS seems to know it's WTG, and puts up that banner on the desktop at startup. It starts up unlicensed. (Which doesn't make sense particularly, since the hardware hash of the computer will be exactly the same as before. The activation state survives quite nicely normally, when Win10 is just cloned from disk to disk.) The OS resolves the activation, at least if you visit the Activation panel and "look at it". Within seconds, a call to: slmgr /dlv in an administrator command prompt, shows a licensed state, instead of notification state. After a reboot or two, you might notice that Device Manager is now fully populated as driver issues get resolved automatically. That doesn't really explain how it all works, but the fact there's a recipe written in 2012 says the information has been around for a while. And all that wintousb has to do, is effectively make some DISM calls. Paul |
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