Windows 10 1803 iso

Interesting observation, I tried the download link for Windows 10 ISO on
my Windows 10 machine and all I can get is the 1809 October update.

But if I go to the same link on Linux, the page obviously knows I'm not
on Windows and offers me a choice of what I want. From this page I can
either download a 1809 or 1803 iso. Not sure why they don't put 1806
there but that's another issue.

Not sure why, but the size of the Linux download of 1809 is 1GB larger
than the Windows download. 4.1G vs 5.1G

Just thought I'd toss this out. There's been a lot of chatter lately
about the 1809 update.

Al.

Big Al wrote:
Interesting observation, I tried the download link for Windows 10 ISO on
my Windows 10 machine and all I can get is the 1809 October update.

But if I go to the same link on Linux, the page obviously knows I'm not
on Windows and offers me a choice of what I want. From this page I can
either download a 1809 or 1803 iso. Not sure why they don't put 1806
there but that's another issue.

Not sure why, but the size of the Linux download of 1809 is 1GB larger
than the Windows download. 4.1G vs 5.1G

Just thought I'd toss this out. There's been a lot of chatter lately
about the 1809 update.

Al.

OK, what's the capacity of a single layer DVD ?

4,707,319,808 DVD-R
4,700,372,992 DVD+R

And how does a 5.1GB download fail to correlate with
readily available single layer media ?

Microsoft doesn't really want to be distributing
images which only work on (less available) dual layer
media. They will try to keep the image size below
the single layer DVD limit.

I've had problems in the past, with "direct" ISO downloads
from the Microsoft CDN. Whatever the bug was, it spread
from the Win10 distribution, to other areas of the CDN,
like some SDK I was trying to download got truncated too.

The symptoms in my case we

1) Both ends of the link are happy.
2) Transfer stops. No errors reported.
Both ends think everything is peachy.
3) Truncated file size isn't particularly "themed".
I didn't see a pattern that it was "always on 1024 byte
boundaries". None of the file sizes particularly made sense.
I couldn't draw any conclusions about what layer
in the session it might be.

I don't know what the symptoms would look like, like if
a bidirectional RST was send by my ISP for example. I
assume this is a MS CDN problem, but running Wireshark
for a 4.5GB download is likely to run out of
resources at some point.

This is my collection on this machine, relevant to 1809.
So lets try validating the last one. (Don't ask me what
the word Dec22 is doing there. It wasn't downloaded Dec22.)

Win10_1809_English_x86.iso 2,918,776,832 bytes Acquired October 05, 2018
Win10_1809_English_x64.iso 3,849,388,032 bytes Acquired October 05, 2018

Windows64_1809_1_Dec22.iso 4,068,671,488 bytes Acquired December 14, 2018

The quickest way, is to pop that last file into 7-ZIP as
an "open as archive". I ran "Test" on the "install.esd"
I opened, as in this example. The Test passed, but takes
maybe four minutes plus. 7ZIP decompresses 98GB of overlaid
images, and on my puny machine, at around 400MB/sec.

https://i.postimg.cc/KvP158kM/not-re...rification.gif

I don't think there is a validator, unless it happens
at install time or something. For a gross error, like
an overflowing install.esd because of a download protocol
problem, 7-ZIP ought to tell you it's corrupted.

Unfortunately, I didn't keep my corrupted images so I
could demonstrate what happens when one is bad. Mine
were always undersized... I did manage to make one
oversized one, but it takes a browser that has byte-range
capability and the browser attempts to "retry" the transfer
when the transfer aborts. And I had to keep hammering the
retry button. And the loony thing then managed to make
an ISO which was "too big" and "a total mess". I don't
know how you can write a re-try-able download and not
realize the file is too big. But, it happened, and it
wasn't pretty.

The question is, do you want to waste your time by transferring
that image to a USB stick or a DVD-R or whatever. Maybe Imgburn
could tell something is wrong. Dunno.

Good luck,
Paul

Paul wrote:
Big Al wrote:
Interesting observation, I tried the download link for Windows 10 ISO
on my Windows 10 machine and all I can get is the 1809 October update.

But if I go to the same link on Linux, the page obviously knows I'm
not on Windows and offers me a choice of what I want. From this page
I can either download a 1809 or 1803 iso. Not sure why they don't put
1806 there but that's another issue.

Not sure why, but the size of the Linux download of 1809 is 1GB larger
than the Windows download. 4.1G vs 5.1G

Just thought I'd toss this out. There's been a lot of chatter lately
about the 1809 update.

Al.


https://i.postimg.cc/KvP158kM/not-re...rification.gif

OK, did the download, and the 5.1GB one has four more images
in it, than the previous one. A total of 11 images.

Win10_1809Oct_English_x64.iso 5,075,539,968 bytes
SHA1: BEE211937F3ED11606590B541B2F5B97237AC09D

Most images have the same files. The images are overlaid, so
the shared files are shared amongst them. All that's needed
is more directory space to record each image structure.
And that's what bloats it up like that.

https://i.postimg.cc/JnDfwkkK/latest...ore-images.gif

Opening the XML file at the bottom of that list, will give
the names of the 11 images. For example, one will be "Core"
and a descriptive title next to that would be "Windows 10 Home".

WIM
NAME Windows 10 Home /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Home N /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Home Single Language /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Education /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Education N /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Pro /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Pro N /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Pro Education /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Pro Education N /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Pro for Workstations /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Pro N for Workstations /NAME
/WIM

I have no idea what Microsoft is thinking.
This is not clever. Where would I get stock of dual-layer
media. I have 30+ single layer left approximately, but
I only have one "hood ornament" dual layer blank left.
I wouldn't waste that for making boot media.

It's also possible to split the WIM/ESD files, and that
would help if the file system was, say, FAT32. For example,
if you attempt to use the Win7 ISO to USB tool, chances are
it's going to fail on this particular image, because
nobody split the image into two files. I had something else
around here at one time, delivered as two image files. And
that was specifically to beat a 4GB limit problem.

So there can be two limits. A 4GB limit when repackaging
one of these ISOs for a FAT32 USB stick (needs segmented
WIM/ESD). Then, a 4.7GB limit for single layer DVD. And
a dual layer DVD could hold a larger quantity - except you
might get a complaint about "layer break". I don't know
what happens to the layer break on a dual layer used for
data. Any large files should really be cut in two, so
they don't straddle the break. Imgburn would likely tell
you the ISO is "defective", even if you insert your
blank dual-layer media.

I guess that leaves Rufus (for some value of the file
system that Rufus uses, and you know that's going to be
FAT32 as well - nobody is going to use NTFS).

Hmmm. Not good. Not good at all. Sad faced customers is
my guess. Because every end-user is a "boot expert".

Good luck,

Paul

On Thu, 07 Feb 2019 22:04:11 -0500, Paul wrote:

OK, did the download, and the 5.1GB one has four more images
in it, than the previous one. A total of 11 images.

Win10_1809Oct_English_x64.iso 5,075,539,968 bytes
SHA1: BEE211937F3ED11606590B541B2F5B97237AC09D

Most images have the same files. The images are overlaid, so
the shared files are shared amongst them. All that's needed
is more directory space to record each image structure.
And that's what bloats it up like that.

https://i.postimg.cc/JnDfwkkK/latest...ore-images.gif

Opening the XML file at the bottom of that list, will give
the names of the 11 images. For example, one will be "Core"
and a descriptive title next to that would be "Windows 10 Home".

WIM
NAME Windows 10 Home /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Home N /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Home Single Language /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Education /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Education N /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Pro /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Pro N /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Pro Education /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Pro Education N /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Pro for Workstations /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Pro N for Workstations /NAME
/WIM

I have no idea what Microsoft is thinking.
This is not clever. Where would I get stock of dual-layer
media. I have 30+ single layer left approximately, but
I only have one "hood ornament" dual layer blank left.
I wouldn't waste that for making boot media.

Just a guess, but maybe MS is (finally) coming around to the idea that
optical drives have gone the way of the Dodo bird. Make a bootable USB
instead.

Char Jackson wrote:
On Thu, 07 Feb 2019 22:04:11 -0500, Paul wrote:

OK, did the download, and the 5.1GB one has four more images
in it, than the previous one. A total of 11 images.

Win10_1809Oct_English_x64.iso 5,075,539,968 bytes
SHA1: BEE211937F3ED11606590B541B2F5B97237AC09D

Most images have the same files. The images are overlaid, so
the shared files are shared amongst them. All that's needed
is more directory space to record each image structure.
And that's what bloats it up like that.

https://i.postimg.cc/JnDfwkkK/latest...ore-images.gif

Opening the XML file at the bottom of that list, will give
the names of the 11 images. For example, one will be "Core"
and a descriptive title next to that would be "Windows 10 Home".

WIM
NAME Windows 10 Home /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Home N /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Home Single Language /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Education /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Education N /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Pro /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Pro N /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Pro Education /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Pro Education N /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Pro for Workstations /NAME
NAME Windows 10 Pro N for Workstations /NAME
/WIM

I have no idea what Microsoft is thinking.
This is not clever. Where would I get stock of dual-layer
media. I have 30+ single layer left approximately, but
I only have one "hood ornament" dual layer blank left.
I wouldn't waste that for making boot media.

Just a guess, but maybe MS is (finally) coming around to the idea that
optical drives have gone the way of the Dodo bird. Make a bootable USB
instead.


Great. But they do have a way of segmenting the WIM/ESD file,
and making two or more files of it. That would give greater
flexibility to conversion tools.

I tried to find a utility to segment one of those after
the fact, but couldn't find anything. It means, I'm guessing,
firing up DISM, mounting the WIM, and recompressing it, and
selecting the correct option during the output phase.

Paul