Super newbie guide for creating image to w10?

[motto]

hello! im new at FOG and PXE, I read a lot of sites but I couldn’t make a w10 iso to install over pxe…

Is there some guide where I can make my custom winpe image with w10 install? I will add the xml for automated installation too.

Thanks for the help!

[george1421]

Welcome to the forums. Your request is outside of what FOG can do for you. You will use fog once you have a working windows 10 reference image. FOG can not help you create your initial image.

I can tell you that many people start with Microsoft’s Deployment Toolkit to build the reference image or people build the reference image by hand in audit mode. Once you have your master/golden/reference image built then you can capture and deploy with FOG.

[motto]

Hello and thanks!

Yes, I know, I’ve searched the forums and also internet trying to make a simple image to boot it with FOG but im still unable to do it, that’s why Im asking for help, but if its not on the FOG’s scope, could you please tell me where I can find a guide?

I have this: https://forums.fogproject.org/topic/10944/using-fog-to-pxe-boot-into-your-favorite-installer-images/5

could it be ?

[george1421]

@motto Just so I’m clear, you want to pxe boot the Windows 10 installer?

To do that follow the Win7 instructions in that guide. You can not pxe boot directly the win10 iso image. You have to copy the win10 files to a linux server running samba or a windows computer and make a share. Then you can make a winpe image (requires windows WAIK files) that connects to the share you created with the win10 files. Then the winpe boot image can be delivered by fog and pxe booting.

[motto]

@george1421 Thanks!

Let me explain:

I have the FOG installed, and the samba share activated (under linux)

In a w10 pc, I installed the windows ADK, but is seems its not the same than WAIK, so I will try it

next I think is to copy the “files” needed to my linux server, and the create the menu entry…

I will try with windows AIK, thanks!

[george1421]

@motto OK It sounds like you are on the right path now.

One thing you need to check/make sure is that on your windows 10 media, that setup.exe is in the root of the dvd. I’m finding some media does not contain the setup.exe program.

Understand at the end of this process, you will only be able to start the win10 installer over the network via pxe booting. You must still install win10 as normal.

[motto]

@george1421 said in Super newbie guide for creating image to w10?:

ng you need to check/make sure is that on your windows 10 media, that setup.exe is in the root of the dvd. I’m finding some media does not contain the setup.exe program.

I did all the steps, and im pretty sure that it will work now, but I dont have the setup.exe

can I just copy it from my w10 dvd ?

many thanks again and sorry to bother you

[george1421]

@motto OK so the idea is this. You will take the MS Windows DVD and create an iso of it and copy it to the FOG server then extract it using the commands I provided, or if your fog server has a dvd drive, insert the DVD into your fog server and copy the entire contents of the dvd to your fog server in the path defined by your samba share. Now from a windows computer test to ensure you can access the samba share on the via the fog server. If that is successful then you should be ready for the winpe boot. The setup.exe should be in the root of the dvd drive that you copied to the samba share directory.

When you pxe boot winpe you created it should map a directory to the samaba share on the fog server and then call the setup.exe program to start the win10 installer.

[motto]

@george1421 Hello,

Yes, it is all did and working, I only have 1 problem

When I pxe win10, it downloads my winpe iso image and “press a key to continue” like a normal windows, but when I press a key it justs boot normal.

I think its because I dont have setup.exe inside the iso , my setup.exe is on the same folder at the same level, with the other extracted files of my w10 dvd.

So I have my extracted files AND the winpe iso, but i dont have setup.exe INSIDE the winpe iso

I will try tomorrow putting my setup.exe inside

thanks!

[george1421]

@motto The setup.exe should not be in winpe, if you modified
the startnet.cmd file properly.

This is from the tut:

  echo Connecting to the remote share
  net use z: \\<server_name>\<share_name> /user:<domain\uid> <pass>
  z:
  setup.exe

In the startnet.cmd it should map the z: drive to what you have shared in samba. Then it should change current directory to Z: and finally run setup.exe from the samba share. That is the design.

[motto]

@george1421 Oh, ok ! So it’s just pointing to the setup.exe I had in the server.

I’ll check the route, because if I click the setup.exe from a windows machine (accessing via samba) it works , so there is something bad with my connection for sure!

Maybe because I have no user access or something, ill figure out

thanks!

[george1421]

@motto OK well done then.

Just so you know there is a samba setup guide at the bottom of the tutorial that tells you what is required. https://forums.fogproject.org/topic/10944/using-fog-to-pxe-boot-into-your-favorite-installer-images/2 If the guide is not accurate for your distribution, please let me know what is needed and I’ll update my guide.

[motto]

@george1421 Hello again !

Im using ubuntu 16 as server, but dont worry, I’ve setup samba OK (I can access from my w10 virtual machine with user and password)

my problem now is that when I pxe in the laptop to be installed, I can access the ISO, it downloads, then “press any key” and when I press it, it just boot from hard drive (same problem has yesterday)

But the commands are OK because I’ve tested it, and I think that the bat file is in the iso (how can I check it?)

any suggestions please? thanks!!

Im thinking that the problem is on my ISO file, wich is not loading properly, and thats why I get a black screen (its not even starting the .bat file to connect to samba share, and I cant even see the windows GUI, but it downloads the iso…)

I make the w10 iso as suggested in your tutorial, and I load my winpe_x64.iso over pxe… but fails…

[george1421]

@motto Interesting, it should not boot from the local hard drive at all since you are booting into WinPE. Let me see if I can setup this design again with Win10. I might have missed something in the documents, but I don’t think so. I will use the MS VLK media for win10 1709 for testing.

[motto]

@george1421 Sure! I can make you a video so you can check what’s going on for further investigation if you want.

The PXE computer is downloading my winpe iso from the pxe server, then trying to boot it, then failing.

I really appreciate if you redo the w10 setup , really!!!

ps. If I can contact you via email or something (and you want) pls let me know !

[george1421]

@motto What I’m thinking is that in WinPE if you do not add in the steps for launching setup.exe directly, but do let it connect to the share, winpe should give you a command prompt at the end of the booting process. From there you should be able to inspect the z: drive and manually start the install process as a test. That is what I think I will do so I can be sure where the system breaks.

[motto]

@george1421 So, for my understanding, I need to redo the iso but in the .bat I dont add the “setup.exe” line, right?

edit: interesting thing, I tried to force an ubuntu.iso (modifying the iso to load) and I get the same response, “press any key blabla” so maybe, even it is downloading the iso, is not executing it or something!!

My parameters:
initrd nfs://${fog-ip}:/images/os/mswindows/10Pro/WinPE_amd64.iso
chain memdisk iso raw
boot || goto MENU

[george1421]

@motto That is what I’m going to test. That will give me a chance to make sure everything is correct before launching setup.

[motto]

@george1421 said in Super newbie guide for creating image to w10?:

@motto That is what I’m going to test. That will give me a chance to make sure everything is correct before launching setup.

Sure, really apreciated

[george1421]

@motto Well, it works as documented.

I can tell you I had more issues with my vm I was using as a test system than the process. I reused a vm from another test that was configured for uefi mode. So there was some things I learned during this process.

1. While I created a universal bios/uefi boot winpe image, memdisk (what we are using in fog to launch the winpe.iso image) only supports bios mode. I need to look into what needs to be done for uefi booting.
2. My vm was using a vmxnet3 adapter. The winpe iso didn’t have the required driver for this network adapter. Once I switched the vm to the Intel E1000 network adapter I could pull an IP address.
3. If you made a mistake in the startnet.cmd file you will still be dropped to a command prompt, where I was manually able to connect to the network share with win10 installed and run setup.exe no problem.

Just to make sure I didn’t have any legacy stuff from previous test left behind I created the winpe ISO starting on a clean Win10 system. This was a VM just setup by FOG imaging specifically for the purpose to create this iso image.
I downloaded the Win10 1709 ADK from the MS web site as well as the latest Dell WinPE 10 driver cab files from the dell site. From there I executed the instructions in the script verbatim.

For my fog menu settings I used tftp transport instead of NFS so I just placed the winpe iso image in the /tftpboot on the server. That has no bearing if winpe works or not, its just a delivery tool. I could have use http or nfs transport just as easily.

For the win10 image, I downloaded a fresh iso of win10 pro v1709 from the MS Volume Licensing Center and install the files under samba on our dev FOG server running fog 1.4.4.

So I’m not sure what could be wrong here. Its possible since I use the us english version and you are probably using your native language version of windows there is a compatibility issue ??