Need help building ISO file with WinPE ISO Builder

See Gary's tutorial http://forum.acronis.com/forum/9449 for some help.

Thank you for the response.

After reading the tutorial, I'm still confused. Gary states, "The first matter to take care of is creating the Windows PE Build Environment." He then goes on to say, "My Start Menu has a Windows PE Tools Command Prompt entry, but you can also get this command prompt by Start->All Programs->Microsoft Windows AIK->Windows PE Tools Command Prompt."

Well, I have no such folder (Microsoft Windows AIK) on my computer. A search of my hard drive foe AIK yielded nothing. I was able to search Microsoft for the Windows AIK image file, which I downloaded. However, I don't know how to burn the image file (.img) to the DVD. I use Nero, and cant find an option for doing this.
Secondly, the download page says that the AIK image file is applicable for XP SP2, with KB926044 installed. However, I can't seem to find KB926044 anywhere - all searches on Microsoft lead to the AIK file that I downloaded.

I was under the impression that if I purchased the TI Home 2010 Plus Pack (which I did), I would have everything I need to create a WinPE boot disk. If this is not the case, then at the very least, the program literature is misleading. The whole operation of creating the boot disk seems to be much more complicated that just using the Plus Pack. Please correct me if I've overstated the problem.

The version of Nero that I have (bundled free with a DVD drive) does have the option to burn an image file. I've burned DVDs of all versions of the WAIK, actually, as well as many other image files. After burning the image file, you have to install the WAIK from the DVD. The 2.0 and 2.1 versions of the WAIK work fine for XP SP3 - they need at least XP SP2. The tutorial is based on the assumption that you have the WAIK installed from the DVD. If you don't have it installed, you won't have the Windows PE Tools Command Prompt available to make the build environment.

The Plus Pack provides Acronis's side of a WinPE build. You have to provide the WAIK side, and this is Microsoft's doing, not Acronis's. At least from my point of view, you are overstating the problem. The situation is the same as for a BartPE build - in fact the same Acronis plugin is used for both WinPE and BartPE. Acronis does not provide the BartPE builder - this is the responsibility of the end user. So it is with WinPE, but in this case, Acronis provides more than in the case for BartPE. I personally don't feel there is anything misleading in the program literature, especially the specific documentation for TI 2010. You have to understand what a WinPE build is in the first place.

Gary, thank you for responding.

I have Nero version 6.6.1.15.
From the Nero help file on burning images:

"A dialog box will open and you can select the image file you would like to burn. Nero currently supports NRG, ISO and CUE-Sheet formats."

So it appears that my version of Nero will not burn a .img file. Any suggestions for how to burn this file?
Also, the WAIK file I downloaded from Microsoft is labeled "vista_6000.16386.061101-2205-LRMAIK_EN.img". I have no idea what version this is, but theMicrosoft site said that it will work wth Win XP SP2, with KB926044. As I noted, I can't actually find KB926044. Is it really necessary?

As for the my feeling that the program is misleading, let me rephrase that. Unless I'm missing something, the program is misleading by omission. It assumes the existence of WAIK on my computer, but nowhere does it specify that this is necessary. This may be considered common knowledge to others, but I have never created a BartPE or WinPE boot disk before, and was unaware of this requirement. Before I purchased the program, I looked at the system requirements. Since the requirements were for SP3, I first tried the trial version of TI Home 2010 to confirm that it would work with SP2 (it did), and spoke with tech support to confirm that the paid version would also work with SP2 (they said it would). I certainly couldn't find the requirement for WAIK in the user manual when I was looking for help burning a WinPE recovery disk.

You appear to have taken my comments as a personal criticism of your tutorial. I assure you it was not. Clearly, it helped me by pointing out that something is missing on my computer in order to make the Acronis WinPE ISO builder work. I only wish that I had found that requirement in the Acronis documentation.

So, if you can answer my questions about burning the .img file and KB962044, I'll try once again to create a boot disk.

Les.
Download and install Imgburn http://www.imgburn.com/. It will handle the .img file. Here is a link the KB926044 http://support.microsoft.com/hotfix/KBHotfix.aspx?kbnum=926044&kbln=en-….

I think the .img file is WAIK 2.0. WAIK 2.1 is an .iso file, and should be used instead of 2.0 (newer) and works with XP SP2 so far as I remember (I think the link is provided in a later posting in the tutorial). If you get this version, it will work fine with nothing else. The tutorial was made with WAIK 2.0, so if you end up using that, it will work too.

Both the Acronis documentation and the tutorial point out that the WAIK has to be installed, actually. From the installed WAIK, one can create the build environment that I mention, which is basically a specific directory structure with specific files in places where the Acronis WinPE ISO Builder expects them to be.

Section 15.3 of the TI 2010 User's Guide, on p. 131, specifically states that the WAIK must be installed. If I am mistaken, let me know. I knew this requirement well before I purchased TI, since I studied the manual prior to purchase, and I had the WAIK installed weeks before I acquired TI. But I also found the instructions on pp. 130-133 fairly difficult to understand (although I built several WinPE ISOs with them), which is why I made the tutorial in the first place! But nothing, in my view, was omitted in any Acronis material.

Here is another forum thread that you may find useful: http://forum.acronis.com/forum/12049

Thomas and Gary, thank you. These replies were very helpful. I have downloaded both files that you linked to, Thomas, and the WAIK 2.1 file is being downloaded as I write (it's a 1.3 GB file!). Gary, I guess I didn't read past your tutorial to the following posts, or I would have seen that link. My bad!

Thomas, WAIK 2.1 is an ISO file, as Gary stated, so I'll burn that with Nero. But I'll keep Imgburn in my toolbox in case I run across another .img file. Also, thanks for the link to KB926044.

Gary, I re-read the user guide, and I guess my confusion stems from the reference to the WinPE plug-in for Acronis. I had installed the plugin, but then found that it provides the same files as the Plus Pack provided, so I removed it. Clearly, the user guide is just for the TI 2010 program, without the Plus Pack. I could find no separate user guide for the Plus Pack (this was confirmed by Acronis tech support).

Meanwhile, while our forum exchanges have been transpiring, I have been in contact with Acronis tech support concerning my DVD burning problem, which is what drove me to try a WinPE environment in the first place (ref. my post 12686). They have sent me an ISO file of the latest Acronis Loader, from which I've burned a boot disk. I haven't tried to burn a disk image with it yet (which I'll do right now), but if that resolves my image burning issue, then creating a WinPE boot disk will be moot. I'll still probably do it for the learning experience, however.

Again, thanks to you both for your help. This forum is a great resource, thanks to guys like you.

WinPE has many advantages, even if an ISOLINUX ISO works!

Gary, I take this to mean that producing a disk image by booting into a WinPE environment would be a better choice than creating the image from a Linux (Acronis acroloader) environment (?). If so, could you please explain why?

Les, Imgburn will handle .ISO files as well. Its much simpler to use than Nero.
WinPE contains many more drivers than the ISOlinux versions. That means it supports a wider range of hardware.

What I mean is that with an ISOLINUX or Acronis loader bootable media version, the only functionality you have is running TI (unless you happen to be an knowledgeable Linux command line user, which I am not). The WinPE environment provides much more functionality other than TI - regedit is available for example, chkdsk can be used quite readily on all partitions, including your main system partition without rebooting. Basically, WinPE can be used for a variety of disk maintenance activitites in conjuction with TI, and it can be customized to meet your particular needs. From the point of view of TI, the functionality is the same regardless of which bootable media version you use. And as mentioned by thomasjk, driver support is vastly superior to any Linux version. I have multiple versions of bootable media for TI, but I tend to use WinPE exclusively.

Gary, I still need some help!

I installed WAIK 2.1. The folder is in C:\Program Files\Windows AIK. I can get to the PETools command prompt with no problem (shows as C:\Program Files\Windows AIK\Tools\PETools).
I'm having trouble running the copype command. When I type copype x86 c:\winpe_x86, I get the following response:

1 file(s) copied.
1 file(s) copied.
`xcopy` is not recognized as an internal or external command,
operable program, or batch file.
Failed to create working directory.

When I look at the newly created C:winpe_x86 directory (as a result of the copype command), it contains 2 folders (ISO and mount), and a
file, etfsboot.com. The ISO folder contains a single file, bootmgr. The mount folder is empty.

This obviously doesn't match the configuration that you have. I don't understand what I'm doing wrong, or why I even get the xcopy error message, since I never invoked xcopy in the command line.

What did I do wrong?

Look at the thread I give the link for in posting #6 above, which has a screen shot (in posting #9 of that thread) of what the copype script execution should look like. I'm not sure why this isn't working for you. One thing - you shouldn't just navigate to this directory. You should go through the Start menu to start this command prompt, since certain parameters must be set up in the command prompt environment that aren't done if you start and independent command prompt and navigate to this directory.

Wow! This has been quite a roller coaster, with limited success.

First, Gary and Thomas, thank you for your help.

Here's what happened. Gary, I verified that I was using the the command prompt from the start menu. I ran the exact script that you did, but my results were still the same as I described above (post #12). So I decided to resort to my DOS roots and do some troubleshooting.
It's apparent from the information I got when I tried to run the script that it was invoking an XCOPY command, but was not able to find the XCOPY.EXE file. So I checked the environment variables, and saw that XCOPY.EXE was not in the path statement, although it resides in at least 3 places on my system. Rather than change the path statement, I copied XCOPY.EXE fom my Windows\system32 folder into the Windows AIK\Tools\x86 folder. Then I followed your tutorial, ran the script, and got the same file structure that you did. Following the rest of the tutorial, I was able to create the AcronisMedia ISO file that I burned to CD to create the WinPE boot disk.
I used it to successfully boot into True Image. So far, so good, right?

NOT!!! I started to go through the steps to perform a full disk backup, and when I got to the screen where it asked where I wanted the backup to go, I hit the Browse button so that I could choose my DVD burner. But the DVD (and CD) burners were not available in the list of devices that I could choose!
Thinking that perhaps the WinPE boot disk lacked the drivers necessary to recognize these drives, I attempted to verify this theory. I tried to start a restore operation from my previously burned backup image (which was done using the Acronis Loader boot disk, 2 days ago). I wasn't actually going to do a restore, but I wanted to see if True Image could find the image disk in my DVD burner. To my surprise, the program could see my DVD (and CD) drives with no problem.

So once again I ask, WTF? The WinPE boot disk is useless to me if I can't backup to my DVD drive. I hope you guys have some ideas. I'll also throw the problem at the tech support guys, and see what they have to say.

Thanks again. with your help, I'll slowly (and not so surely) work through these issues.

I have no experience with backing up to a DVD drive, so I can't help you out. Maybe someone else is knowledgeable in this regard. I hope you can find a solution that does what you need.

I am trying to creat a boot CD using the acronis WinPe ISO builder.

Reason: I am unable to boot my new laptop using the latest boot iso 10-8398. I don't want to upgrade because of cost if it can be avoided. I thought I could use the pe builder to create a boot up cd to include the network drivers for my nic (which is the problem).

First, is this possible? The machine is running windows Enterprise 7 64-bit system. It is a Dell E6510 laptop with an Intel 82577LM gigabit network card. (driver name is: elk62x64.sys). I have installed WAIK for window 7. I am not getting past a question during the process of giving the proper Windows AIK installation directory. I don't know what it is looking for as I have tried just about every directory I could under the Microsoft Windows AIK directory?

Can anyone please help me try to figure this out?

The Acronis WinPE ISO Builder is based on the True Image 2010 BartPE plugin. There is no way to use this builder with an earlier version of True Image. The builder is part of the Plus Pack, available for True Image 2010. How can you be using the Acronis WinPE ISO Builder if you don't have True Image 2010 with the Plus Pack? What upgrade are you talking about?

Ok so your answer is no I can't do this without upgrading to Ture Image 2010. I currently have True Image Echo Server for Windows version 10?

In the past I have had no problems with the boot disk and connecting to the network to restore and create images until I got this new machine. Now it seems as though the nic drivers are not on the cd. I went and downloaded the latest iso boot cd and still was unable to connect to the network where my images are. In my previous comment, I gave the nic card, so is there some solution?

My knowledge covers only True Image Home 2010, and this is what the WinPE ISO builder is for (this is the True Image Home Forum). You should check the True Image Echo forum - there is one on this site. Someone there might have some ideas for a solution. Sorry I can't be of any more help.