Thanks, I was planning to install Windows 8.1 in UEFI Mode. This perfectly sums up everything we should do (except the disk partitioning, but this part is well developed around the internet)
Thanks for your great explanation! Just today I downloaded your previous .7z pack from this thread, I'm still figuring everything out, looks very promising though! (rEFind looks like a great tool!!) Can you please explain a bit more about the quote above: "Optionally, use bootx64.efi from Ubuntu to defeat secure boot". That *only* allows to boot Linux, right? To boot rEFInd, I have to use its own .efi, and turn off secure boot myself, right?
I have been working on the efi dir alot the last few days, so if you have an older package, grab the new one above. As far as i know, the Ubuntu bootx64.efi is just a grub2 efi file that they had signed by microsoft. I have seen many distros use the same file, and they all seem to have varying files they use for their boot process. The common factor is the bootx64.efi and an accompanying grubx64.efi file that is a custom grub2 compile that loads grub efi. The files grubx64.efi needs are in different locations depending on the distro. My long story short is i think the bootx64.efi defeats secure boot, and is basically like jailbreaking a phone. It then loads whatever file is in the same dir named grubx64.efi that is in my case a refind.efi. I had a hyrbrid mbr\efi bios that i now have a pure efi setup on, and i have all my secure boot disabled anyways. Im pretty sure in my testing i tried it with it enabled, and it booted any 3rd party efis. If you wanted to mess with grub2 efi, i have some half assed inststructions of the commands i used to compile it in Ubuntu 13.04 inside the \efi\grub dir named EFI_GrubInstall.txt.
Ahh, so it's either: (1) bootx64.efi (rEFInd.efi with a new name) or (2) bootx64.efi (from Ubuntu or Fedora), which then load grubx64.efi (again rEFInd.efi with a new name) For (1) you have to manually turn off Secure boot, and (2) should work on a system where Secure boot is still on? That seems very logical, but I'm sure I'm missing something?! Thanks for your replies, and I will download your new iso! EDIT: - Your new download is a different (smaller) pack than the first, right? - Sorry, didn't realize this was actually Faikee's thread
I'm having trouble getting the 2nd partition on the usb to assign a drive letter. It creates one, but it doesn't assign it a drive letter, so it'd be extremely difficult to try to copy any files over to it. I've tried a few tools and I just can't seem to get windows to assign another drive letter on the flash drive. It might be possible, but I don't know enough about how to trick windows into treating it as a non-removable.
no problem mate, my intention was just try to start people discussing. I know little about EFI thingy, tried some bootloaders like clover and grub, etc, and thought that better to raise the topic from EFI shell. In any case, I believe putting the wim in NTFS is the correct way to go(instead of split wim's). btw, the ISO9660 included in the attachment is to enable viewing DVD's (just load it in shell); so it can view burned data DVD's or a 2-layer with the large wim, haven't tried it myself. Now 9471 is out, I'll just leave it aside.
I would say make them both primary, the first active, and try something like bootice to assign a drive letter with "parts manage". Thats how i usually do it. If it still wont let you do it, try a smaller fat32 partition.
I think there are tricks to assign USB FD multiple partitions in windows but that's not the point, the important thing is EFI could read the FAT and the NTFS partitions in the USB FD because it's EFI doing the job of booting and launching BOOTx64.efi to start windows installation. Maybe linux or ubuntu(or whatever) could do the partitioning? I don't know.
I just tested this fairly simple method: First you need 2 flash drives. One cheapo for the uefi booting, and your normal higher quality larger flash drive. Prep the cheapo with a fat32 format and the large file one with ntfs. (exfat might work but haven't tested) So copy your win8 x64 dvd content to the cheapo, but obviously don't copy the huge install.wim Next just copy the same files, but with the install.wim to the fast drive. Go into bios, select booting from the UEFI: flash drive (the crappy small fat32 one) After you select language it will auto-detect the install.wim in the larger drive to find the indexes and will install from that. This seems like the most pain-free way to do it, but you would need that extra flash drive. I've just personally tested it by re-installing win8 here. Works fine.
Yep, I saw another member mentioned this in the previous thread, and actually I have tried this method before, but what I encountered was different: after select language, it proceed for a while then displayed an error: install.wim missing, then in a few secs goes into reboot. Maybe it could work with USB FD's? check bcdedit /enum and see if it's EFI, tks.
Yah it's definitely not guaranteed since it relies on the install.wim auto-find, but it does seem to work for me using uefi boot. It could be that your install.wim was not in a sources\ directory.
If your going to use 2 usb keys now you might as well just boot into winpe, insert the 2nd key & just run install/setup from there. Why run it from the 1st key?? Have a batch to list volumes so you can find your key: v.txt lis vol v.cmd @diskpart /s v.txt You can of course add a search & change to your key. I've seen them in the forums here...
Yep, it's in the sources folder. I asked a OEM guy, he said never heard of wim-auto-find in a windows installer, because it means the installer could just find a random wim and use, and is unreasonable. If you were not greeted with the "install.wim not found" error screen, chances are you have actually booted into the NTSF and installed a MBR edition. However, you could use ADK to put PE in the FAT, and the larger file(s) in the NTSF; I have tried that but it's a real pain, I never liked ADK. I would rather install Clover in the USB FD and let it launch the bootX64.efi, but(IMO), it's still a bit more complicated than just load NTFS.efi to launch bootX64.efi Edit: LOL, just seen Flipp's post after I posted this, yes you can use PE, but....I hate ADK
If you look at Sources\Boot.wim, index 1 is WinPE & index 2 is Windows Setup. You could extract index 1 & use that as your winpe...