Nice but you can get SSD usb keys, external enclosures supporting raid & thunderbolt drives. Nothing beats installing from floppy though.
I'm sorry, but I can't understand what you mean... Perhaps a cause of my poor english. What I mean is that ISO files seems to me very useful yet. The IODD device (identical with Zalman ZM-VE400) I use, is simultaneously seen by computers as two different USB 1.1/2.0/3.0 devices: A real USB external HD drive. (256-Bit AES encrypted partitions, or not.) Used to: Store your preferred ISO files. (Originals or modded, Windows/Linux/Other OS, ...) Store your preferred VHD/VMDK/DSK/IMA files. Store your preferred scripts and installers. (And, once the new OS booted, to install them.) A virtual USB CD/DVD/Blu-Ray/HD/FD drive. (Any of the stored ISO/VHD/VMDK/DSK/IMA files can be easily selected, via the included display and touchpad.) Used to: Boot with any of the stored ISO (CD/DVD/BR image) files. Size doesn't matter, as the real HD is NTFS formatted. To install a new OS. To repair the existing boot files. To backup the current system. ... Boot with any of the stored VHD/VMDK/DSK/IMA (HD/floppy image) files (RO or RW mode) For instance: Windows To Go, Windows/Linux/Ms-DOS/other installer, non-UEFI HD backup, etc. To repair the existing OS To search for computer forensic evidences To temporalily use a reliable backup ... Avoid to extract or burn the original downloaded ISO files. Avoid to use and reconfigure GRUB/LiLo or any other bootloader/chainloader, every time you add a new ISO to your collection. Mount any ISO/VHD/VMDK/DSK/IMA file (at customer old PCs) without installing any third-party software/driver. Also, by using a SSD drive into the IODD device, you'll get all the benefits of a standard USB CD/DVD/BR/HD/FD drive, but faster than any USB key.
The install.esd i just made, containing 2 fully updated (and dotnet3 enabled) 10586 x64 Home/Pro, is 3.11 GB (3.348.395.832 bytes) in size, so it doesn't seem to be possible to create a x64/x86 install iso < 4.37GB. EDIT: i've tried to find out why the desired size has to be under 4.37GB. If it's because of UEFI booting you also could split the install.wim into more smaller install.swm ones, eg: 3500MB a piece.
So it can fit on a single layer DVD5. Also, see his post #18. And thanks lot for your help, especially those dism command lines--you can see in post #15 I was able to make an aio. Interesting, the aio will do everything except upgrade an x86 machine because I exported the x86 .wim into the x64, so the setup is still basically x64. Is there anything that can be done or would you just have to have an aio with the two separate directories (x86 and x64) like the Microsoft one to get that capability?
Given that you can get a 8GB thumb drive for under $10 these days, and you can carry it around with you at all times, that would seem to be a better option than fighting to jam it all on a single layer DVD
See his post #18, and I quote: "I only use DVDs when for some reason the flash drive doesn't boot or the computer/laptop isn't able to boot from USB."
For me it became a total blurr, so much side info was shown, sorry Than it'll have to be 2 seperate iso's.
I always have in my laptop case: - a flash drive to install the most common OSes from XP to 10 (rmprepusb + untouched ISOs) plus a few tool ISOs; - a flash drive to install the most common free software (with a batch made by me that silently installs everything) - a CD/DVD case with some of the OSes above, usually one per Windows version (1x CD XP Home/Pro, 1x DVD Windows 7 x86/x64, and now 1x DVD Windows 10 x86/x64) for those rare cases where USB is not an option I don't want one DVD for each x86 and x64 flavor, so I combined each x86/x64 into 1 DVD5, that way I keep the CDs/DVDs to a minimum. Why is that so hard to understand? I'm going to use VirtualBox this weekend to test the ISO by running it has an upgrade over a Windows 7 x86 and a Windows 7 x64 and see what happens, I'm guessing it won't automatically select the right version to upgrade. Maybe there's some file that can be modified so it auto-selects the right version?
Because the red txt is prehebiting UEFI boot if you use a x86 iso as base, and otherwise (x64 iso as base) you wouldn't be able to install older x86 systems because they don't boot x64 windows. When windows 7 whas released UEFI whasn't used (much), so x86 iso as base containing a combined x86/x64 install.wim whas sufficient.
Actually if you google for "uefi mbr x64 x86 iso", you'll find a few solutions (including ISO torrents) that combine UEFI/MBR on x86/x64 AIO creations, for both ISO and USB. But you got a point there, a Windows 10 x86/x64 DVD should work as an upgrade to Windows 7/8.x and be bootable from MBR/UEFI.
Doesn't Rufus give you UEFI and MBR simply? All you'd need is an .iso that does all the upgrades and of course clean installs.
It could be a problem with esd files with many indexes or something. I just know that AIO versions don't upgrade, at all.
Some of the th2 ones you can download from the Media Creation Tool come as .esd and I'm pretty sure they upgrade. The 'both' option (x86 and x64) definitely have the install files as .esd and I'm pretty sure those should work. Not sure whether the x86 or x64 only have .esd or .wim. I converted the installs on the aio to .wim but I'm pretty certain it would upgrade the way it came. How are you doing otherwise? Hope all is well as I read your message that you're not torrenting anymore.