Making a 32-bit/64-bit Win7 Recovery Disc?

JustinW

Super Moderator
Staff member
Trying to make a working ISO containing both the 32-bit and 64-bit W7 recovery discs, part of a bigger project I'm working on.

Extracted the contents of both discs into a single folder and renamed boot.wim to boot32.wim before copying over the 64 bit version into the sources folder renaming it boot64.wim.

Used EasyBCD to edit the BCD, added two new WIM entries:

Code:
Windows Boot Manager
--------------------
identifier {9dea862c-5cdd-4e70-acc1-f32b344d4795}
description Windows Boot Manager
locale en-US
inherit {7ea2e1ac-2e61-4728-aaa3-896d9d0a9f0e}
default {bc1b0f13-6d51-11df-9f51-001e4cadcfde}
displayorder {bc1b0f13-6d51-11df-9f51-001e4cadcfde}
{f2778d25-6d51-11df-9f51-001e4cadcfde}
toolsdisplayorder {b2721d73-1db4-4c62-bf78-c548a880142d}
timeout 10
displaybootmenu Yes
 
Windows Boot Loader
-------------------
identifier {bc1b0f13-6d51-11df-9f51-001e4cadcfde}
device ramdisk=[boot]\WIN7RecoveryWIMs\sources\boot32.wim,{bbd38887-6d51-11df-9f51-001e4cadcfde}
path \Windows\System32\Boot\winload.exe
description Windows 7 32-bit Recovery
locale en-US
osdevice ramdisk=[boot]\WIN7RecoveryWIMs\sources\boot32.wim,{bbd38887-6d51-11df-9f51-001e4cadcfde}
systemroot \Windows
detecthal Yes
winpe Yes
 
Windows Boot Loader
-------------------
identifier {f2778d25-6d51-11df-9f51-001e4cadcfde}
device ramdisk=[boot]\WIN7RecoveryWIMs\sources\boot64.wim,{f21f5623-6d51-11df-9f51-001e4cadcfde}
path \Windows\System32\Boot\winload.exe
description Windows 7 64-bit Recovery
locale en-US
osdevice ramdisk=[boot]\WIN7RecoveryWIMs\sources\boot64.wim,{f21f5623-6d51-11df-9f51-001e4cadcfde}
systemroot \Windows
detecthal Yes
winpe Yes
Remastered the iso. Testing it in VBox on a W7 VM. Bootmgrs coming up just fine but when I select either entry I'm getting the screen in the attachment. Am I doing anything wrong?
 

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I tried once (very briefly) to run both the x86 and x64 setups from a bootable flash w/ EasyBCD by copying and renaming just the install.wim files from the respective discs.

Didn't work because the "sources" name was hard-coded into the wim somehow, so I could only get one to install. I'll check it out if I get the chance.
 
Looks like ISO emulations the key than, though I haven't been successful getting ISO emulation to work from discs other than flash media. I was able to get it working on flash media long enough to boot, but knowing you can't install Windows I'm not sure if it could reliably be used for recovery purposes.

I noticed grub4dos is case sensitive in paths, is bootmgr? I'm thinking if CDFS supports same filenames in different case like the extended file systems do in *nix OSes than maybe I could get it working.
 
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Well if I get it working it might even be a good idea to host a single ISO, so people don't come back to us to find out they just made a nice cup place mat with the version they didn't need for their machine.

Addendum:

Yippee!! ISO emulation does work from a CD/DVD-ROM, I just had the commands all wrong. It booted up and was able to find my system. Still unsure if this could be reliably used though?... Well if it doesnt work when I need it I could just burn it like everyone else.
 
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No, an ISO that uses ISO emulation from grub4dos to boot either the 32-bit recovery disc or the 64-bit recovery disc. Would have liked to go the first route, but since MS hard codes everything I can't think of another way around it.
 
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