(bcdedit/EasyBCD) hide any partition/disk?

T

TwL

Member
Well, been digging out the bcdedit options and on linux you can actually use command style:
bcdedit /set hide hd1,0
which will definedly hide an partition from OS.

Now, how can I do this in windows BCD?

(NOTE: I am not hiding partition because of OS system install or such. So no don't need an 3rd party bootloader suggestion nor want any.)

Thanks for anyone for advance..
 
yeah, I did and I do not want 3rd party tools as I said what I need is command to bunch in to bcdedit, if it cannot handle it I will go with different formation at partitioning to trick Vista/XP out from the circle.

and saying this again I am not concern about windows systems booting it needs to be completly off.
 
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Computer Guru said:
You can't with bcdedit, you must use 3rd party boot tools.
Click to expand...

No, I don't think so. BCDEdit is like exact copy of grub loader. There most be a way to overwrite it's configs as in grup or do an hiding. I will not watch some loader before the bcdedit that is a fact as bcdedit is as good loader as any.

'must be' ? There has never in my 15-17 years of computer career been an must be either it is somewhere there or it can be hacked in there. What is executed can be broken.
 
If you're convinced that MS put unpublished commands inside BCDedit, what do you think their motive is for keeping them secret ?
Are you saying they've stolen grub code ?
Why would they bother ? It's not a huge task to write their own, and not as if they've no experience of boot loaders.
 
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TwL said:
No, I don't think so. BCDEdit is like exact copy of grub loader. There most be a way to overwrite it's configs as in grup or do an hiding. I will not watch some loader before the bcdedit that is a fact as bcdedit is as good loader as any.

'must be' ? There has never in my 15-17 years of computer career been an must be either it is somewhere there or it can be hacked in there. What is executed can be broken.
Click to expand...

Why MUST there be a way to do it? Why must Microsoft allow the BCD to do anythign other than boot Vista? That is all it was designed for. So why MUST it work someway that you want it to?

I have been workign on PC's jsut as long as you and the BCD is not like a normal boot loader nor is it anything like GRUB.

Sorry you are nto happy with the answer but it is the truth.
 
I actually do believe there is such command hidden somewhere there. Been reading their WMI specifications here for BCDEdit controlling, but as of yet haven't found an way to hide the device. Motive? Well read below this text there's a lot of motives why hide such commands which were available under previous windows editions.

@Makaveli213
"Why MUST there be a way to do it? Why must Microsoft allow the BCD to do anythign other than boot Vista?" <- now that's one loaded question, hehe. Yeah, you are correct why would they of add an hide of their software function. Also good question is I am customer shouldn't I also have a choice what they can use? Or perhaps what I can protect from OS system what if this OS system is attacked and it becomes vunerable to my work? Why can't I have an partition which has absolutely no attachments to that OS system? Of course I could use Linux Partitioning that would defeat all of the above mentioned, but that wouldn't be again readable by OS unless mounted under VM or expensive partitioning tools.

Also same Partitioning something like USB is incredible hard since MS won't regonize such scheme setup. So would the question also be "Why is MS detecting falsely USB?"
 
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TwL, I've been working with bcdedit for 2 years now and just the other day I rewrote GRUB from scratch. I can promise you that it's impossible to use bcdedit to hide a partition. It just can't be done.
 
@Computer Guru

Thank you.

That solves a bit I trust, if you have searched through this for 2 years, I have absolutely no clue what I am getting in to. Better stick to partitioning schemes. Sad that even 3rd party like Acronis Boot Manager or the Hide'n'seek cannot hide an secondary USB partition from windows because that cannot see it either.
 
HnS can do it - just not automatically.

I think I'll modify HnS to add an option to hide external drives of all types.....
 
I know BCDEDIT has at least one undocumented value, that being "displaybootmenu", but bcdedit has nothing to do with hiding partitions. It doesn't even make sense that a command designed to boot an OS should be able to hide partitions. Instead, they use partition types to accomplish this. But you haft to really know what you are doing and have the right kind of disk tools.

What exactly what are you trying to accomplish anyway? Why do you need to hide a USB partition from Windows? None of us can clearly picture your situation and therefore can not give you a satisfactory answer to at least address some of the issues you're having.
 
Thanks. I thought it wasn't cause I didn't see it the first time...

Kinda came across it one day without looking at documentation on it, :smile:
 
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