How to start an OS at the Harddisk FROM a boot menu on an USB

Sihm

Member
I will try to write my question one more time and try to make it a little clearer:

I have installed Windows 10 on an empty harddisk. I got a boot partition on around 500 Mb and a system partition on the rest of the harddisk.

As this is a test machine and I am going to setup around 16 computers, I have made an installation USB drive with both 32 and 64 Windows 10. I have made a boot menu with EasyBCD - and everything works perfect - both boot menu and the installation.

The problem is that when the installation has run first time it boots up again, and starts into the boot menu again.

I would like to ad a new entry (in the boot menu ON the USB) which starts up the new Windows 10 on the HARDDISK - and then make this the default choice.
... But I can't get it working.

How can I boot an OS which is placed on a partition on the harddisk from the boot menu placed on the USB???

Kind Regards
Carsten Sihm
 
Dear Terry

I hadn't disabled this, but when I did, it still didn't work.

And on the other hand this is not a solution.
You see - I want to make an installation USB Stick for Windows 10. In the boot menu I have some tools, and an installation of Windows 10 - 32 bit and 64 bit. This works super fine. No problems.

The problem is that when the computer reboots after the first part of the installation I would like to let the boot menu go default into the (newly installed) OS which should be on C:
But no matter what I do I get an error (Windows couldtn't start bla bla bla - File: \windows\system32\winload.exe - Status: 0xc000000e)

I have an idea that I maybe add a wrong type of entry to the boot menu on my USB. I choose the top part and choose Windows - Type: Windows Vista/7/8/10 - Drive C: (I have also tried D:smile:

Kind Regards
Carsten Sihm
 
There are no disk letters in the BCD (despite appearances). The BCD identifies partitions with a UID hashed from the drive signature and the partition offset from the front of the drive.
Because these UIDs are human-unfriendly, EasyBCD translates the value into a disk letter (as seen from the running OS) by reference to the registry partition/device map, so that you can easily understand it.
Likewise it does the translation in reverse when you add an entry. You point to a drive letter and EasyBCD creates the correct UID in the BCD by reference to the registry (of the running OS)
Hence, you must always create BCD entries pointing to the real partition as seen from the OS you are running, not the letter you think that partition will have when it's running.
 
Yeah - also what I thought
... but the big question - how do I do that? :wink:
  1. I have mad a BCD on my USB (BCD Deployment)
  2. I "Add New Entry"
    • Choose "Windows" under "Opereration System" - in the top
    • Type: "Windows Vista/7/8/10"
    • Name: "Windows 10"
    • Drive: "C:\"
      (I also tried D:\ )
    • Add Entry
... but nothing worked :frowning:

Somewhere in all the manuals or forums I found something about "hd0:1" but I can't find it any longer.
But maybe my way to do it is NOT my steps 1 and 2 above.

Can you give me a little more precise way to do it
- please :unamused:

Carsten Sihm
 
I'm not sure precisely what you're trying to do.
Is it to create an OS which you can deploy to multiple PCs by cloning the USB, or just to create an installation medium which you will use to install W10 in place of the MS DVD multiple times ?
In either case, for such a scenario on multiple PCs you'll need a commercial licence for EasyBCD, which entitles you to more rapid and comprehensive support than is available from these volunteer forums.
In the former case, you're outside my experience zone, so the professional support available to commercial licence holders would be more appropriate.
In the latter case, if you're referring to the multiple reboots which occur during setup, they must return to the installation medium until the process is complete and it will switch you to the completed new OS drive.
Any attempt to switch the boot to the new OS before the setup is complete (after many auto-reboots) will fail because the incomplete installation is incapable of booting at that stage.
Many previous problems in these forums (for every variety of Windows) of failed installations, were due to the user failing to make the DVD drive higher priority in the boot sequence than the HDD, resulting in the failed attempt to re-boot to an incomplete version of the new OS.
 
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