With Windows 8 coming within a few months it's good to have a look a new functionality. One way to install Windows 8 is on a VHD (Virtual Hard Disk). New in Windows 8 is the option to mount VHD files and boot from it! A guide to install Windows 8 on a VHD can be found HERE. Great that so many people viewed this blogpost to install it that way. In this blogpost I explain the new Windows To Go functionality.
Windows To Go is an enterprise feature of Windows 8 that enables users to boot Windows from a USB-connected external drive. Windows To Go drives can use the same image enterprises use for their desktops and laptops and can be managed the same way. Windows To Go is not intended to replace desktops, laptops or supplant other mobility offerings. Rather, it provides support for efficient use of resources for alternative workplace scenarios.
You need the following for installation:
- 16 GB or larger USB 2.0 / 3.0 Drive
- Windows 8 Release Preview ISO (download HERE)
- ImageX.exe stand-alone straight from Microsoft (download HERE)
That way you don't have to download a full copy of Windows Automated Installation Kit (AIK) for Windows 7 (1.7 GB) found HERE.
How to Create a Windows To Go USB Drive:
- Quick Format the USB device with NTFS, and create a partition on it
- Extract or mount the Windows 8 ISO and copy the Install.wim file (Sources folder) to a folder where ImageX.exe is also placed
- Have a look at the drive letter which is used for the USB device and type the following command: ImageX.exe /apply Install.wim 1 F:\ (where F: is the drive letter of your USB device)
- The result (after some time) must be "Successfully applied image"
- Once this is done the boot record on the USB device must be changed with the following command: Bcdboot.exe F:\Windows /s F: /f ALL (where F: is the drive letter of your USB device)
- The result must be "Boot files successfully created" now
After the command has completed you are ready to use your new Windows To Go USB device. Now it's time to reboot your system and start from the USB device. There will be some final configuration during first start. During the session the USB device must be plugged in.
What a great year with many new Microsoft releases and functionality!
Last week I posted a setup for installing Windows 8 on a VHD (Virtual Hard Disk). Have a look for that here: Guide to install Windows 8 on a VHD. Now I received some questions how to make the Windows 8 setup undone, so Windows 7 will be the default Operating System again. In this blog I will give some solutions for this!
First it's possible to make Windows 7 the default Operating System again, without removing the Windows 8 installation. This is the easiest one to configure. Just boot from hard disk then, and while on the "Choose an Operating System" screen select "Change defaults or choose other options".
Then select "Choose the default operating system" to select Windows 7 as default OS again. It's also possible to change the default timer (from 30 seconds to 5 seconds) for faster boot there.
That way another boot menu will be used (from Windows 7 OS) which is must faster for booting Windows 7 AND Windows 8. I prefer this one because it's faster, not for the better menu.
Now another solution for totally remove Window8 from the boot menu. There are a few possibilities to make this possible:
- Use BCDEDIT and remove the Windows 8 boot entry
- Rebuild the boot menu from the Windows 7 DVD repair option
- Use BCDBOOT to repair boot files or create a new BCD store
It's of cource possible to remove the VHD file from hard disk. Then the boot menu will not be changed, and when selected "Windows 8" an error will follow:
Nothing to worry about, but not the better solution. It can be still part of a solution when using BCDEDIT, Windows 7 repair option or BCDBOOT. I will explain them all now.
With BCDEDIT many options comes available to add, delete, edit, and append entries in the boot configuration data (BCD) store. The BCD store contains boot configuration parameters and controls how the operating system is booted.
When not sure about BCDEDIT command first create a backup with: BCDEDIT /Export C:\BCDCOPY. Then delete the Windows 8 entry with the BCDEDIT /Delete command. For doing that the Identifier is needed. This can be found with the BCDEDIT command (without parameters):
The command for deleting Windows 8 here (in my case) is BCDEDIT /Delete {3b0c2878-9f48-11df-8e48-a2ba939022f2} /Cleanup. Let's have a try! I've deleted the Windows 8 entry and Windows 7 is booting immediately after reboot. Exactly what I want. No need to display the 30 seconds timer anymore, because there's only a single OS left.
When running BCDEDIT again my Windows 8 entry is gone, and Windows 7 will be the only OS left to boot. When I want to go back to Windows 8 again I choose: BCDEDIT /Import C:\BCDCOPY to have it all functional again.
The second solution is the Windows 7 repair option. Just start from a Windows DVD and choose "Repair your computer". Then select your OS (Windows 7) and choose "Startup Repair". The boot manager will then be repaired, and Windows 7 will be the default OS again. That way no rollback to Windows 8 is possible, because a clean boot manager is created.
If you click on “Startup Repair” then Windows will scan your system for common errors and will hopefully figure out that your boot manager is broken. A simple solution and maybe the most effective?
At last there is the BCDBOOT command. With BCDBOOT it's possible to copy critical boot files to the system partition and to create a new system BCD store.
I'm not that familiar with BCDBOOT, but for more information about this there is a TechNet post available: BCDboot Command-Line Options. It seems the most effective for creating a new BCD store or to add boot options to an existing BCD store.
For example, to create a BCD store on the default system partition with the optional locale parameter set to US English, you would use the following command: BCDBOOT C:\Windows /l en-us
Hope you have enough tools by now to remove Windows 8 from the boot menu and re-use Windows 7 as the only OS installed (if needed).
