WinReducer 7.0 - FINAL Builds

Thanks, KrX! I'm trying yours now.

I think I did find out that some of the early things it was hanging on were features, so I made it to not change/remove any features, only components. However, now it appears to be hanging on the Anytime Upgrade removal. Since I'm using Win7 Pro images those still feature anytime upgrade, only Ultimate doesn't. So maybe that has something to do with it.

It's so strange, I was able to use WR before, suddenly it won't let me do anything. I'm going to try again without Anytime Upgrade and see if it hangs on anything else.

BTW, winter, when I try to kill WR I get an unhandled exception error for WR. I then have to use WinToolkit to unmount the mounted images (it seems both install and boot wims are mounted every time). If there could be a way to let WR not only kill the app but also dismount->discard any mounted images, it would be better. Is it OK to mount both boot.wim and install.wim at the same time? Or is that just how WinToolkit is displaying the info? I can't remember ever mounting more than 1 image at a time myself.

Torrentus wrote:

that solved it

i added 26 files with that names and everything is ok

now i will try to look if i can remove some of that

Ah ok, so yea I have read that Microsoft-Windows-Deployment specifies Computer Name etc. you did automatically fill out the Name in the autounattended.xml. I always manually type the name, for me it's better that way, more flexible. That's why the error occurrs if someone autofills the Computer Name in the Windows Installation and no Microsoft-Windows-Deployment manifest files exists :p.

Try to find out how many of these 26 Microsoft-Windows-Deployment manifest files you need, I think only two. Doing some other things at the moment

@parapher no only 1 wim at a time, you can select to mount boot.wim or install.wim.

Also guys , I played around and found a way to clean up the registry before installation without sysprep on an already slimmed Windows ISO !
( didn't find the error yet which files are needed in order to run sysprep correctly on a slimmed Windows )

OK, well when WR hangs for me, I have to run WinToolkit after I kill it because the volumes stay mounted. When I run WinToolkit, it shows both the install.wim and boot.wim are mounted at that time. I have to go now but when I come back I'll try it again and show you a screenshot of WinToolkit's WIM Manager. I'm also going to try to run Ultimate (not Pro) images, to see if that makes a difference. I'm starting with SP1 RTM

so this files need to be kept, without them i get this error

amd64_microsoft-windows-deployment_31bf3856ad364e35_6.1.7600.16385_none_57e3e87206ff08ca.manifest

amd64_microsoft-windows-setup_31bf3856ad364e35_6.1.7600.16385_none_be35a5668f2a09a0.manifest

amd64_microsoft-windows-unattendedjoin_31bf3856ad364e35_6.1.7601.17514_none_113aea0e8374286d.manifest

x86_microsoft-windows-deployment_31bf3856ad364e35_6.1.7601.17514_none_fdf660b64b901b2e.manifest

x86_microsoft-windows-setup_31bf3856ad364e35_6.1.7600.16385_none_621709e2d6cc986a.manifest

Is the Extreme.wccf already available somewhere?

OK, this time I used a Win7 x64 Ultimate (SP1 RTM) image and it worked fine   But this time I did not select any disabling of Features, nor did I try to alter Control Panel items (incl. Anytime Upgrade which it was hanging on before).

I did think that what could be causing the problems I had with the Pro image was that I hid some Control Panel items via sysprep, so perhaps WR was struggling with Anytime Upgrade because of that... or something. Still doesn't make complete sense to me but this time around with Ultimate it worked. Next I'll try a fully updated sysprep'd Ultimate image (but not making any CPL changes in that one) and see how that goes. Thanks for the help!

highend wrote:

Is the Extreme.wccf already available somewhere?

Hi,

Yes, here ... LINK

parapher wrote:

OK, this time I used a Win7 x64 Ultimate (SP1 RTM) image and it worked fine   But this time I did not select any disabling of Features, nor did I try to alter Control Panel items (incl. Anytime Upgrade which it was hanging on before). I did think that what could be causing the problems I had with the Pro image was that I hid some Control Panel items via sysprep, so perhaps WR was struggling with Anytime Upgrade because of that... or something. Still doesn't make complete sense to me but this time around with Ultimate it worked. Next I'll try a fully updated sysprep'd Ultimate image (but not making any CPL changes in that one) and see how that goes. Thanks for the help!

Hey parapher,
Could you please let me know if you find something ! Just an information, have you tried to restart WR7.0 and exit it directly when you killed the process; because it should clean your previous mounted folders (boot and install) ?

KrX wrote:

so this files need to be kept, without them i get this error
amd64_microsoft-windows-deployment_31bf3856ad364e35_6.1.7600.16385_none_57e3e87206ff08ca.manifest
amd64_microsoft-windows-setup_31bf3856ad364e35_6.1.7600.16385_none_be35a5668f2a09a0.manifest
amd64_microsoft-windows-unattendedjoin_31bf3856ad364e35_6.1.7601.17514_none_113aea0e8374286d.manifest
x86_microsoft-windows-deployment_31bf3856ad364e35_6.1.7601.17514_none_fdf660b64b901b2e.manifest
x86_microsoft-windows-setup_31bf3856ad364e35_6.1.7600.16385_none_621709e2d6cc986a.manifest

Hi KrX,
I've tried with your list and it works so I will release a new build later today (I have to work ...   )

winterstorm2050 wrote:

Hey parapher,
Could you please let me know if you find something ! Just an information, have you tried to restart WR7.0 and exit it directly when you killed the process; because it should clean your previous mounted folders (boot and install) ?

I will let you know of any more findings

No, I did not try to start and exit WinReducer again after exiting it for the first time. But I can reproduce the unhandled exception error with the Pro image that was failing if you want to know more about it.

I think something is messing up where it comes the Features Cleanup. When using WR on the Win7 x64 Ultimate image I mentioned earlier, it worked but I did not remove Features at that time (which I did do with the Pro images). Now I tried it on both a base image (no updates) and an updated image and did select some Features to be removed and they both get stuck on Features Cleanup -> Games -> Freecell.  It just hang there indefinitely and it doesn't matter on which 'speed' setting I put it.


BTW, when WR is hanging it isn't actually crashing, it just keeps running with CPU @ 75%. Also, when this happens, 2 instances of winmserv.exe are running. Is that because it is mounting both install and boot wims? Whenever it hung before and I wanted to unmount mounted volumes after closing WR, I used WinToolkit to unmount and every time it showed both the boot.wim and install.wim as being mounted. Are you sure only one install.wim is mounted at a time, winter? I was thinking maybe this is what is, in part, causing the hanging.

By the way, I tried your suggestion of restarting WR when it hangs, and what I was able to do was select the source folder again and then it mounts the image(s) again and when I then exit it, it does unmount the image(s).

But please check if indeed only one .wim is mounted at a time. Is it even possible to mount 2 at a time? Anyway, WinToolkit WIM Manager is showing both boot and install.wim's are mounted after killing WR.

I'm not sure why I'm having trouble with the Feature Cleanup but this is mostly where it hangs for me.

EDIT: also, when I kill WR there is that 'unhandled exception' error. It looks like this:


The entire text inside the box is as follow:


EDIT2: Also, it has been hanging on the Anytime Upgrade removal (both with the Pro and Ult images). See:


When I don't select Anytime Upgrade, it goes further. Then, it gets stuck at Sticky Notes, too... It's like certain Accessories and Features Cleanups are giving it trouble for me. It could be a combination of things. I'm going to try again, this time also without Stick Notes and see if it can make it to the end that time. After that, I will post one of my .wccf files so you guys can try it out also and see if you can get it to hang/fail.

EDIT3: Did another try with Sticky Notes unselected and it went wayyy further. All the way to item 226 in my list of 285, MultiMedia -> Mobile PC (Mobility Center). Now it is hanging there. I wonder if it has anything to with other items being removed already, that it is somehow interfering with removal of certain items. I say that because I also removed 'Mobility Center' from Control Panel already... so perhaps this is why it's hanging at MultiMedia -> Mobile PC (Mobility Center)? Perhaps worth looking into.

My preliminary opinion is that it may not be so much the specific items that are causing the problems, but a combination of items. So it is possible that an extreme removal might even work for me, too, but when I combine my own list in a certain way, the combination of factors involved is causing the hangs. Something like that. It's definitely stuck at Mobility Center now, so I'm going to kill it again and unselect that items (and similar ones perhaps) and see what that does.

EDIT4: This time around I did not select MultiMedia -> Mobile PC (Mobility Center) but kept the other Mobile PC items selected. Now it is stuck on Mobile PC (Sensors). Now, as with the Mobility Center problem, I also had 'Sensors' removed in Control Panel removals. So I am starting to think that if I select the removal of those Control Panel items, the MultiMedia items that correspond with it fail. So I will do another try with the Control Panel items for Mobility Center untouched, and see if it removes the MultiMedia items then.

EDIT5: I changed my mind and just decided to unselect MultiMedia -> Mobile PC (Sensors) but now it is stuck on MultiMedia -> Mobile PC (SideShow) and I don't think there is a CPL item for that (or is there something relating to it in CPL?).

EDIT6: I unselected SideShow and now it went all the way through to item 261 out of 282, but now it is stuck on THEMES -> Themes -> Local Packs. I figured this image would have local packs because it's Ultimate? Anyway, it hangs on this so I'll do another try without it selected.

BTW, this is what I was talking about where it appears 2 wims are mounted when I kill WR:


EDIT7: I'm getting more hang-ups when it gets to removing the various Theme packs like 'Landscape', etc. So I unselected these too. Hopefully, now it can reach to the end. (Sorry, winter, I didn't intend for this post to be this long. Had I known, I would started it in the Bugs section. Feel free to move it there.)

EDIT8: Now it's hanging on removal of Licenses... stuck at Starter. It's just hanging on everything. I can't figure out why. My Win7 install is very up to date, I have all latest runtimes installed, etc. Perhaps I should just post a problematic wccf file so you guys can take a look at it or try to run it and see if you have similar problems:

download: https://www.mediafire.com/?tiscdvzei5vaa8c

Note that I'm using an updated Win7 x64 SP1 Ultimate for this (so may need to change which licenses get removed, etc.). For me, with this wccf file it would hang on Anytime Upgrade, Sticky Notes, etc.

Thanks

PS: The Ultimate iso I was using doesn't list a Starter edition .clg file. Could that be why it hung? If so, WR really needs to skip anything it can't delete or find, because users in general can't know what experts know about Windows components and how they relate to the various iso's, etc. I'm not saying this is what is wrong, but it could be a problem. I'll try one more time without Starter and Enterprise selected and see how it goes.

EDIT: Nope, even when I only select HomeBasic and the other licenses (except Ultimate of course) that are present on the ISO, it still hangs on those too. It is stuck on HomeBasic now. So it appears I have to unselect all removal of licenses to be able to reach the end. I wonder why this is... license files are simple, small files, it should not pose any problem for WR to remove these.

EDITEDIT: So I unselected all License removal and now I finally got to complete it!   Strange how it hangs on removing Licenses, but has no problem deleting almost the entire WinSxS folder! I hope anyone can reproduce my problems with the above wccf file. If not, I have no idea why this stuff is happening. I run Win7 x64 as host OS and have used Pro and Ultimate images. Good luck

FINALEDIT: Well, during install, after first reboot, Windows couldn't start. When I entered to start Windows anyway, it blue-screened. I am having no luck whatsoever with this... Could any upload a current wccf file that works solidly for them with the latest WR? Because I think my tests are putting too many variables in the mix. Thanks.

Hey Parapher,

1) Did you search for bad clusters on your Hard-Drive ?

2) Are you sure to have enough space on your Hard-drive ? You need 15-20 Gb of free space. Maybe you could try with another HDD ?

3) Have you check the SHA-1 value of your ISO ? To be sure to have an official ISO ?

4) You could use this preset ("Benchmark-Preset.wccf") : http://1drv.ms/1cLRRmH

5) I will have a look on the bug you report when killing WR7

6) This is normal to have bot install and boot wims mounted at the same time, this is to improve speed and never had troubles like this. It has been always like this, even with previous WR7 builds ...

Best Regards.

@parapher

did you just try to select 1 component that hangs to remove? like Anytime upgrade? does winreducer also hang?

Hi Winter:

I have 90gb of space on that drive. It's a rather new Crucial M500 SSD. I also make images with it (imagex, dism, etc.). Never had a problem. I did check for errors on the drive but nothing.

The iso I'm using is an updated iso, so it cannot be original. There would be little use to making a lite image from an iso from 4 years ago, or trying to figure out how to apply updates after making a lite image. So it would only be useful to use on updated images in my opinion. But the iso it is based on is original, yes, but of course updates have been applied.

@ KrX:

I haven't tried only the components that gave me trouble, I will try that next.

Tried it with the benchmark preset on another drive (hdd) and also hang. More tomorrow

hey winterstorm,

i was searching through the batch files billybully, torrentus and i made and what WinReducer did not delete from them.

now i made 2 new batch files with the leftovers for boot.wim

http://www71.zippyshare.com/v/51206579/file.html
http://www71.zippyshare.com/v/77733857/file.html

that saved 61Mb on my boot.wim,
i removed some files that made problems

maybe some ppl could try them if they also work for them and after that you could add that to Winreducer maybe.

as soon as i have done that also with the install.wim batches i will post that too.

Winter,

The problems I'm having with WinReducer definitely have to do with using my updated install.wim's. I just tried a original SP1 iso and WR runs right through it, no problem.

When people use sysprep (many IT persons use sysprep to deploy images, etc.) you basically install the Windows edition it is made as; in other words, if you use an Ultimate image, when you install it in the VM and sysprep it, the install.wim that is a result of that process will be Ultimate. Meaning, when I use WinReducer on an updated install.wim made with sysprep, only the Ultimate image will be listed for mounting. So instead of seeing all the Windows editions inside, like HomeBasic, etc., I only see Ultimate when I mount the image in WinReducer.

Maybe this is one of the things causing this problem. As you said, you used an updated image in February. But I'm assuming it was made using offline integration, which would leave the image count inside intact. Perhaps that's the problem. However, it should work with images that have only 1 image inside.

It is also possible that my images have more updated files inside because I use the LDR method of installation of updates, so perhaps some driver-related update (like the USB updates caused problems for vLite) is causing problems.

Hey parapher, I tried the latest Winreducer build and everything works just fine, tried Winterstorm's preset. It seems that it's not Winreducer's fault but your Computer. Do you have a firewall running? In my case I have Comodo Firewall and I need to switch to Game Mode in order to run Winreducer properly. I am certain that firewalls kill some processes that are executed while Winreducer is working.

Edit: Yea I wrote while you posted

Hey torrentus. No, it's not my computer :)just trust me on that. It's the images that WinReducer is having problems with. So we need to figure out a way to run WR on these type images. You kind of posted at the same time so perhaps you didn't read my previous post yet. I can run WR just fine on original ISO's but the ones I used sysprep on with all updates applied it won't work with those. Also, as I explained in the previous post, sysprep basically only creates the install.wim in the image you've installed in the VM, so in this case only the Ultimate index remains. Whereas if you mount the original ISO from MS, you can see the various indexes (HomeBasic, Premium, Ultimate, etc.) when you load WinReducer, but on the updated sysprep images only the Ultimate index remains. So I'm thinking it has something to do with one of these changes to the images that makes WR struggle with it.

EDIT: To avoid confusion, I did give the impression before that I had trouble with original ISO's also. That is not true. I was having problems with images that I had prepared via sysprep but without updates applied (my 'base' images). Sorry for the confusion. But MS original ISO's do work with WinReducer for me.

Also Guys I have great news for you! I have finally made sysprep to work on my slimmed Micro edition  . It was hard to figure out what was causing the problem but I tried some stuff and it seems to work. The problem is really simple, I am still using my slimmed down Micro edition which was built with RT7-Lite, RT-Booster, Winreducer v.1, WinToolkit and manual files removal.

It is a registry problem that is causing sysprep to fail, you need to remove manually entries from your registry in order to work.

Go to HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Setup\Sysprep 
First you need to clean the Cleanup folder. In the Data value there are various paths to windows dll's.

You need to check which dll's are missing from your slimmed down Windows. Best way to do this is to mount your slimmed down Windows ISO then go to your Windows folder and search for all dll's which are listed in the Cleanup folder in the registry. If some are missing from your mounted image you need to delete the entries. 
  
Then you go to the Generalize and Specialize folder in the registry and also check the dll's in the data value. If some are missing delete them. 

Also if people used RT7-Lite you need to delete following entries: 

In the Cleanup folder delete the whole key: 
C:\Windows\System32\wevtapi.dll,EvtIntSysprepCleanup
In the Generalize folder delete the whole key:
C:\Windows\System32\AuxiliaryDisplayClassInstaller.dll,WindowsSideShow_Sysprep_Generalize

If you done everything correctly your sysprep should finally work again! 
This will work on all of your slimmed down Windows ISO's!

Great news on your sysprep fix, torrentus! I knew you could figure that out

Parapher, I have tried sysprep and I see changes in the registry. If I cleanup/tweaked my registry and capture it, the size of the registry files are like the same as the installed Windows. The size of the SYSTEM registry file in the Windows/system32/config folder is much bigger than on my slimmed down Micro edition. This means sysprep generalizes the registry but when you capture it is still the same like on the installed Windows. This is not good in my opinion and this will also cause the problem to your situation!

Also my install.wim is about 20 MB bigger than my slimmed down ISO. This means when you install Windows some files are generated by the Installation. I will try to Winmerge both install.wims to see which ones were created to remove them again. I also need to figure out how to trick the generated User SID in the registry in order to get 0 registry errors after Windows installation. I still get some after I cleaned my registry wit CCleaner, Wise Registry and Glary Utilities. The available option right now is to manually remove registry entries...

Need some more time to play around, when I got it I will post a tutorial here

Cheers!

Well, opinions vary on the usefulness of offline integration vs sysprep, but it's getting a bit crazy with 500 updates for Win7 and trying to figure out what is needed for offline integration. Plus these deployment methods were created for Enterprise and the OEMs and such pro environments so if what you mentioned would produce any issues it would definitely not be sustained by MS. But it's interesting what you mention about the registry as a possible culprit. Of course, until the USB update came around, do remember that vLite had no problems with making lite images out of the sysprep'd images, so I think it is a situation that can and should be fixed. I just don't know what is causing it exactly and so it would be very hard for winterstorm to fix it unless he tries sysprep'd images.

But my mindset at this time is that most people will either use non-updated original images or images updated via offline integration, so then my problem has become a niche problem so it shouldn't deter from the current development spree of WinReducer 7   Had I known how specific a problem it was I probably wouldn't have mentioned it at all

@winterstorm

one question why does winreducer (if selected winsxs cleanup AND Winsxs compression) dies first the compression and after that the cleanup?

wouldnt it be faster if it cleans first the winsxs folder and after that compress it? because it needs to compress less files after the cleanup.

Parapher, try to replace the whole registry. Copy the registry (Windows/system32/config) from the untouched original Windows ISO to your sysprepd ISO and see if it works...

Hey torrentus, I'm trying your suggestion right now. It looks good so far, not hanging on anything yet. However, I know info about certain updates beings installed is saved in the registry (that is also how you can trick WU in some cases) so I'm not sure how/if this would compromise the install or updated status. What do you think?

But it is definitely getting further than it was yesterday. I'm now reducing a fully updated sysprep'd image and it's not hanging on many of the problematic items that it would get stuck on yesterday.

If it is the registry, how is it you think WinReducer has problems with it?

OK, the image where I replaced the registry hives did complete a WinReducer run, but I am having a failed install that blue-screens. Here is a screenshot:


So it would seem replacing the registry hives did allow WinReducer to finish the reduction, but the resulting images won't install. The one wccf file I did manage to make a reduced image with (the one I mentioned yesterday) also blue-screened. So it could be a registry issue but just replacing registry hives from the original iso to an updated one probably will not be a good solution in any case. But we've narrowed it down quite a bit more though

This means that sysprep is not as good as I thought it would be. The culprit is more likely the SYSTEM file in the Windows/system32/config. When you sysprep your Windows and capture it the SYSTEM file will be captured like after Windows installation. This means that it is not the original HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM before installation, but it is already extracted like after Windows installation.

This would also mean that it is not a clean solution and might cause later on problems with different configurations.
There are some important configuration stored about your system...

Parapher the bluescreen means that after you copied the whole registry ( system32/config ) the permission for the individual files are not set correctly. 
I know this because I also had this problem. That's why I only copied the SYSTEM file from the system32/config folder.
There is a way to setup the correct permission on the registry files, you could google this, but before that try to delete first the SYSTEM file from your 
syspred ISO and then copy the original SYSTEM file into the system32/config folder. For the SYSTEM registry file you can just copy it without setting permissions. 
Plus we could see if my theory is right