Create a VHD from the Windows 7 Image disk

This being my first week at SSW , and still waiting for my nice shiny new laptop to arrive, I am sitting here at my Wife’s laptop (which is PINK, a requirement to keep the WAF high), until it arrives.

Figure: Current workspace…one wall short of working in a cupboard, but it beats trying to work with the kids underfoot.

Figure: I know its nearly Christmas, but that’s a long time between order and delivery!

SSW have sent me a .wim (Windows Image) file in the post and I really want to get a look at it before my new computer arrives.

In order to be able to create a clean install very quickly we need to convert this to a Windows 7 VHD. This way when the new computer arrives we can just move it over :) I also want to be able to reinstall my computer quickly. And what is quicker then mounting a new VHD and rebooting.

In order to achieve this there are a number of things that need done:

1. Copy all of the .rar files from the DVD’s

   

   Figure: First disk nearly finished

   Figure: Third disk is taking a while

2. Use WinRar to fit the 3 packages back together
   

   Figure: Joining the wim file together is going to take a while as well. I don’t want to have to do this more than once!

3. **Create a new VHD
   **

   Figure: Showing the physical and Virtual disks on my wife’s pink laptop.

4. Deploy Image to new VDH

   In order to do this you will need imageX from the Windows 7 Automated Installation Kit . Check http://blogs.technet.com/aviraj/archive/2009/01/18/windows-7-boot-from-vhd-first-impression-part-2.aspx for more details and scenarios that will suit you.
   note: You may look at the Windows(R) Image to Virtual Hard Disk (WIM2VHD) Converter as another solution, but it requires that the Windows 7 Automated Installation Kit be installed locally, where I just downloaded imageX separately and bypassed the 1gb download.
   

   Figure: As usual, this is showing the remaining in “Microsoft Minutes”

   Figure: So 10% took just over a Minute? What is the rest of the hour for?

   Figure: All done, I don’t know how long it took because I got on with some other things, but it was a while!

5. Detach the VHD
    

   Figure: Detaching the VHD will allow us to copy it.

6. Copy the new VHD

   

   Figure: This will allow me to save ssw.vhd for a rainy day, and use the copy as a working install.

7. Rename the copy to “SSW_001.vhd”

8. Attach SSW_001.vhd
   

   Figure: Attaching a VHD is very easy

   Figure:

9. Add  the new SSW*001.vhd to the boot list using the folowing commands:
   **_C:>bcdedit /copy {current} /d “SSW_001”
   C:>bcdedit /set device vhd=[driveletter:]
   C:>bcdedit /set osdevice vhd=[driverletter:]
   C:>bcdedit /set detecthal on
   *****Note:**  detecthal is used to force windows to auto detect the Hardware Abstraction Layer.
   

   Figure: Added and configured the new Image…lets try it out…

Although this took a long time with 3 long running processes, it will be a lot faster next time as I can start from step #9…

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