Ok so I'm trying to make some modifications to windows, it requires me to reinstall windows completely about 10 times a day or so. I"M SICK OF IT... I really want to have my install media on an SSD, in a second partition. Is this possible(Please don't say "well don't modify windows" or whatever). I tried copying over the install media to a second partition, and it kinda works. However it seems to try to add a BCD entry to the installer partition instead of my second SSD. Heres the setup
Drive 0
F: (Must not be removed, has old Win install)
J: (Also must not be removed, contains a Remix OS install)
Drive 1
D: (The place I want to install windows into)
I: (Contains the installer files)
If need by I can move the installer files to the other disk in a new partition, just as long as it works.
"...Please don't say "well don't modify windows" or whatever..."
ok, we won't say it
*sigh* So is it not something that can be done? Is it not simple?
Why not use Macrium Reflect Free to make an image of your base Windows 10 installation, then instead of re-installing Windows 10 each time you just restore the image. Then you will have all the basic setup actions already completed - user account created, email setup, etc. Restoring the image is a LOT faster than re-running Windows setup.
In fact, you might even be able to incorporate Macrium Reflect Free into the Windows 10 image - it has an option to add a boot menu item for Macrium Reflect PE. You add that option. Make an image of your base Windows 10 install, save it to Drive 0. When it comes time to reload Windows 10, when you restart the computer select the Macrium Reflect PE option, the computer boots into Macrium Reflect, you restore the base Windows 10 image from Drive 0 to Drive 1, reboot the computer and go. You should be able to do that over and over again.
Thanks so much, I should have thought of that before.
Please let us know if after several reboots everything works aok -- I'd like to learn how it was doneThanks so much, I should have thought of that before.
Just tried it and it works! This is what I have/did. I have a cheap NextBook Windows 10 tablet that I used for the experiment. It has 32GB eMMC memory which is the equivalent to an SSD. It is UEFI, and it had 32-bit Windows 10 Home insider build 14316. There were three partitions in the memory, EFI boot partition, C: drive, and Recovery.
I installed latest Macrium Reflect Free. Did the option under Other Tools (I think) to add Macrium Reflect to the boot menu. It built the WindowsPE and added it to the boot menu. Then I created an image of the entire 32GB eMMC (all three partitions) to an image file stored to an external USB hard drive. The image file ended up being just less than 7GB. I used MiniTool Partition Wizard Free to shrink the C: drive partition by 7GB (free space at the end), and added the 7GB to the recovery partition which was at the end of the eMMC making it 7.5GB in size. I also assigned drive letter R: to it. The tablet had to reboot into MiniTool Partition Wizard to do it, since I was adjusting C: drive. I then copied the image file I created to R: drive (the recovery partition) and disconnected the USB external hard drive.
Then I rebooted the tablet, selecting Macrium Reflect Free. When I browsed for image file to restore, the recovery partition did not have a drive letter. So I clicked the little command prompt icon in the task bar and ran:
Diskpart
Select Disk 0
Select Part 3
Assign
Exit
Exit
Note: your disk and partition numbers might be different. You want to select the Recovery partition. That assigned drive letter D: to the recovery partition.
Back to Macrium Reflect, browsed for image file, selected D: drive and the image file there. Selected C: drive partition within the image file to restore that partition only. Selected the C: drive partition in the eMMC memory. Clicked delete partition and the C: drive turned to blank grey space. Restored the C: drive partition from the image to the grey space. Rebooted the tablet. Both selections on the boot menu for Windows 10 and Macrium Reflect worked!
Now, I would highly recommend you also make a Macrium Reflect Rescue USB/DVD/CD because if you modify your Windows 10 enough that you can't boot into it - you will also lose the Macrium Reflect boot option and have to boot from the Rescue disk.
Try this
I'm thinking you could probably also move the boot.wim file from the C: drive partition to the Recovery partition and adjust the BCD to point to it.
EDIT: Yes. You can move the boot.wim file to the recovery partition as well, and use EasyBCD to add a boot menu item to it. Also, if you want, you can use the boot.wim file from Kyhi's recovery drive instead of the Macrium Relfect boot.wim and have all the functions of his recovery drive.
