UEFI/GPT Windows 10 fresh install, some questions on diskpart and ESP

Page 3 of 4 FirstFirst 1234 LastLast

  1. Posts : 18,428
    Windows 11 Pro
       #21

    @tenuser1967,

    If you give me about 2 hours, I will post a step by step procedure to do exactly what I think you want to do.
    Last edited by NavyLCDR; 26 Sep 2021 at 10:53.
      My Computer


  2. Posts : 25
    Windows 10 Professional
    Thread Starter
       #22

    quandary said:
    Use option a), just install in unallocated space. Do not do anything with the Recovery partition unless you specifically find a problem (highly unlikely). Do you really need that extra space, if not just leave it alone.
    If I may, how do you take an image of your Primary partition? What I do is:

    1. I check c:\
    2. Image this disk
    3. Advanced options > Compression set to None
    4. And then pretty much Next > Next > Next

    Maybe I had both the Primary and Recovery Partition checked when I took the problematic image, it was more than a year ago so I forgot if that was my issue.

    - - - Updated - - -

    NavyLCDR said:
    @tenuaer1967,

    If you give me about 2 hours, I will post a step by step procedure to do exactly what I think you want to do.
    That is incredibly kind, I won't do this before next month but I love to plan ahead so absolutely no rush.

    For the record, so far I took down these notes after the help from all of you friends, feel free to correct where I'm wrong. Just one small correction, the partitions will finally be three not two (earlier I said two to keep it simple):

    So the end result must be three Windows 10 Professional on the same drive, a 512GB SSD:

    Partition 1: 150GB/153600MB for everyday use
    Partition 2: 150GB/153600MB for other stuff
    Partition 3: 200GB/204800MB for gaming
    Others: ESP (EFI System Partition) and MSR (Microsoft Reserved Partition

    1) Boot using the bootable USB created in Rufus(Partition Scheme: GPT / Target system: UEFI)
    2) Install Windows in "Drive 0 Unallocated Space", no diskpart required
    3) Install drivers
    4) This PC > Choose c:\ > F2 > Rename to "Everyday use"
    5) My Computer > Manage > Disk Management
    6) Right click c:\ > Shrink Volume > Amount: 153600MB
    7) Right click c:\ > Shrink Volume > Amount: 204800MB
    8) Right click 153600MB partition > New Simple Volume > Volume Label: Other
    9) Right click 204800MB partition > New Simple Volume > Volume Label: Gaming
    10) Boot using the bootable USB created in Rufus(Partition Scheme: GPT / Target system: UEFI)
    11) On Windows Setup screen, select Drive 0 Partition 2: Gaming (Primary) and proceed with installation
    12) Boot using the bootable USB created in Rufus(Partition Scheme: GPT / Target system: UEFI)
    13) On Windows Setup screen, select Drive 0 Partition 3: Other (Primary) and proceed with installation
    14) Proceed with driver/software installation
      My Computer


  3. Posts : 18,428
    Windows 11 Pro
       #23

    Well, @tenuser1967, now you are changing the parameters on us! And, btw, if I was going to add a year, I would be NavyLCDR1966 . Ok. Fasten your seat belt, hold on tight. I'll show you the tricky way to do what you want. There will be a post when I start, keep watching the same post, it will get added to as I do the steps. Watch the code boxes with text carefully because there will be both commands and responses and you don't want to miss a command. I am going to start with a computer booted from a Windows 10 USB flash drive (mine doesn't have any of that silly RUFUS stuff, so I hope that doesn't change things) and a brand new 512 GB "SSD". But, heck, we'll clean our drive anyway just to make sure.
      My Computer


  4. Posts : 25
    Windows 10 Professional
    Thread Starter
       #24

    NavyLCDR said:
    Well, @tenuser1967, now you are changing the parameters on us!
    I know, I promise the Windows will be three, that's final

    PS: I'm very loyal to Rufus(worked on five different laptops) but I'm certainly open to use a Windows 10 USB Flash drive created with something other than Rufus.
      My Computer


  5. Posts : 18,428
    Windows 11 Pro
       #25

    tenuser1967 said:
    I know, I promise the Windows will be three, that's final

    PS: I'm very loyal to Rufus(worked on five different laptops) but I'm certainly open to use a Windows 10 USB Flash drive created with something other than Rufus.
    Mine is going to be the standard flash drive created by Microsoft's own Media Creation Tool. It shouldn't matter, except the RUFUS flash drive might have an extra partition on it.
    https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/soft...load/windows10

    Hang on, though, you're going to love this!
      My Computer


  6. Posts : 161
    Windows 11
       #26

    tenuser1967 said:
    If I may, how do you take an image of your Primary partition? What I do is:

    1. I check c:\
    2. Image this disk
    3. Advanced options > Compression set to None
    4. And then pretty much Next > Next > Next
    Yes, that is the process I use. Why are you not using Compression? I use Medium (Recommended) with Intelligent sector copy (Recommended). This works well for me.

    PS. Create an image copy after the basic install and then do a restore to make sure it works. You can do this from a bootable MR Rescue USB. This will increase your confidence level of the process.
      My Computer


  7. Posts : 18,428
    Windows 11 Pro
       #27

    I booted my computer from the Windows 10 USB flash drive and get the first setup screen:
    UEFI/GPT Windows 10 fresh install, some questions on diskpart and ESP-capture.jpg

    I press Shift + F10 to open a command prompt. Note, I'm going to have to screen capture, I can't copy text from the VM yet. Let's see what we have:

    UEFI/GPT Windows 10 fresh install, some questions on diskpart and ESP-capture1.jpg

    Diskpart shows the brand new "SSD". Let's make it GPT. When I converted to GPT, I did not get an MSR partition:

    UEFI/GPT Windows 10 fresh install, some questions on diskpart and ESP-capture.jpg

    If yours is the same as above, then skip this next step. Usually, from what I have seen an MSR partition does get created. If it did, let's delete it:

    UEFI/GPT Windows 10 fresh install, some questions on diskpart and ESP-capture.jpg

    Now we have the SSD converted to GPT with no partitions on it. Let's create and format of our partitions starting with EFI system partition and MSR (EFI system partition gets drive letter S :

    UEFI/GPT Windows 10 fresh install, some questions on diskpart and ESP-capture.jpg

    Let's create our other three partitions. U: and V: for Windows, and whatever for Gaming, we don't care. I made a booboo on the Gaming partition :):

    UEFI/GPT Windows 10 fresh install, some questions on diskpart and ESP-capture1.jpg

    Let's see what we have and exit diskpart (do not exit the command prompt window!) If you do exit command prompt window, just press shift+F10 to open it again.

    UEFI/GPT Windows 10 fresh install, some questions on diskpart and ESP-capture.jpg

    My USB flash drive is listed as D. Yours might be a different letter. Change the letter in the commands below to what you have. So, we are going to move to D drive, then the sources folder on D drive, let's see what our install file is, and then let's see what is in our install file:

    UEFI/GPT Windows 10 fresh install, some questions on diskpart and ESP-capture.jpgUEFI/GPT Windows 10 fresh install, some questions on diskpart and ESP-capture1.jpg

    Note: you might have install.wim. If you do, just use install.wim instead of install.esd. So, my Windows 10 Pro is index number 6. Yours might be different. Again use your index number for Windows 10 Pro. Now, let's apply Windows 10 Pro images to our U and V partitions:

    UEFI/GPT Windows 10 fresh install, some questions on diskpart and ESP-capture.jpg

    Now let's put some boot files into our S EFI system partition (note, do V drive first, then U drive):

    UEFI/GPT Windows 10 fresh install, some questions on diskpart and ESP-capture.jpg

    Exit the command prompt window, the click on the X on the setup window behind and reboot the computer from the SSD.

    So, now we are in the first Windows installation, which should have been Volume 3 and we have this:

    UEFI/GPT Windows 10 fresh install, some questions on diskpart and ESP-capture1.jpg

    I'm going to leave the drive letters alone, you can change them to whatever you want. When you are dual booting Windows 10, the first thing you want to do is turn off hibernation, which also disables Windows fast startup. You need to do this on both of your Windows installs. The reason is hibernation and Windows fast startup will on most system interfere with dual booting. Open a Command Prompt with Admin privileges command prompt and run (don't close the command prompt window, we'll continue to use it):

    Code:
    powercfg -h off
    Now let's cleanup our boot menu. Here's mine:

    Code:
    C:\Windows\system32>bcdedit
    
    Windows Boot Manager
    --------------------
    identifier              {bootmgr}
    device                  partition=\Device\HarddiskVolume1
    path                    \EFI\Microsoft\Boot\bootmgfw.efi
    description             Windows Boot Manager
    locale                  en-US
    inherit                 {globalsettings}
    default                 {current}
    resumeobject            {46ccbba9-1ef4-11ec-99dd-dc5ecc619477}
    displayorder            {current}
                            {3ad2757c-1ef4-11ec-99dd-dc5ecc619477}
    toolsdisplayorder       {memdiag}
    timeout                 30
    
    Windows Boot Loader
    -------------------
    identifier              {current}
    device                  partition=C:
    path                    \Windows\system32\winload.efi
    description             Windows 10
    locale                  en-US
    inherit                 {bootloadersettings}
    recoverysequence        {46ccbbab-1ef4-11ec-99dd-dc5ecc619477}
    displaymessageoverride  Recovery
    recoveryenabled         Yes
    isolatedcontext         Yes
    allowedinmemorysettings 0x15000075
    osdevice                partition=C:
    systemroot              \Windows
    resumeobject            {46ccbba9-1ef4-11ec-99dd-dc5ecc619477}
    nx                      OptIn
    bootmenupolicy          Standard
    
    Windows Boot Loader
    -------------------
    identifier              {3ad2757c-1ef4-11ec-99dd-dc5ecc619477}
    device                  partition=D:
    path                    \Windows\system32\winload.efi
    description             Windows 10
    locale                  en-us
    inherit                 {bootloadersettings}
    isolatedcontext         Yes
    allowedinmemorysettings 0x15000075
    osdevice                partition=D:
    systemroot              \Windows
    resumeobject            {3ad2757b-1ef4-11ec-99dd-dc5ecc619477}
    nx                      OptIn
    bootmenupolicy          Standard
    
    C:\Windows\system32>
    We are going to change our current Windows description to "Windows Default". Then change the second Windows to "Windows Other". We are going to make sure "Windows Default" is the default, and then we are going to set the boot menu timeout to 3 seconds. NOTE: your identifier for the second windows is going to be different. You can copy and paste the identifier from the list you got from the above command. Of course, you can modify these however you want to:

    Code:
    C:\Windows\system32>bcdedit /set {current} description "Windows Default"
    The operation completed successfully.
    
    C:\Windows\system32>bcdedit /set {3ad2757c-1ef4-11ec-99dd-dc5ecc619477} description "Windows Other"
    The operation completed successfully.
    
    C:\Windows\system32>bcdedit /default {current}
    The operation completed successfully.
    
    C:\Windows\system32>bcdedit /timeout 3
    The operation completed successfully.
    Your result is:

    UEFI/GPT Windows 10 fresh install, some questions on diskpart and ESP-capture2.jpg

    Don't forget, when you log into the second Windows installation for the first time to run the command to turn off hibernation:

    Code:
    powercfg -h off
    Have fun! <insert applause here> :)
    Last edited by NavyLCDR; 26 Sep 2021 at 12:38.
      My Computer


  8. Posts : 25
    Windows 10 Professional
    Thread Starter
       #28

    NavyLCDR said:
    Have fun! <insert applause here> :)
    That was a fun ride, hopefully my F5 key is still working :)

    On a serious note, I really appreciate you taking time to provide this guide, luckily I understood all of it :)

    But I have some questions, if I may:

    1. I see you didn't specify alignment for the partitions (1024), can I keep the align=1024 parameter?

    2. I noticed that list volume does not list the MSR, 16MB partition, is it normal?

    3. For the step "click on the X on the setup window behind and reboot the computer from the SSD", do I have to enter BIOS and change the boot sequence order or simply removing the USB stick from the laptop?

    4. I see you didn't specify a drive letter for the Gaming OS and didn't apply any image, is it intentional? Most likely I didn't make myself clear, this will not be a data partition to install games on to but a third Windows 10 Professional.

    5. How do I apply my Windows 10 Pro keys?
      My Computer


  9. Posts : 18,428
    Windows 11 Pro
       #29

    1. Don't worry about partition alignment. It will be good.

    2. That is normal. If you do list part for the disk you will see that it is there. It does not appear in volume list, nor does it appear in disk management.

    3. You can do either one. Whatever gets you to boot from the SSD. You can do both. Pull the USB flash drive, reboot the computer into bios settings and check the boot order.

    4. I thought the gaming partition was going to be just a partition to install games to. So, you will have to add the additional commands to assign it a drive letter and apply a third image to it. Also add a third bcdboot command. You want to do the bcdboot commands in the reverse order that you want the final boot menu to be in.

    5. Once your are connected to the internet in a Windows installation, in a command prompt (admin) run:

    Code:
    slmgr /ipk xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx
    slmgr /ato
    obviously the x's are your product key.
      My Computer


  10. Posts : 25
    Windows 10 Professional
    Thread Starter
       #30

    NavyLCDR said:
    I thought the gaming partition was going to be just a partition to install games to. So, you will have to add the additional commands to assign it a drive letter and apply a third image to it. Also add a third bcdboot command. You want to do the bcdboot commands in the reverse order that you want the final boot menu to be in.
    Perfect :)

    So I added to my notes:

    1, assign letter=w

    2. dism /apply-image /imagefile:install.esd /index:6 /applydir:w:\

    3. bcdedit /set {xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx} description "Gaming"

    And also:

    bcdboot v:\windows /s S: /f UEFI
    bcdboot w:\windows /s S: /f UEFI
    bcdboot u:\windows /s S: /f UEFI

    Because I want them in this order:

    1. Default
    2. Gaming
    3. Other

    It's a shame I will only do this next month, I'm looking forward to testing it out :)
      My Computer


 

  Related Discussions
Our Sites
Site Links
About Us
Windows 10 Forums is an independent web site and has not been authorized, sponsored, or otherwise approved by Microsoft Corporation. "Windows 10" and related materials are trademarks of Microsoft Corp.

© Designer Media Ltd
All times are GMT -5. The time now is 16:04.
Find Us




Windows 10 Forums