Copying Vista files without installing

[EarthQ]

Just a few lines on how to copy Vista files from install.wim included in Vista DVD 🙂

Option 1) You can use 7-zip (http://www.7-zip.org) to open and browse install.wim. In 1.xml file you will see the different editions that correspond to 1-to-6 folders within install.wim. For example, browse 4 folder to browse Windows Vista Ultimate.

Option 2) If you want also to do some windiff, file comparison, etc. you can also mount the WIM image using imagex. You can get it by downloading AIK from http://www.microsoft.com/Downloads/details.aspx?familyid=94BB6E34-D890-4932-81A5-5B50C657DE08&displaylang=en
You do not need to have the full AIK installed to make ImageX run to mount the WIM file. Just copy imagex.exe, intlcfg.exe, wimfltr.inf, wimfltr.sys and wimgapi.dll from your platform (x86/amd64/ia64), and then install the WIM filter by right-click on wimfltr.inf. Then you can mount the WIM image using “imagex /mount install.wim 4 c:mnt” to mount Vista Ultimate on c:mnt folder, for example.

Enjoy 🙂

[Arris]

Whoei, that’s a nice trick! 😀 I ‘ve never looked into the files on the Vista DVD but this is really interesting to play with! Thanks for this information! 🙂

[randomnike]

I read information on copying vista files without installing . I try both options which you have given and they are really useful. Thank you very much for sharing this information.

[aviv00]

u can do on it on vhd file too 🙂

change add package and more the same as wim 🙂

[Author]

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