Customize WinPE

Description:

I have not actually done this, but I copied someones comment on a reddit thread the other day and wanted to post it here in case it ever gets lost. They describe making a master WinPE boot.wim and using that as the basis to create any drive. Here is an overview of how to do it.

To Resolve:

1. Download and install the ADK. Use it to create the WinPE working source directory by using the following:

   copype amd64 C:\WinPE_amd64
   

2. Mount and customize the image:

   Dism /Mount-Image /ImageFile:"C:\WinPE_amd64\media\sources\boot.wim" /index:1 /MountDir:"C:\WinPE_amd64\mount"
   

3. Modify the startnet.cmd from the mounted directory:

   C:\WinPE_amd64\mount\Windows\System32\Startnet.cmd
   

   • In this file, I use the following method. Basically, I search for an Images folder in the PE Images partition. Inside of that folder, I have a start.cmd file which is called from the startnet.cmd.

   • After you’re finished, unmount the image:

   Dism /Unmount-Image /MountDir:"C:\WinPE_amd64\mount" /commit
   

4. You can now create a start.cmd for your Images folder on the Images partition and call whatever you want there. I typically have to make a drive that covers several different types of models, so I’ll write a script that has a menu with selection items in it.

5. Create your USB drive

   • Don’t forget to add the Images folder in the Images partition. Put your start.cmd in that folder and call your menu or Dism image apply call (or whatever you want) from there.

   • Added Fun: Bonus cookie points if you replace the WinPE background with your company background

   • Notes: Don’t forget to set the power configuration to High Performance in your startnet.cmd (call this prior to calling your batch script start.cmd menu)

   • You can have better resolution in WinPE by using an unattend.xml file.

   • TLDR: Basically, I use startnet.cmd to call a start.cmd in an Images folder on the PE Images partition. That way I can automate things easily and can re-work this single start.cmd script in the future for any applicable image or process needed, as opposed to having to edit the boot.wim and change the startnet.cmd contents.

   • While the image is mounted, you may want to try the following PS commands:

6. To Remove images:

   #Remove image indexes for Ent N, Pro/Pro N, and Edu/Edu N
   for ($i = 6; $i -ge 1; $i--) 
   {
      if ($i -eq 3) 
      {
         continue
      }
      else
      {
         Remove-WindowsImage -ImagePath $ImageFilename -Index $i
      }
   }
   

7. To Extract all but one image

   Dism /Mount-Image /ImageFile:"D:\sources\install.wim" /index:1 /MountDir:"C:\temp\mount"
   dism /export-image /SourceImageFile:D:\sources\install.wim /SourceIndex:3 /DestinationImageFile:C:\W10\install.wim /Compress:max /CheckIntegrity