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With a WinPE CD I always get the prompt "Press any key to boot to CD/DVD". How can I create a CD that automatically boots to CD without the prompt?

kinokijuf
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kyle
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3 Answers3

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That behaviour you see is specific to a PE disc running any form of Windows PE. More specifically, it happens if there is a boot sector detected on the hard drive.

An easy way to demonstrate this is to clear any partitions from the hard drive and put in your PE disc - it will boot immediately without prompting.

As for answering your question, I don't believe it is possible.

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    Whilst correct, that doesn't really answer his question... "clear all bootsectors on other drives" is not really feasible, obviously... – Matthieu Cartier Jan 03 '11 at 21:58
  • I don't know about PE, but with nlite I can have the custom XP install cd skip the prompt, so it might be possible with PE somehow. – Moab Jan 03 '11 at 22:30
  • @Moab, if it is possible, I'd be interested. One of the bugbears I have with PE is that prompt if I'm busy with something else and forget to press a button within that five second gap. –  Jan 04 '11 at 00:04
  • Somehow Nlite does it if you choose the option in the unattended installer section, so it must be in the text file windows uses for an unattended install. Not sure if it could be done for PE since it does not install from CD. – Moab Jan 04 '11 at 00:26
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    If there is a bootfix.bin file in the iso, try removing it. – Moab Jan 04 '11 at 00:29
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Moab's answer is correct. Create the WinPE ISO as you usually would, then mount it and remove the bootfix.bin from the Boot directory. After that, burn it to a cd and you can boot without the prompt.

See here: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff794558(v=winembedded.60).aspx

Oebele
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    Welcome to Super User! Generally we like answers on the site to be able to stand on their own - Links are great, but if that link ever breaks the answer should have enough information to still be helpful. Please consider editing your answer to include more detail. See the [FAQ](http://www.superuser.com/faq) for more info. – slm Apr 11 '13 at 12:02
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WinPE itself contains one "bootfix.bin". When converting WinPE to ISO, that ISO will be having one more "bootfix.bin".

I think when booting through WIMBOOT it will use bootfix.bin inside *.wim file. And when booting through ISO it will use bootfix.bin under "media/boot/bootfix.bin"(this is for 32bit).

I am able to boot without the "press any key prompt" after removing the "bootfix.bin" from WIM file and also from ISO file.

karthikeayan
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