Capture and Mount an Image (Standard 7 SP1)

  • Article

7/8/2014

Capturing an image is the process of taking a device offline, creating a Windows image (.wim) file, and copying that image to your development computer. The following list describes the circumstances where you must capture an image:

  • You want to prepare a reference image for deployment to other devices.
  • You want to update a device on your development computer rather than on the device.
  • Your device does not support online updates, does not have access to a configuration set, or for any reason cannot be serviced on the device.

This guide walks you through the process of capturing an image by using ImageX (Imagex.exe), and then mounting it as a new volume with a drive letter associated, so that its contents can be read or modified.

Important

If you are capturing an image to deploy to a new device, you must run Sysprep /generalize, even if the device has the same hardware configuration. This command removes unique information from your Standard 7 installation so that the specialized configuration pass runs and the system performs actions required to restart the image on different devices. Moving or copying a Windows image to a different development computer without running Sysprep /generalize is not supported.

To deploy multiple partitions, perform these steps independently for each partition and then deploy them separately.

Hardware and Software Assumptions

Note

The Standard 7 setup process performs several verifications, which rely on the target device's date and time settings. For optimal performance, confirm that the target device is set to the correct date and time.

  • To copy an image to your development computer, your device and your development computer must also have access to a network share or writable media.

Key Concepts and Technologies

This guide assumes that you have a basic familiarity with technologies such as ImageX, Sysprep and Windows Preinstallation Environment (Windows PE) 3.0. For information about these technologies, see ImageX Command-Line Options, Sysprep Command-Line Settings, and Introduction to Windows PE.

Before capturing an image, make sure that ImageX is on your Windows PE media. You may have to copy it from \Windows Embedded Studio\Program Files\Windows Embedded Studio\Tools\<device architecture> on your Standard 7 installation media.

To capture an image

  1. Start your device into Windows PE.

    Do this by creating a Windows PE bootable media, or by starting a PXE-capable device into a Windows PE environment using a network. For more information see Create a Bootable USB Flash Drive.

  2. (Optional) Connect to your network share or the media share where you want to copy your captured image At a command prompt on your development computer, type the following, replacing <network_share> with the location of the network share and <domain_user> with the domain and user name to use to connect to the network and <domain_password> with that user's domain password:

    net use * <network_share> /USER:<domain_user> <domain_password>

  3. Use ImageX to capture the image by doing one of the following:

    • To capture an image without compressing it, at a command prompt, type the following, replacing <image_drive> with the letter of the drive you want to capture, <wim_file> with the full path and filename of the Windows image file you want to save the image to and <image_description> with a description of the image:

      imagex /capture <image_drive>: <wim_file> "<image_descripton>" /verify

    • To compress and capture an image, at a command prompt, type the following, replacing <image_drive> with the letter of the drive you want to compress and capture, <wim_file> with the full path and filename of the Windows image file you want to save the image to and <image_description> with a descripton of the image:

      imagex /capture /compress maximum <image_drive> <wim_file> "<image_description>" /verify

To mount the image

  1. If you are running ImageX on a development computer that does not have Windows Embedded Standard 7 Toolkit, you must install the Windows Imaging File System Filter (WIM FS Filter) Driver as described in Install the Windows Image File System Filter Driver.

  2. To mount an image as a new volume with a drive letter associated so that you can read or modify its contents, at a command prompt, type the following, replacing <wim_file> with the full path of the wim file that contains the image, <image_number> with the volume number within the wim file that contains the image and <image_mount_path> with the path the image will be mounted to:

    imagex /mount <wim_file> <image_number> <image_mount_path>