Sunday, August 08, 2010

Use GImageX to work with .Wim OS Images

People who create and deploy Windows Vista and Windows 7 images know that .wim is now new native image format used by Microsoft for all its OSs. Microsoft has provided a command line tool called ImageX as part of WAIK short for Windows Automated Installation Kit to work with .wim images. ImageX being a command line tool, sometimes we tend to make mistakes while typing the commands and feel if it had a GUI to work with. Jon Bennett a MCS consultant has felt the same and built an app called GImageX – a GUI for ImageX using C++ and Microsoft’s WIMGAPI API (the wimgapi.dll file from the imagex directory of WAIK)

You can capture, apply, change, mount, delete, export and get info from .wim images using GImageX as you can with ImageX CLI. Below are the screenshots of ImageX CLI and GImageX

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GImageX is a native application for x86 and x64 platforms that also works in Windows PE (WinPE) and a COM component version is included which implements some of the basic functionality for direct use in languages such as VBScript.

The gimagex.zip file contains a folder called install which has a help file (gimagex.chm) and three folders each for 32 bit, 64 bit versions of GImageX and COM component.

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Inorder to start using GImageX first you have to copy the following files from WAIK

  • wimgapi.dll
  • wimmount.inf
  • wimmount.sys
  • WimMountInstall.exe
  • wimserv.exe

  • These files are available at below locations for 32 bit and 64 bit versions respectively if you have WAIK installed
    32 Bit - C:\Program Files\Windows AIK\Tools\x86\
    64 Bit - C:\Program Files\Windows AIK\Tools\amd64\

    Win7AIO-3

    Now just double click the gimagex.exe from the folder to launch the GUI and start working.

    Click here to Visit GImageX webpage
    Click here to Download WAIK – 1.7 GB
    Click here to Download GImageX – 600 KB

    2 comments:

    1. nice theme music "RedQuadro - Morning Wave"

      ReplyDelete
    2. After getting gimagex up and going I started making a winpe disk, After the part of transferring imagex I transferred gimagex.exe to the same folder. Now
      after booting to the cd at the promt I type in gimagex.exe and the gui appears
      which lets me browse for drive letters, Capture, apply and so on, if the image is captured with gimagex there is no need to repair boot files.

      ReplyDelete

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