RAM Disk (Drives)

[David White]

Hello,

I've read a lot about creating a RAM disk in XPe. I've had one working
reliably (the QSOFT one) for a while now, and have also had the other
common ones working (MS sample, AR-SOFT). What I wonder is if anyone
has managed to make these work without having Dial-Up Networking Common
Libraries and Internet Explorer components? These do bring in about 30
Mb to my image, but I can't find what specific bits are the magic to
make the Ram disks work.

Without these components I see the disk in explorer but just get the
"Z:\is not accessible" problem (or "Incorrect Function" from the CMD
prompt).

At the minute I'm still at the post installation phase, so I'm confident
my problem is down to other missing dependencies in Windows. But I've
also tried building my own component, and still see the same problem.

Looking in C:\WINDOWS\setupapi.log, it says the same whether I have a
version of XPe that works or doesn't. The indication is always that the
driver installed correctly.

I refuse to believe the you need IE to make a RAM disk work. But then
again... /08

Thanks in advance.
David.

 

[KM]

David,

It is surely not IE or Dial-Up Networking Rather one or more of their dependencies.

I do have a ram disk driver working for me on some Winlogon (with IE though) and Minlogon (no IE) images here.

Just a few suggestions to you:
- Higher Setup API log level to see more information. Look in to the thread with subject "Shutdown by power switch with MinLogon"
below (a few days ago). There were some suggestions on how to increase the Setup Api log level (either registry or using a simple
app).

- You may try using ConfigurationExplorer and DependencyExplorer components from XPeTools package (www.xpefiles.com, Development
Utilities/Main) to explore dependencies of component in your Configuration only. This may help you to find out what primitive
dependency of IE makes it work for RAM driver in your image.

- At runtime with working RAM disk start deleting ssome Dlls under \windows\system32 and reboot each time (hope your image boots
fast). You will finally get to the state where the RAM disk is not accessible - you will know what Dll (and therefore the component)
makes it working.
If you can't find such component, it could be some registry settings you are missing.