Download ZIP file and drag-and-drop onto \e2b\Update agFM\Add_Ventoy.cmd to update.
The download is in the latest Betas folder on Alternate Downloads site.
https://1drv.ms/u/s!AqlrQcdsFA-K7S2G6_UPKR7HCecH?e=dhknNv
I will release in a few days unless someone reports a problem.
This is NOT the official version of Ventoy - it is modified - so do not report any problems to the Ventoy author!
Ventoy UEFI32 is not supported.
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If you have added your own \boot\grubfm\startup_menu.txt file, you can check for an expiry date. This would force the user to update their USB drive. Here is an example of how to test dates.
You can add the lines below to check that an expiry date has not been met or exceeded. Change the value of LOWERDATE and UPPERDATE as required to set a valid range.
The code gets the current date in YYYYMMDD format into sdate. The regexp command is used to get the first 8 characters only.
It then compares that dates and reboots the system if the expiry date has been met or if the date is before or equal to the LOWERDATE. The LOWERDATE test helps to prevent the user from cheating by setting the RTC (Real Time Clock) to an earlier date.
This may be of use if you want to force the user to update the USB boot drive after a specific date (.e.g. example = expires Feb 01 - valid for any day in January).
# check date - reset if UPPERDATE (YYYYMMDD) is equal to or smaller than current dateE2B has a slightly revised version of the new Launcher Windows app.
agFM uses the latest version of grubfm (last one for this year). I have now added the F1-F6, F10 and Ctrl+F menu icons into the default grubfm menu theme too.
Has anyone tried the new Launcher app? Please provide feedback...
Happy New Year to all - and let's hope 2021 is better than 2020!
Download from the Alternate Downloads areas as usual (see side panel for links).
a1ive has improved the menu system and the F1 button can now display hardware information under grub2.
You can also boot to Ventoy and AIOBoot and PXE boot if you have them present on the USB drive.
Unfortunately, if you have added a your own grub2 theme to the agFM partition, you will have to modify it so that it works correctly with the new grubfm\agFM version. Details of how to modify an existing theme are included in the latest version of eBook #4 v1.19Beta which has been updated for agFM v1.69. You can get the updated version for free by using the link that was emailed to you when you first purchased it.
The E2B eBook 4 covers how to add different themes and configure your own startup menu (updated specifically for agFM v1.69 and later only).
I have also updated five different agFM themes which should work with the new agFM v1.69 - see here.
The new agFM v1.69a Beta can be found here.
Note that 'Ventoy for Easy2Boot' has not been updated and is still v1.0.29. I do not intend to update this version for a while.
A few of the modified themes are shown below:
 |
| seven22 theme (22 menu entries per screen) |
 |
| Tela theme |
You can modify the theme.txt and fm.txt files to adjust the menu as required.
Just a heads up...
Under some (as yet unknown) conditions, running chkdsk c: /f may damage your Windows filesytem and cause BSODs! See here for a report for Windows 10 20H2 update KB4592438.
The 'bug' is unconfirmed by Microsoft.
This version has a new version of the 'E2B Launcher.exe' 32-bit Windows application which you can find in the \_ISO\docs\E2B Utilities\Launcher folder.
I have also added a 'Desktop E2B Launcher.cmd' file into the folder. You can copy this file to your Windows Desktop so that you can quickly run E2B Launcher from any E2B USB drive that is connected to your system. Each E2B USB drive must contain the new Launcher folder or else it won't be detected.
2.07c adds an extra link in the 'Tools' tab which copies the 'Desktop E2B Launcher.cmd' file to the Desktop for you.
This version has a new Beta version of an 'E2B Launcher.exe' 32-bit Windows application which you can find in the \_ISO\docs\E2B Utilities\Launcher folder.
Download from the Latest Betas folder here.
Version 1.66 and 1.67 had a bug when booting Legacy Linux and other non-windows ISOs using the .isodef, isomap and .isomem options in agFM. This was due to a1ive changing his code and removing the MAP file from his file structure!
Use the \e2b\Update agFM batch file to update to the new version.
I was asked today for a grub2 menu which would protect the E2B USB drive from being cloned onto another drive.
The lines below can be added into your startup_menu.txt file.
It checks the total drive capacity of your E2B USB drive - if it is not as expected, then it displays a graphics file (candle in this case) and then prompts you to enter a password (3 chances). If the user does not know the password, then it loads a 'guest' menu, but it could just as easily shutdown or reboot the PC.
You can display any graphics file you like (.png, .jpg, .bpm) and you can change the messages, etc. as you wish.
I have just updated eBook #4. You can get the update for free by using the link in your original Payhip email that you received when you first purchased the eBook.
I also found an old bug in the .isopersist code in agFM, so I have now updated agFM to v1.67 today. The problem was that the *-rw persistence file would only work if it was in the root of the USB drive. Now it can be in either the root or the same folder as the Linux ISO.
Easy2Boot and agFM can boot WinPE-based ISOs easily, however many of these ISOs require access to files on the 'DVD' drive once they have booted to WinPE.
Since these files are inside the ISO file on the USB drive, these extra utilities cannot be found by the miniWindows environment and you may find some Desktop and StartMenu items missing!
E2B and agFM can make this work however by using that fact that most WinPE's are built using WinBuilder which typically contain this extra startup code. When a WinPE made by WinBuilder boots, it looks for a volume containing a .ini file in the root (e.g. \WIN10PESE.ini) which specifies the path of an ISO file. WinPE will then find that ISO file and auto-mount it as a virtual DVD drive so that WinPE can now access the files within the ISO.
WIN10PESE.ini
E2B and agFM will modify these .ini files before booting the ISO (that is one reason why a write-enabled USB drive is required). The ISO filename should not contain spaces because some versions of WinBuilder cannot cope with spaces in filenames.
However, this only works if the WinPE contains this special WinBuilder startup code which looks for the special WinBuilder .ini file.
E2B and agFM also modify the \AutoUnattend.xml file in the root of the E2B USB drive - this file is automatically run if the ISO is a Windows Install ISO (but it is not usually run by WinPE ISOs).
Unfortunately, some WinPE ISOs do not contain this special startup code (e.g. c't Emergency Windows 2021). There are a number of ways around this:
Changes from v1.65 are:
agFM Beta10 adds a new F10 hotkey function (new hidden feature).
If you press F10 in a grubfm menu, then it will completely reload grub2.
You may find this useful if you run an ISO or some other payload file and grubfm loses the gfxmenu system and just displays a black-and-white text menu. If you then press F10 then the whole agFM boot file will be reloaded thus saving you having to reboot. Since some servers can take 5 minutes to reboot, you might find this useful.
The actual code is compiled within agFM (in global.sh), but if you are interested, you can add a menuentry to your own menu system as shown below:
Please test latest version 1.66 Beta7 as I hope to make it the new release version in a day or so.
See OneDrive - Latest Betas folder for the download.
Please don't just wait for it to be released before trying it. It is easy to test it by simply extracting the files to the 2nd partition. If you want to go back to the old v1.65 then simply click on \e2b\Update agFM\Download and update agFM_v2.cmd.
Changes from v1.65 are:
Todays version in 'Latest Betas' will automatically download and add 'Ventoy for Easy2boot' when you double-click the \e2b\Update agFM\Update_to_latest_Ventoy_version.cmd file.
The current version is Ventoy v1.0.29 but is slightly modified to run on E2B.
See the Ventoy page on the E2B site for details and a suggested ventoy.json file...
{
"control_uefi": [
{ "VTOY_DEFAULT_MENU_MODE": "1" },
{ "VTOY_FILT_DOT_UNDERSCORE_FILE": "0" },
{ "VTOY_DEFAULT_SEARCH_ROOT": "/_ISO" },
{ "VTOY_MENU_TIMEOUT": "5" },
{ "VTOY_DEFAULT_IMAGE": "/_ISO/LINUX/ubuntu-18.10-desktop-amd64.iso" }
],
"control_legacy": [
{ "VTOY_DEFAULT_MENU_MODE": "1" },
{ "VTOY_FILT_DOT_UNDERSCORE_FILE": "0" },
{ "VTOY_DEFAULT_SEARCH_ROOT": "/_ISO" },
{ "VTOY_MENU_TIMEOUT": "10" },
{ "VTOY_DEFAULT_IMAGE": "/_ISO/LINUX/linuxmint-20-cinnamon-64bit.iso" }
]
}
If you often need to gain access to a customers Windows account (local or online account) or MAC OS account but don't know the account password, then Kon-Boot is the quickest and simplest way to gain access (MBR or UEFI).
Today you can get 25% off KonBoot by using this link,
Kon-Boot can now work on larger USB drives as well as small USB Flash drives, so you can install Kon-Boot onto any USB drive and then add E2B to the same drive. More details here.
P.S. Black Friday Samsung 860 500GB SSD #ad on offer at Amazon for 47% off (over 60% off 2TB version!). If your laptop does not have an SSD hard drive, this will be the best saving you've ever made as you won't have to buy a new laptop for another few years at least! Why not give them as Christmas present and help your family upgrade their own laptops over the Christmas holidays?
Hurry! 128GB SanDisk Extreme Pro (#ad) USB 3 Flash drive for only £30 !!! One of the fastest flash drives you can get - ideal for E2B!
Note: This is the superfast PRO version, not the slow, budget GO version (which is not recommended!).Check out the SD card discounts too...
I have updated the test version of Ventoy v1.0.29 for E2B and also I added the core.img into the .zip file itself.
This now makes it easier to add Ventoy to an E2B USB drive.
Latest Betas are here as usual.
I do not intend to continually patch and recompile Ventoy every few days so that it can be added to E2B, however if you want to know how I made my own version, I have written up some notes here.
My knowledge of C is limited and I am not very experienced with Linux, so please correct me if any of the instructions are wrong or maybe inaccurate!
I have also slightly modified the wallpaper in my new version of Ventoy_1.0.29_windows.zip now to make it obvious that it is not the official Ventoy version - can you tell?
I have recompiled Ventoy 1.0.29 so that it runs on E2B.
You can obtain the patched version from here.
Drag-and-drop the zip file onto the \e2b\Update e2b\Add_Ventoy.cmd file.
After installing it using that .cmd file, you will need to download the v1.0.29 patched version of core.img from here and overwrite the \ventoy\core.img file with this new version - otherwise MBR-booting will be blocked.
I have not changed its appearance, so please don't report any problems to the Ventoy forum unless you can reproduce the same issue on a genuine Ventoy USB drive!
The MBR version appears to say 'Unofficial Ventoy' but the UEFI version does not display that text message.
This version is temporary and for Beta testing only. I do not intend to maintain a forked version of Ventoy for E2B.
LongPanda (the developer of Ventoy) has changed Ventoy so that it will only work on MBR-partitioned disks if that disk was prepared using the official Ventoy tools. The second partition must be exactly 65536 sectors long now.
Recently, I received some special error reports, which finally proved to be the cause of the non-standard Ventoy environment. Especially use Ventoy in a single partition environment.
Although Ventoy displays Unofficial's label information, users will not care and will still think it is a Ventoy problem. Ventoy has been an overall design from the beginning, and has not considered integration into other bootloader or partition environments. Ventoy's verification and subsequent development of new features will not consider this non-standard usage. Therefore, I decided to prohibit the use of Ventoy in a non-standard environment and no longer accept requests for deregulation. Of course, this is just the default behavior of Ventoy. Ventoy is still 100% open source. If you want to apply Ventoy in your own environment, you can fork a branch and modify the source code implementation.
This means that v1.0.28 (and all future versions?) will not run from an E2B drive.
If you would like to be able to continue to add Ventoy to E2B, please feel free to contact LongPanda and request that he changes his mind!
See here for more details of this recent change.
For now you need to use 1.0.27 (see here for details).
For the changes in Ventoy which check the partitions for validity - see the new code here (starting line 509).
If you wish, you can run the newer versions of Ventoy using MBR-booting only by using an older version of core.img, however UEFI-booting to Ventoy will still be blocked.
Footnote (2021): I have now recompiled Ventoy as 'Ventoy for Easy2Boot' with the restrictive code removed. Also, you can easily convert an E2B USB drive into an official Ventoy USB drive (original unmodified Ventoy) by making three different image files of 'official' Ventoy from the latest build of Ventoy and 'switching' one of them into Partition 2 (uses Ventoy grub2 boot code too).
The old v2.06 Make_E2B_USB_Drive.cmd had a typo in the URL to get the LatestVersion.txt file from the server. This caused a 3-5 second delay and the latest version was not displayed. v2.06A fixes this issue. Since it is a minor issue, this version is still called 2.06.
MAKE_E2B_USB_DRIVE should now be v4.40 in E2B 2.06A.
Well, the UK is in Covid Lockdown for a month so I am reading lots of autobiographies which I buy second-hand from Amazon. I am interested in reading about the life of entrepreneurs (e.g. some of the stars in 'Dragons Den', Alan Sugar, etc.), scientists (e.g. Richard Feynman) and engineers (e.g. 'Woz') - amongst many others.
If I had my way, all high-schools should have these types of books on the English Lit. curriculum. They are so inspiring and are much more valuable to any young person than 'Catcher in the Rye' or Shakespeare ever could be. They teach you about real life, proper work ethics and how to take calculated chances when necessary. If you know anyone who is stuck in a 9-5 job and is always moaning about it - then why not give them a good autobiography for Xmas!
It has always been my philosophy in life to do my very best in any job I find myself in. I can remember working as a fruit picker at the age of 16 one summer (piecework!) and cycling 3 miles to the orchards at 6.30am each morning, working all day and cycling home completely exhausted at 6 pm, so tired I could hardly move - BUT I picked just as many apples\pears\plums as the 'professional' itinerant workers did and after a few weeks I was promoted to a group 'supervisor'.
I was talking to a young boy the other day and he was complaining about having to do very menial tasks around the office where he had just started a temporary job. He had the attitude that it was beneath him - he was not doing a very thorough job and so was getting moaned at by his boss. I pointed out that if HE was an employer and he had one employee like him and another employee that always did the same job perfectly (or even improved on the end result), which one would he pick to promote? Why would he promote someone who could not even do simple tasks well? Equally, if one of his staff constantly showed that they had good organisational skills, clever ideas, always on time, polite, well presented, worked late and never complained - wouldn't he feel that he had to promote them or else risk losing a valuable asset?
At the moment, I am half-way through Richard Branson's very large autobiography 'Losing my virginity' (#Amazon ad link) and am very much enjoying it, having lived through those times (the late 60s onwards) as a teenager/young man. The person who said 'If you can remember the ’60s, you really weren’t there' was probably right - especially if you were a student! I am certainly surprised Richard Branson can remember it all after reading about his recreational experiences in the book (or perhaps he made a few of the things up just to fill in the gaps!).
Richard Branson was apparently hopeless at school and severely dyslexic (especially with maths). He hardly had two O-levels to rub together but he worked hard, told lots of (small) lies to get started in business, took calculated risks and looked after his staff as best he could.
I am just at the part in his autobiography where Branson states that the initial instrument list that Mike Oldfield requested for recording his album (now known as 'Tubular Bells'), actually included tubular bells. However, in the YT video (below), Mike Oldfield implies that their inclusion was serendipitous - he happened to see them being removed from Virgin's Manor recording studio by the previous band and spontaneously asked for them to be taken back inside because he could probably make use of them.. but maybe your take is different...
Of course, after watching this YT video, it has now prompted me to listen to the whole Tubular Bells LP again - and it's still great!
P.S. If you can recommend any good autobiographies - please let me know.
No major bugfixes, mainly just some housekeeping.
v2.06 - changes from E2B v2.05
A year ago Low Dough Tech brought out a YT video on E2B which got some amazing view stats (I am not jealous - honest!).
He has also recently released a new one with a quick demo of UEFI-booting...
Arfan noticed that the F3 Boot Menu was not working properly in agFM v1.64. Please use the latest v1.65 to fix it. You can update by running the update agFM .cmd file in the \e2b folder on partition 2 as usual.
In a recent E2B chat session, a user wanted to use an E2B USB drive to contain lots of special disk images. These images contained multiple partitions. Some of these images used multiple GPT partitions. For instance multiple Mac OS X installers, full multiple-partition Windows To Go with BitLocker, full Linux OS with swap and encrypted data partitions.etc.
Unfortunately, such a scenario is not feasible when using Easy2Boot (at least not easily!) - however, the user did own an IODD DVD emulator, so I suggested using it's VHD feature.
He did not realise that it could be used in this way!
The IODD Mini
This video demonstrates how to use the UtilMan XML files to create a new ADMIN account or reset an offline account password.
It should work even if your PC contains multiple Windows installations.
It speeds up and semi-automates the process so that you do not have to type multiple Windows commands.
The latest beta version of E2B v2.06c has the latest version of the .cmd scripts which now also patches the Magnify.exe file.
In case you missed it, today is the last day of the Amazon Prime sale.
If you read my earlier blog posts, you will know that I have recently subscribed to Readly and cancelled all my paper magazine subscriptions. Yesterday, I noticed that the Amazon Fire HD's are now on sale with massive reductions, so I just received my new Fire HD 10 (#ad) this morning - installed Google Play and Chrome - and logged into Readly.com. Wow! Very nice display and it works as an Amazon Echo Show too - bargain!.
agFM v1.63 just has a very small change to the \boot\grubfm\SAMPLE_startup_menu.txt example menu file. The small change will cause all .pf2 font files that are present in your theme folder to be automatically loaded.
This means that if you use your own grub2 theme and it contains .pf2 font files, then they will be automatically loaded.
e.g.
