HBS ED and KB5101650: Issues with keyboard driver and PE Network

[al3x]

I had a few mails between the author of PE Network Manager (Holger) and me and this is the result in a nutshell.
Here's what he has sent me, translated from German:

I've made a bit of progress regarding the issue with it not starting.

Of course, I don't know exactly how the boot image for the ISO is created internally, but the Win1125H2 July update definitely included an update to the SMB 2.0 driver/service.
PENM doesn't start because it keeps trying to start the network for the following reason:

• The LanmanWorkstation service isn't running; it's supposed to start, but it depends, among other things, on MrxSMB2.0, which in turn depends on MrxSMB.
  
• Without LanmanWorkstation, there's no connection to network resources.
  
• Mrxsmb won't start and returns error 127… some specified procedure could not be found. Although Mrxsmb depends on Rdbsss, the latter is running and has been started.
  
• Since, according to CFFexplorer, Mrxsmb also depends on TDI.sys, ksecdd.sys, Netio.sys, msrpc.sys, and FWPKCLNT.SYS, it may be necessary to ensure that all these files are up to date.
  
• In the Boot.wim, at least mrxsmb.sys and tdi.sys are still from 2024. It's quite possible that there are a few other dependencies here that were updated with the July update and would need to be updated in PE.
  

Holger's right, I also tested this and the network stack seems to be down after WinPE booted up, ping doesn't work etc.

Then he tested further and was able to fix this with an updated ISO:

As a test, I manually integrated a few updated Windows files into the Boot.wim using DISM, including mrxsmb.sys, tdi.ys, ksecdd.sys, nwifi.sys, and a few others that weren't up to date yet and looked like they were related to "network" to me. With this, the LanmanWorkstation service starts without any problems and the GUI opens.
The necessary files need to be updated by Hasleo; a few files are copied into Boot.wim, but others are missing or are still from 2024.

I also asked him about the error message that is thrown on first start. Here's his answer:

Regarding the error with the Tcpipreg service. Yes, that's more or less a bug in the Hasleo Backup Suite.
I enabled debugging in the PENetwork.ini file as a test. When I start the program, I see in the logs that there's an overlap here.
That is, when I launch PENM via the Hasleo interface, the program launches twice, even if I only click on it once. This essentially affects the initial launch of PENM.
If I open the program directly via the Explorer-like interface or CMD, there's no error because there's no simultaneous launch of two PENM instances.

So HBS seems to open PE Network Manager twice which causes the problems.

I'm still trying to incorporate a fix for the dual process, because I've noticed that if you start PENM too quickly - for example, via a shell interface - and possibly twice, graphical overlaps can occur, which of course shouldn't happen.

So additionally to the GUI fix that HBS should get, there might be an updated version of PENM to fix that, too.

Awesome support from Holger, he was so incredible fast with his testing and responses. Almost like a German copy of Hasleo support 

@admin: Hope that helps and let me know if you need further infos!

[Bespoken]

Thanks for the detailed update @al3x

Low expectation on this trial, but I mounted the winpe.iso, updated the older version of those Windows .exe in the boot.win, rebuilt the .iso and saved it to the Boot Menu. No error-pop-up but PE Network Manager started and then nothing.

Now waiting for an HBS update.

[admin]

@al3x,

Thank you for your feedback and your efforts to resolve this issue. Please also convey my gratitude to Holger, his analysis was very thorough and prompt, which has been a great help.

We will attempt to replace the relevant files to address the compatibility issue brought by KB5101650. However, please note that this change will only be applied to this specific version of WinRE. We do not want to affect the stability of other WinPE versions due to one adaptation. Microsoft's recent updates have become increasingly less rigorous, causing too many problems over the past few months.

Regarding the issue of PE Network Manager starting twice, this was indeed an intentional design on our part. In early testing, we found that starting it only once could not guarantee that the interface would be brought up properly, so we changed to attempting two launches to ensure success.

However, Holger mentioned that this might be one of the reasons for the first launch error. If his future versions can resolve this issue from the program itself, we would be happy to adjust Hasleo Backup Suite's logic for launching the program accordingly.

We look forward to Holger's future updates, and thank you and @Bespoken for your continued testing.

Best regards,

[admin]

Strangely, on my laptop, after installing KB5101650, the WinPE created from WinRE.WIM is able to start PE Network Manager and properly recognizes the wireless network adapter and configures the network, it only shows a "TCP/IP Registry Compatibility" error.


@Bespoken, technically speaking, KB5101650 should not affect the WinPE downloaded from Microsoft. At the very least, PE Network Manager should be able to start on a WinPE created from the downloaded components. Are you sure the issue actually exists?

Thanks.

[al3x]

Strangely, on my laptop, after installing KB5101650, the WinPE created from WinRE.WIM is able to start PE Network Manager and properly recognizes the wireless network adapter and configures the network, it only shows a "TCP/IP Registry Compatibility" error.

Hmm, maybe this only happens with specific hardware, drivers or even Windows languages?

Would it help if I created an ISO from my PC and gave you a link to that download? Maybe you can test that on your laptop or a VM.

I didn’t test the ISO on my PC directly, but the error was reproducible in VMware Workstation.

[admin]

Strangely, on my laptop, after installing KB5101650, the WinPE created from WinRE.WIM is able to start PE Network Manager and properly recognizes the wireless network adapter and configures the network, it only shows a "TCP/IP Registry Compatibility" error.

Hmm, maybe this only happens with specific hardware, drivers or even Windows languages?

Would it help if I created an ISO from my PC and gave you a link to that download? Maybe you can test that on your laptop or a VM.

I didn’t test the ISO on my PC directly, but the error was reproducible in VMware Workstation.

Thanks. I'm currently trying VMware Workstation.

[admin]

@al3x,

I have reproduced the issue. It is not feasible for us to replace all files, and we would greatly appreciate it if Holger could provide a list of files to be replaced (if any). Thanks.

Best regards,

[al3x]

Are there really that many files where you intentionally stay on older versions to bypass problems with WinPE? I’m just wondering because I’ve not been reading about such problems in other PE projects. In general I think it would be a good idea to be as updated as possible. Maybe this would also resolve issues like the keyboard driver @Bespoken reported.

That being said, yes, I can contact Holger again and ask for the list of files he replaced.

[al3x]

[...] we would greatly appreciate it if Holger could provide a list of files to be replaced (if any).

Got an answer:

The minimum list of files he had to replace was Mrxsmb.sys and Ksecdd.sys, then PENM started up normally again.
Ping works and he was also able to access shared folders on the network; wi-fi network has not yet been tested.

He's now continuing to try to fix the double start problem and made already some progress. But he needs to run a few more tests on this first.

[Bespoken]

FYI: the Windows July 18 OOB Update did not resolve the issue after the ED was recreated.