DiskConfiguration

DiskConfiguration contains all of the settings that are used to partition and to format hard disks on 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Windows. For 32-bit systems, the format for basic disks is always master boot record (MBR). 64-bit systems can support both MBR and GUID partition table (GPT) formats, but 64-bit systems cannot boot from MBR disks.

DiskConfiguration contains entries for configuring and partitioning one or more physical hard disks. DiskConfiguration is supported only in the windowsPE configuration pass.

DiskConfiguration can contain one or more Disk settings that represent a single hard disk on the computer that you configure.

You can specify that all disk configurations be done manually, by setting only the following:

<DiskConfiguration>
   <WillShowUI>Always</WillShowUI>
</DiskConfiguration>

However, there is no automatic partitioning. The values in Disk are required to complete installation. If no Disk elements are specified and WillShowUI is set to Never, an error is logged, and installation terminates.

Child Elements

Disk

Specifies the disk configurations to apply to a disk on the destination computer.

WillShowUI

Specifies whether to show the user interface (UI) for this item.

Valid Passes

windowsPE

Parent Hierarchy

Microsoft-Windows-Setup | DiskConfiguration

Applies To

For the list of the supported Windows editions and architectures that this component supports, see Microsoft-Windows-Setup.

XML Example

The following XML output for DiskConfiguration shows how to create three different partitions on a hard drive.

<DiskConfiguration>
   <WillShowUI>OnError</WillShowUI>
   <Disk>
      <DiskID>0</DiskID>
      <WillWipeDisk>true</WillWipeDisk>
      <CreatePartitions>
         <CreatePartition>
<!-- Create primary partition, 20 GB -->
            <Order>1</Order>
            <Type>Primary</Type>
            <Size>20000</Size>
         </CreatePartition>
<!-- Create extended partition and fill the rest of the hard disk -->
         <CreatePartition>
             <Order>2</Order>
             <Type>Extended</Type>
             <Extend>true</Extend>
          </CreatePartition>
<!-- Create logical partition within the extended partition, 6 GB -->
          <CreatePartition>
             <Order>3</Order>
             <Type>Logical</Type>
             <Size>6000</Size>
         </CreatePartition>
      </CreatePartitions>
   </Disk>
</DiskConfiguration>

See Also

Concepts

Microsoft-Windows-Setup