Located on the Registry page after loaded image, supported features are:
– Integration of a POW file
– Export a plan to a POW file
– Direct host import on the fly (premium feature), optionally overwrite existing plan/GUID
– Set active plan
– Renaming or changing description
– Deleting plans

All operations are direct to registry without extra tools or operations during install, supports images (offline) or deployments (e.g. C:\Windows).
To configure power plan before import or export, you can use Windows Settings or powercfg working on an active plan on the host.
Once configured, export the active-tagged host plan for future use or import directly to an image.
Preset remembers imported plan and will refresh it on each new apply.
It also supports exporting from an image.

Note that some plans have non-standard names, like ‘High Performance Overlay’, usually are hidden in Windows behind the slider, more info here.

ISO support
On the image page you can drag and drop or use the toolbar to Add an ISO to the list.

To start using the ISO content, either Load the target edition directly, or right-click on the ISO and choose New edit.
Both will prompt to select the Image edit cache directory, which can be hidden for future use.

Image edits
Creating a new image edit, a writeable copy of the reference image, copies ISO or another directory content and establishes a connection back to the reference image.

The reference image, be it another directory or an ISO, is read-only.
All edits are created under the chosen location, and shown on the list in its own group.
Individual edits can be deleted, reverted to the reference state, or in a case of a directory as a reference, replace the reference content.
Delete works even if the image is loaded, it will do the unloading and deletion automatically, same goes for Revert, for a fast workflow.

To maintain connections between ISO and edits, or between directories and edits, use the right-click on an edit Connect/Disconnect menus.

The edit Revert functionality mirrors the reference image, only the differences are copied or deleted, making it fast and efficient in comparison to a manual directory replacement.

Replace reference functionality mirrors an edit back to the reference image directory, again only the differences are copied or deleted.
This can be useful if you’re happy with the changes, and want to store the edit back as the backup read-only reference.

You can see editions on almost any Windows image, those in a form of Home, Pro, Enterprise and similar.
NTLite supports this, basically you can Export each edition to another image (WIM file) from the Source page, make your own editions, rename them.

Here are instructions how to do so:
– choose the base image, you can also update it with latest updates as well, do nothing else to it, not even update cleanup.

– after it’s done, make sure it’s not loaded, icon should be gray

– right-click and Export – WIM it to some file
For example “D:\CustomImages\FirstCustomImage.wim”
Only don’t put it inside any ISO structure just yet, keep this in a folder as your editing ground.
Export as many as you need, from any base image, be it updated or not, different or same, just each differently named, make sure it’s from the ISO that you will return this back into because the boot image (boot.wim) needs to be compatible.

– Add the exported images to the Source page if they were not listed already.
Right-click the desired edition, Edit to change its name to something specific like “Windows Pro for Admins”, so you don’t lose track which is which, especially when they are merged back into a single image.

– when editing each of those exported images/editions, make sure those images are detected as Status: “Isolated” on the Source page.
And if also editing on them the Unattended settings, make sure to enable the option “Copy to Install image” in the toolbar; that way automation settings are per image, not on the root for all the same, like in the default Windows setup.
On how to edit each image and what else can NTLite do, check the Support page.
Keep note about presets as well, rename each autosaved session to the corresponding image for future use.

– when you’re done with configuring each isolated image to your liking, make sure none is loaded.
Then Export them back into any ISO structure, the exact file location is relative in the target extracted ISO file structure .\Sources\Install.wim
When asked Overwrite or Append, choose No (Append).
Review the current status of images on the Source page, should be obvious how the images are stacking up inside the destination one.
You can right-click Delete any unwanted editions on the resulting image as well, especially unedited ones.

– Make sure there are no files: .\autounattend.xml and .\Sources\ei.cfg in the resulting ISO file structure, those can automatically pre-select default image and skip the prompt.

– Create ISO by right-clicking the final image folder and choosing so.
Test the ISO in a virtual machine, potentially start with just two lightly but obviously different images, to see if the method works as expected before investing time into the final product.

– From this point on, you can choose to keep the original isolated images for future editing, or delete them and edit directly on the resulting merged image.
Just note to backup that complex final image from time to time if choosing to continue editing on it directly, as mistakes can happen and you want to have an easy redo at hand.
Also if editing multi-edition image, after bigger file changes, it is recommended to rewrite it.
Right-click on the WIM itself, Convert – Recompress before making the final ISO.

Let us know if you have any questions or suggestions.

Download and Enqueue
It can be used to only get latest updates even before loading any images, or to enqueue updates for download plus integration in the same session.
Enqueue is helpful to handle updates as they were already downloaded, to not wait for downloads to finish before editing the image.

Features
– downloads the latest updates
– verifies downloaded update file hashes
– resumes interrupted downloads
– organizes downloaded updates per Windows version
– labels the updates, helps with pre-selection of the recommended updates
– multi-threaded download and hashing


Update lists are manually curated, usually updated within a few hours from an update’s release.
While lists are downloaded from our server, the actual updates are downloaded only from Microsoft’s servers and the tool internally does not allow any other way.

Supported Windows updates download lists below, client edition, with Server listed where appropriate.

Architectures: amd64 and x86, with arm64 only on Windows 11 24H2 and 25H2:

• Windows 11

25H2 – 11.0.26200
24H2 – 11.0.26100, including Server 2025
23H2 – 10.0.22631
22H2 – 10.0.22621
21H2 – 10.0.22000

• Windows 10
  22H2 – 10.0.19045
       10.0.20349 Server 2022 (22H2)
  21H2 – 10.0.19044 ‘October 2021 Update’
       10.0.20348 Server 2022 (21H2)
  21H1 – 10.0.19043 ‘May 2021 Update’
  2009 – 10.0.19042 20H2 ‘October 2020 Update’, including Server 20H2
  2004 – 10.0.19041 20H1 ‘May 2020 Update’, including Server 2004
  1909 – 10.0.18363 19H2 ‘November 2019 Update’, including Server 1909 (Microsoft Retirement Date 10/05/2022)
  1903 – 10.0.18362 19H1 ‘May 2019 Update’, including Server 1903 (Microsoft Retirement Date 12/08/2020)
  1809 – 10.0.17763 Redstone 5 ‘October 2018 Update’, including LTSC 2019 and Server 2019 (Microsoft Retirement Date 05/11/2021)
  1803 – 10.0.17134 Redstone 4 ‘April 2018 Update’, including Server 1803 (Microsoft Retirement Date 05/11/2021)
  1709 – 10.0.16299 Redstone 3 ‘Fall Creators Update’ (Microsoft Retirement Date 10/13/2020)
  1703 – 10.0.15063 Redstone 2 ‘Creators Update’ (Microsoft Retirement Date 10/08/2019)
  1607 – 10.0.14393 Redstone 1 ‘Anniversary Update’, including LTSB 2016 and Server 2016 (Microsoft Retirement Date 04/09/2019)
  1511 – 10.0.10586 Threshold 2 ‘November Update’ (Microsoft Retirement Date 10/10/2017)
  1507 – 10.0.10240 Threshold 1 RTM, including LTSB 2015 (Microsoft Retirement Date 05/09/2017)
• Windows 8 (8.1), including Windows Server 2012 R2
• Windows 7 (SP1), including Windows Server 2008 R2 (Microsoft Support End Date 01/12/2021, extended support optional)

– Update Cache
Before using the Downloader it is recommended to set the desired download location under the File – Settings – Update Cache directory option.
You can use the subfolders to organize your other updates, even not on the online update list. Update files can be renamed and are still properly detected.
Downloader lists any found updates in those subdirectories depending on the Windows version selected.
Here are some self-explanatory examples of the subdirectory names: 10.0.1803.x64, 10.0.1607.x86, 6.3.U3.x64, 6.1.SP1.x86
Or simply download an update from a list and allow the tool to create the appropriate subfolder.

– Verify
After opening the Downloader, if there are any pre-existing updates in the Update Cache folder, it is recommended to first Verify the updates.
That will trigger hash check which helps also detect incomplete downloads, among any corrupted or replaced ones. Only the updates from the online list are supporting verification.

– Enqueue
Adds the updates to the Updates – Integration Queue, ready for integration to the loaded image.
For Enqueue to be enabled, first load a target on the Source page.
Any non-existing updates will be automatically downloaded before integration once the Apply – Process has started with all of the other pending changes.

– Download
Pre-downloads the selected non-existing updates.

– Trim
To easily delete unlisted updates from the Update Cache, including the obsolete ones, use the File – Settings – Update Cache Trim option.

System Requirements

• Recent version of Parallels (version 10) on a recent version of OS X (Yosemite) and 8 GB RAM (this will probably work similarly in VMware)
• Windows ISO file: RTM or Download version of Windows 7 SP1 or Windows 8.1
• NTLite with at least the Home license, after trying out the free version (it cannot remove as much as the licensed one)

Preparations

• Preferably, create a Virtual Machine as a Host for NTlite with the full version of the target OS
  • for example Windows 8 Pro 32 bit
  • assign at least 2GB memory for the OS hosting NTlite
• Install NTlite on the Host
  • use HWlist, if targeting the OS for other hardware
• Download Windows 8.1 ISO from Microsoft (this includes a lot of recent updates already) or use RTM/MSDN ISO
  • http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-8/create-reset-refresh-media
  • Official downloads for Windows 7 SP1 are available here with an (unused?!) product key. Iso images can be also be found on MSDN; and by looking up for example en_windows_7_professional_with_sp1_x86_dvd_u_677056.iso with a hash of SHA1: D89937DF3A9BC2EC1A1486195FD308CD3DADE928 (Google: ‘mydigitallife MSDN Windows 7’)
• Extract contents to a folder on the Desktop, for example ‘Windows8Pro’

NTlite Settings

• Toolbar – Add – Image Folder – select ‘Windows8Pro’: to select the OS source
• For Windows 8.1, let NTlite convert the compressed .esd to a .wim
  • Backup this folder for re-use later for example Windows8ProForNTlite
  • Add this folder as the source
• Toolbar – Load: Load Windows 8.1 Pro from install.wim (wait a minute…)
• In Components:
  • Toolbar – Compatibility: select things you want to keep working…
    • Printing
    • Recommended All
    • USB support
    • Windows Update
    • Host Machine (or HWlist)
  • Toolbar – Expand All – Uncheck All: now only the absolute minimum is selected to be installed
  • Add to that the following, by checking what you need:
    • Application Compatibility! (needed for a lot of older applications)
    • Media – high definition audio device (both)
      • wdmaudio (if not already selected)
    • Floppy Disk Support (otherwise Device Manager will have an unassigned Device from Parallels)
    • Group Policy Client & Local Security Policy (useful for changing some otherwise inaccessible settings)
    • Wallpapers (Default)
    • Internet Explorer client
    • optional: Accessories – Mouse pointers
    • optional: add ‘Time Service’ (did not work in Windows 8.1, but OK in Windows 7)
    • Win7: Desktop Window Manager (for Audio and Network Connections to work – may get fixed in later NTlite version)
  • No need to add Metro (almost all settings can be done elsewhere)
• In Features:
  • Internet Explorer is enabled
• In Updates – Integrate Update Packages:
  • Automatically using the NTLite (v1.7+) with the Download Updates function, more info here
  • Or manually:
    • To find out relevant Update packages, you should first make an NTlited install without integrated updates
      • then run Windows Update and make a list of all important Security Updates by KB number
    • Download the relevant updates based on the list created in the first step
      • manually from Microsoft Download Center (search by KB number) or some other tool
  • Integrate relevant updates
• In Tweaks:
  • optional: modify ‘Services’ according to Black Viper Safe list usually a few dozen changes
  • Auto Reboot on BSOD – disable
  • UAC: disable prompt on Secure Desktop
• In Unattended:
  • Toolbar – Enable, then Auto-fill
    • modify Administrator user as needed including Password “yyyyyy”, possibly check Autologon
  • optional: Toolbar – Add local account: Group – Users, …
  • Toolbar – Configure disk partition: Check… Install to this partition, Maximum, OK
  • use Generic install Key for Windows 8.1 (Bing it 😉
• In Post Setup:
  • Add 7Zip
  • Add Sysinternals Process Explorer (self-expanding 7zipped exe)
  • Add WinDirStat http://windirstat.info/index.html
  • optional: Add Firefox
  • add some tweaks, reg hacks etc. (see below)
    • Win8DisableSwapfile.reg – disable Metro swapfile
    • Win8NoLockScreen.reg – disable the Lock Screen
    • setvmem.bat – set smaller Virtual Memory
• In Apply:
  • Toolbar – check Clean Update backup, optional: check Reuse Driver Cache
  • Toolbar – check Save changes to image
  • Toolbar – keep check on Backup Log & Backup preset
  • optional: Toolbar – check ESD compression (gets the image down to almost CD size, but can take about 15 mins longer) without ESD compression the image will be around 900 MB
  • Toolbar – check Create ISO image: Save to outside of the VM and name it something meaningful (Windows_8.1_Pro_32bit_en_US_NTLite4.iso)
  • In Source – Toolbar – Save – Preset name: for example Win8NTlite4

Installation in Parallels VM:

• Select image file
  • Select Operating System – ‘Windows 8.1’ (if not recognised)
  • Win8: Select ‘Look like Windows 7’ (to get Start8 start menu)
  • Customize: Sharing, Applications, Startup, Memory, disable USB Webcam
• Install should then all be fully automatic for Windows 8, Windows 7 may ask for a key, which can be skipped
  • when creating partition manually: search for “How to Avoid Reserved or Hidden Partition in Windows 8”

After Installation in Parallels VM:

• Parallels Hard Disk will be about 2.3 – 2.8 GB, memory usage about 250 MB (win8.1)
• Win7: disable system restore
• set 125% Windows & Font scaling (on Hi-Res monitors)
• Install Parallels Tools
  • Win7: Install Parallels ‘Mac Look’
    • adjust fonts & sizes Segoe UI 11px
  • Win8: ‘Windows 7 Look’ (Win8)
• add Process Explorer shortcut
• check or install WinDirStat
• In Win8.1:
  • Start8
    • optional: Update Start8 to version 1.5+ (from website)
      • sometimes problems with uninstall-loop in Windows 8.1
  • Start 8 settings:
    • Desktop: Disable all Windows 8 Hot corners
    • Configure:
      • Show ‘Run’
      • Hide shortcuts:
        • Games (do not work)
        • Help and Support, etc.
• Check for Updates in Windows Update (first time can be slow)
  • ignore (most) Optional Updates
  • change Settings (uncheck ‘give me recommended updates…’)
  • hide unwanted updates, especially if you skipped some intentionally during the integration
• make Firefox default (if installed)
• launch 7Zip as Admin to associate file-types with all users
• disable Windows Error Reporting in Group Policy
  • Administrativ Templates – Windows Components – Windows Error Reporting
• Activation
  • check: %windir%\system32\cmd /c slmgr/dli
• optional: Install downloaded Theme
• Check Device Manager
• Win7: sounds: disable startup sound
  • Disable Delete Confirmation on Recycle Bin

Cleanup:

• Use WinDirStat to check what is taking up most space
• Delete ‘Software Distribution’ (stop Windows Update Service first)
• Shrink WinSXS
  • (see relevant articles)
  • On Windows 8.1:
    • Dism.exe /Online /Cleanup-Image /AnalyzeComponentStore
      
    • Dism.exe /online /Cleanup-Image /StartComponentCleanup /ResetBase
    • Dism.exe /Online /Cleanup-Image /AnalyzeComponentStore
• Delete: C:\Users\Christian\AppData\Local\Temp\PrlToolsPackages
• Delete any restore points and disable System Protection (Win7)
• launch Windows Disk CleanUp
• optional: CCleaner (disable Monitoring)

Not working or Missing:

• Creating new Users in a Group
  • fast user switching
  • Create an account via an Administrator command shell cmd.exe:
    • net user /add useraccountname mypassword
    • net localgroup administrators useraccountname /add
• Even with Metro disabled, Metro IE is installed
  • Metro IE will not load any pages
  • On full screen “Here is Start” will not disappear
• cannot change account picture (due to Metro not being installed)
• generally: if nothing from .Net is installed, Event Viewer will not work
• some errors will show up in Event Monitor, not all of which have been explored by me

Conclusions after testing:

• Saves a lot of space for each VM, usually only 2.5 to 3.5 GB per VM even with installed updates & applications
  • whereas a regular VM with Win7 or Win8 easily takes up 8 to 20 GB and keeps on growing
• Win8 Lite is more responsive and almost as fast as a Windows XP VM
• used Process Explorer to check memory usage, which is between 200 and 300 MB after idling for 5 minutes (about half of a regular install)
• Device Manager shows no errors
• Network, Sound and all built in desktop applications incl. Administrative Settings work
• .Net Framework 3.5 or 4.5 can be installed later, if needed
• most desktop applications will install and run smoothly
• tested Firefox, Quicken, Bibleworks, etc.

Registry tweaks & Swapfile Size in Post Setup:

Some Silent Install Switches:

If you want to use one of these example presets, please adapt them to your needs: at a minimum check the Components – [toolbar] Compatibility options.

For more presets look at Emma’s excellent work here.

Purpose:

Create a small functional image to be used for a fast virtual machine which can run most Windows Desktop applications, using minimal memory and minimal HD space.

OS, VM and NTLite System Requirements

• Recent version of Parallels (version 12) on a recent version of macOS (Sierra) and 8 GB RAM (this will probably work similarly in VMware)
• Windows ISO file: MSDN version of Windows 10 LTSB
  • I am using the LTSB version in this example, because it is already built to function without Metro and it only requires minimal updates (but other versions of Windows 10 should work similarly)
• NTLite with at least the Home license, after trying out the free version (it cannot remove as much as the licensed one)

• Preferably, create a Virtual Machine as a Host for NTlite with the full version of the target OS
  • for example Windows 10 LTSB 32 bit
  • assign at least 3GB memory for the OS hosting NTlite
• Install NTlite on the Host
  • use HWlist, if targeting the OS for other hardware
• Download official Windows 10 ISOs from Microsoft (this includes a lot of recent updates already) or use the RTM/MSDN ISO
  • • https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10ISO/
  • • RTM downloads for Windows 10 LTSB iso images can be be found on MSDN: https://msdn.microsoft.com/subscriptions/downloads
  • The 64bit version takes up a lot more space “Windows 10 Enterprise 2016 LTSB (x64) – DVD (English)” en_windows_10_enterprise_2016_ltsb_x64_dvd_9059483.iso
    • • https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/subscriptions/downloads/hh442898.aspx#FileId=70167
  • The 32bit version will create the smallest image: “Windows 10 Enterprise 2016 LTSB (x86) – DVD (English)” en_windows_10_enterprise_2016_ltsb_x86_dvd_9060010.iso
    • • https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/subscriptions/downloads/hh442898.aspx#FileId=70063
  • the LTSB versions are a bit hard to get without a MSDN subscription; for more info google: ‘mydigitallife MSDN Windows 10 LTSB’
  • check hash of downloaded image with Hashtab
• Mount the ISO image
• Copy contents of the ISO to a folder on the Desktop, for example
  ‘Windows10ltsb’

NTlite Settings

• File – Manage License (check that the license is valid & all recent features are activated)
• Toolbar – Add – Image Folder – select ‘Windows10ltsb’: to select the OS source
• Right Click ‘Windows 10 Enterprise LTSB’ (install.wim) and select ‘Load’ to mount this image in NTLite (wait a minute or two…)
• In Components
  • Toolbar – Compatibility: select things you want to keep working…
    • Component Functionality (each category selects a bunch of stuff to keep)
      • Default fonts
      • Microsoft Office
      • Network Discovery
      • Printing
      • Recommended
      • USB
      • Video Playback
      • Windows Activation
      • Windows Update
    • Machine Support
      • Host Machine (or HWlist)
      • Parallels VM (or other VM you might use)
  • Toolbar – Expand All – Uncheck All: now only the absolute minimum is selected to be installed
  • Add to that the following things to keep, by checking what you need:
    • Drivers (nothing added)
      • Sound – high definition audio device – hdaudio.inf (if not already selected)
    • Hardware Support
      • click on ‘Individual Devices’ so that almost none are removed (double-check!, otherwise Win 10 may not boot)
      • Print to PDF
    • Localization
      • keep some common Fonts like Verdana, etc.
      • German Keyboard Layout & Language Support
    • Multimedia
      • Mouse Pointers
        (optional)
      • Wallpaper Default
    • Network
      • Internet Explorer client (optional – install Firefox instead)
    • Remoting and Privacy
      • Network Discovery (Homegroup not needed)
    • System
      • .Net Framework is included
      • Application Compatibility! (needed for a lot of older applications)
      • Help File Support (CHM)
      • Group Policy Client & Local Security Policy (useful for changing some otherwise inaccessible settings)
      • Event Viewer
      • Disk Defragmenter
      • Zip and Cab folder
    • Windows Apps
      • OneDrive
• In Features (mostly use defaults)
  • deselect XPS Viewer
  • deselect Microsoft XPS Document Writer
  • select Microsoft Print to pdf
• In Services
  • Update: Disabled (because cumulative updates break the system)
  • optional: modify ‘Services’ according to Black Viper Safe list
    • • http://www.blackviper.com/service-configurations/black-vipers-windows-10-service-configurations/
• In Local Machine
  • Auto Reboot on BSOD: Disabled
  • Pagefile: 256 MB
  • Privacy: mostly Disabled
    • Allow Telemetry: Security
  • Automatic Activation: Disabled
  • Sponsored Apps: Disabled
  • Malicious Software Removal Tool Updates: Disabled
  • Updates: Check only

• In Users
  • Welcome Experience: Disabled
  • Privacy: almost all Disabled
• In Updates – Integrate Update Packages:
  • Automatically using the NTLite (v1.7+) with the Download Updates function, more info here
  • Or manually:
    • To find out relevant Update packages, you should first make an NTlited install without integrated updates
      • then run Windows Update and make a list of all important Security Updates by KB number
    • Download the relevant updates based on the list created in the first step
      • manually from Microsoft Download Center https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/default.aspx ;(search by KB number) or some other tool
  • Integrate relevant updates
• In Drivers
  • check that it all looks as expected with most drivers found
  • missing Parallels Drivers will be installedd by the Parallels Tools Package
• In Unattended:
  • Toolbar – Enable, then Auto-fill
    • modify Administrator user Name as needed including Password
    • optional: check Auto-logon
  • optional: Toolbar – Add local account: Group – Users, …
  • Toolbar – Configure disk partition
    • Check… ‘Install to this partition’, ‘Maximum’
    • Label ‘Main’
  • * Setup Key (check for correct key )
    • * use generic free KMS Client Setup Key: https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj612867.aspx
    • * or Generic Windows 10 Installation Key: http://windowsiso.net/windows-10-iso/windows-10-product-key/
    • * Windows 10 LTSB: DCPHK-NFMTC-H88MJ-PFHPY-QJ4BJ
    • * Windows 10 Enterprise: NPPR9-FWDCX-D2C8J-H872K-2YT43
• In Post Setup:
  • To disable the Hibernate: Toolbar – Add – Command: powercfg/h (with Parameters) off
  • Compress the OS to reduce size by 1.2 GB Toolbar – Add – Command: Compact (with Parameters) /CompactOS:always
  • Add WinDirStat http://windirstat.info/index.html: Toolbar – Add – File windirstat1_1_2_setup.exe (with Parameters) /S
  • Add Firefox https://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/firefox/releases/: Toolbar – Add – File Firefox Setup.exe (with Parameters) -ms
• In Apply:
  • check: Save the image: Save to outside of the VM and name it something meaningful
    • for example: Windows_10_LTSB_32bit_en_US_NTLite1.iso
  • Remove non-essential editions:
    • remove Windows PE
  • Image Format: Standard WIM
    • optional: use ESD compression (gets the image down by about one fourth, but can take about 15 mins longer)
  • Toolbar – Preset – Save: for example Win10ltsbNTlite1
• Toolbar – Preset – Save as… the preset under a new name
• Toolbar – Process (and wait for a few minutes)

Installation in Parallels VM:

• Select image file
  • Select Operating System – ‘Windows 10’ (if not recognised)
  • Option: for Software Testing
• Install should then all be fully automatic for Windows 10 within a few minutes (OS compression can take a while and the VM will appear to be unresposive for possibly a few minutes)
  • restarts automatically

After Installation in Parallels VM:

• optional: install Sysinternals Process Explorer & add shortcut (for better Memory usage measurement)
  • Memory usage about 300 MB, after a few minutes idle using Process Explorer
• Install Parallels Tools
  • if auto-start is disabled, manually start setup from CD drive with autorun.exe
  • Unattended installation of Parallels Tools http://kb.parallels.com/en/11616: PTAgent.exe /install_silent
• optional: add GPedit.msc & WinDirStat shortcuts
• make Firefox default (if installed)
• Check Device Manager

Limitations:

• Cannot be updated properly with Windows Update, due to cumulative updates breaking the system (see Host Refresh Wizard for alternatives https://www.ntlite.com/v1-2-stable-released/ )
• Network discovery has to be manually enabled
• Event Viewer Errors: various such as
  • Print Service
  • Task Scheduler
  • Driver install failed
• Strange layout in Settings – Privacy – Location

I tested it with various applications, and so far everything works fine including larger ones such as Corel Draw.

Final on-disk install Sizes with Presets:

• Windows 10 LTSB 1607 (32bit) NTliteTiny2 – 1.2 GB (no swap)
  • The created iso image is less than 700 MB (with esd). This is my smallest image which works without problems, by leaving out Updates, Printing, OneDrive and a few other things. With more testing, this could be reduced further.
• Windows 10 LTSB 1607 (32bit) NTlite9 with integrated updates – 2.3 GB (plus 500MB swap)
• Windows 10 Enterprise 1703 (32bit) original FULL install – 9 GB (no compression), 7.5 GB (with compression)
• Windows 10 Enterprise 1703 (32bit) NTlite1.0 with integrated updates – 2 GB (plus 500MB swap)
  • This is my favorite general purpose VM, using the settings described in the tutorial

If you want to use one of these example presets, please adapt them to your needs: at a minimum check the Components – [toolbar] Compatibility options.

For more presets look at Emma’s excellent work here.

Wizards are started from the Source page toolbar, in later versions the tab is called “Tools”:

Install Updates wizard

To quickly install MSU and CAB updates on the host machine, simply open the Install updates wizard.
It will load C:\Windows as the target, and open only Updates page on the left, ready for updates insertion.
Use the toolbar to either add a single file or a folder full of updates. You can also drag and drop from the File Explorer.
After adding some updates will look like this:

At this point it is always good to check if Analyze is enabled. It will be enabled if there are any recommendations or warnings about the current update queue.

When ready go to the Apply page and press Process.
That’s it when it comes to full Windows.
Now about updating the lite windows.

Host Refresh wizard

Installing updates can be straighforward using the wizard above, but the process may fail on a lite installation, due to missing update dependencies.
To simplify the process of updating a lite Windows, or to recover the installation in general, this wizard provides a quick and easy way to update each month without losing your applications and settings.
Once started it looks like this:

Select the full Windows 10 image, if you don’t have one, you can get it here.
Extract the ISO to some folder and select it with the Add button, or drop it to the Source page before starting this wizard.

Previous preset is optional, make sure to keep Prompt for adjustments enabled so you can change the image before it is applied to the system.

After pressing OK, it will look like you loaded the image normally, with all the options presented.
However in the background the tool protected needed components for the refresh and is waiting to start setup.exe after you’re done with the changes.
Also Unattended page is disabled as it is not necessary.
This is the time to add the cumulative updates, load other presets or do any changes you would like to do, same information about updates applies as with the previous wizard above.
Of course if you have the preset ready you could have just selected it on the wizard page and disable prompt for adjustment, that way single-click gets you all the way.

If you used prompt, when ready go to the Apply page and press Continue.

That is it, now it will take some time to process the changes and start the refresh.
Note that sometimes Windows refresh takes a while to start, it looks like sitting there doing nothing, but it will continue after some time.

If you get into any errors after the refresh has started, check this page for known issues and solutions.
More info on the documentation.

Let me know if you have suggestions for future wizards.
Thank you for your continued support.

Reporting this after a few days from the release, as one should, not.

To describe some of the main changes:

• The UI navigation was slightly changed, now pages are grouped on the left navigation, making it a bit more clear which action does the page belong to.

• Registry integration page, applying REG files directly into the image hives. There is also an easy way to directly edit registry hives manually, if one wishes to.
• 

• Disk Template partitioning wizard. Makes it a breeze to setup Unattended auto-partitioning. There is also the previous Individual partition for further customization.

• Long path support, bypassing Windows limitation of 260 characters in a file path. Lately this became an issue with Metro apps having Program Files as the root, then together with mount folder it passed the 260 mark.

• Bunch of new components, plus fonts are now individually removable.

Now onto v1.2, already tons to do, will prioritize to your feedback over the years.

Thank you for the support, it makes it a joy to evolve this lil’ helper.

For a simpler automated method, check the v1.2 release post

As the Components page warning states, one of the main limitations of component removal is that while most of updates will install fine, the big cumulative updates will fail to install.
Another important one is that you cannot return removed components or configure features.
The obvious way around that would be to integrate latest updates in the original ISO, editing the image again and reinstalling fresh.

Well, here is the alternative method on Windows 10, if you don’t want to reinstall at this point, but want to return some components, reconfigure features or do a cumulative update.
It sounds like reinstalling, but what it actually does is upgrade/reset your Windows, while migrating files and settings, practically resuming where you were.

The procedure:

• Prepare a Win10 ISO. Now you have two ways of doing this. #1 Load your previous preset to remove components and add new updates. Or #2 Just use full ISO, install that, update via Windows Update, then load your preset Live (C:\Windows) and remove components as before. I recommend the first option, to deploy trimmed and updated
• If you chose to remove components and integrate updates then enable the “Manual Setup” compatibility option in Components. (it protects the needed setup.exe on the ISO), among other needed components for the process. You can remove those later Live together with other Live-only removals.
• Do not use Unattended mode – leave at Default and delete .\autounattend.xml from the ISO
• Start setup from your currently installed Windows (do not boot from the ISO) – run the ISO’s setup.exe from File Explorer
• When asked should you download updates, choose Not right now, unless you are using full ISO and no updates integrated
• Accept the license
• Now the important step; when asked choose to keep files. Do not proceed unless you saw and enabled “Keep personal files and apps“
• Proceed with install, that’s it

Notes:

• Static IP addresses might be reset, go to the adapter properties and set them again after the upgrade
• For solving a more complex network issues after the upgrade, try resetting the stack with a command “netcfg -d”. That will reinstall all network adapters and start fresh.

Rinse and repeat when needed.
Let me know on the forum, email or comments here if you have any feedback.

For starters I need to write some documentation, where I’ll put whatever is asked of me during support and some general instructions for each feature.
Then some more removals to satisfy my core passion, followed with some UI reworking to better group pages and prepare them for new features.
Which features, well I like to keep that a surprise, so that no one is disappointed if a certain feature is dropped or replaced by another, especially important for people purchasing a license in expectation of said feature.
Suffice to say I was listening for the last year, v1.1 todo list is huge and I’ll be doing some prioritization, splitting for v1.2 and so on.

1.1 branch will not be in beta for a year, now that the core is quite modular and stable, it’s all about priorities and quality.

Thank you all for your support and feedback, it has been a fun year.
Now let’s move forward.