help deleting the windows recovery in the windows 11 install iso

hello, im trying to get a 2gb windows 11 install iso for mt custom windows operating system. where in the hell is the windows recovery image located so i can remove that from the iso? i know that takes up about 3gb's and id like to delete that.

You can only get WinRE.wim out of the install.wim or install.esd during the installation process.
The recovery environment is created based on your system and language/region.
It contains drivers and RE tools and can therefore be manufacturer specific.

OAT said:

You can only get WinRE.wim out of the install.wim or install.esd during the installation process.
The recovery environment is created based on your system and language/region.
It contains drivers and RE tools and can therefore be manufacturer specific.

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Where is WinRE.wim located?

I believe this program can help in your quest:

thatwindowsuser said:

Where is WinRE.wim located?

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It gets built during the installation from the install.esd/wim.

this is currently what i have built for my custom os. i cant seem to figuer out how to change the windows boot screen to the vista boot screen tho that id like to have.

I've been reading your multiple threads about this "custom" install of yours. Could you please inform me exactly what your intent and purpose is with tearing the OS apart? Is it only to see if you can do it or is there a reason for it? I'm really curious.

glasskuter said:

I've been reading your multiple threads about this "custom" install of yours. Could you please inform me exactly what your intent and purpose is with tearing the OS apart? Is it only to see if you can do it or is there a reason for it? I'm really curious.

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I also would be curious whether such modification avoids violating the EULA/End User License Agreement. But then a one-off thing probably won't ring any alarm bells. And there's always the thing about Version Upgrades setting everything back to default.

Berton said:

curious whether such modification avoids violating the EULA

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Oh it DEFINITELY does. EULA states specifically "Restrictions. The device manufacturer or installer and Microsoft reserve all rights (such as rights under intellectual property laws) not expressly granted in this agreement. For example, this license does not give you any right to, and you may not:
.........reverse engineer, decompile, or disassemble the software, or attempt to do so, except and only to the extent that the foregoing restriction is (a) permitted by applicable law; (b) permitted by licensing terms governing the use of open-source components that may be included with the software; or (c) required to debug changes to any libraries licensed under the GNU Lesser General Public License which are included with and linked to by the software; "

glasskuter said:

Oh it DEFINITELY does. EULA states specifically "Restrictions. The device manufacturer or installer and Microsoft reserve all rights (such as rights under intellectual property laws) not expressly granted in this agreement. For example, this license does not give you any right to, and you may not:
.........reverse engineer, decompile, or disassemble the software, or attempt to do so, except and only to the extent that the foregoing restriction is (a) permitted by applicable law; (b) permitted by licensing terms governing the use of open-source components that may be included with the software; or (c) required to debug changes to any libraries licensed under the GNU Lesser General Public License which are included with and linked to by the software; "

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I repeat im not revers engineering the os. Im theming it to look like windows 7.

thatwindowsuser said:

I repeat im not revers engineering the os. Im theming it to look like windows 7.

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That's understood but the theme changes come after Windows is installed, not changing the installation software first which may cause issues with the EULA.

It is dead easy to remove winre.wim from install.wim by mounting install.wim using dism, deleting winre.wim, saving updated install.wim and then recreating iso.

This presupposes iso only has one version of windows - much harder if multiple skus.

The tricky part is what happens if there is no winre.wim - would the installer fall over with a file not found error.

I suppose you could put a dummy winre.wim in place of actual winre.wim and hope that works.


If you have an install.esd, you would need to convert to install.wim.

Berton said:

That's understood but the theme changes come after Windows is installed, not changing the installation software first which may cause issues with the EULA.

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I’m theming the windows installer as well. But not changing it. And I’m not selling it or profiting from it. It’s just a hobby. There are hundreads of custom windows isos and Microsoft hasn’t gone after them. So I’m not worried.

thatwindowsuser said:

I repeat im not revers engineering the os

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When you make changes to the released iso regarding boot animation, WinRE, OOBE, login screen UI, dll files for buttons, file explorer, and setup installer, you are decompiling it. As Berton said, chances of the man ever knocking on your door are probably slim as MS would consider you a small fish, but it doesn't negate the fact you are violating the EULA.

You're going to all this effort to make every aspect of 11 look like 7, even before 11 is installed. Why, when there are already legitimate 3rd party apps and hundreds of tutorials that can change 99% of it afterwards. MS expects users to do this or they would not leave the door open for it to be possible. They could be like Apple and lock the door for ANY UI changes. Sorry, I'm not trying to be rude, but what you want to do just makes no sense to me.

cereberus said:

It is dead easy to remove winre.wim from install.wim by mounting install.wim using dism, deleting winre.wim, saving updated install.wim and then recreating iso.

This presupposes iso only has one version of windows - much harder if multiple skus.

The tricky part is what happens if there is no winre.wim - would the installer fall over with a file not found error.

I suppose you could put a dummy winre.wim in place of actual winre.wim and hope that works.


If you have an install.esd, you would need to convert to install.wim.

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I think it would fail on hash values checks anyway.

OAT said:

I think it would fail on hash values checks anyway.

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Yeah, probably. Only one way to find out.....

Why not remove recovery partition afterwards? Unless you install Windows every week or so.