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Mike-thinky

Member

Registered: 2021-10-28

Posts: 80  

Not devuan, but need a windows install disk, now synaptic problem

Hi,

I wanted to add the repository to allow ms-sys to be installed, I need to repair a windows PC in my family.
Anyway, in Synaptic GUI, selecting the repository button does nothing, a spinning something for couple of secs, then synaptic does not open anything to let me continue.

Is there a quicker way to get ms-sys available on my devuan laptop?

Elyon

Member

Registered: 2026-03-25

Posts: 31  

Re: Not devuan, but need a windows install disk, now synaptic problem

There are couple of solutions:
1. Use USB drive with Ventoy installed and then just copy Win iso to the usb drive and reboot. in GRUB choose your ISO [Enter] then Wim Boot [enter].
https://www.ventoy.net/en/index.html
2  Use woeusb-ng
https://pypi.org/project/WoeUSB-ng/

I would go with number 1.

Years back I have done Win install disks only by using Gparted. But this was years ago and don't remember the procedre anymore.

Last edited by Elyon (2026-04-17 17:34:26)

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Thinkpad x280 - Devuan Excalibur 6 - Xfce Desktop Environment - Apt/Appman - Antiracist is just codeword for antiwhite.

Mike-thinky

Member

Registered: 2021-10-28

Posts: 80  

Re: Not devuan, but need a windows install disk, now synaptic problem

Well got nowhere with that. I managed to get ms-sys installed directly from the command line, so a windows bootable install made on linuz still seemed to fail completely. "ms-sys" seems to stop at win7 looking at the options available, and I am have win10 on the family members computer.

The only thing that worked was to use another win computer where I had access to an admin account, made a rescue disk, from an install repair option then copied the sticky keys exe to top of c DRIVE, and substituted a command prompt for sticky keys exe.
Next install managed to invoke sticky keys with repeated shift key entry and then updated the admin password.
Now have full access to the errant computer.

Also recent advice is that ventoy is not as trustworthy as it once was, best avoided.

But the other issue is still there, from the gui I cannot see the synaptic repository settings at all on the devuan pc!

chris2be8

Member

Registered: 2018-08-11

Posts: 368  

Re: Not devuan, but need a windows install disk, now synaptic problem

I'd try manually updating /etc/apt/sources.list or a suitable entry in /etc/apt/sources.list.d/ to add the extra repository, then restart synaptic. That should get round the problem with synaptic.

But I don't have any Windows systems so can't help any more than that.