A weird issue: NTLite suddenly started making unbootable ISO images - Fixed!

[Anonymous Internet User]

UPDATE: Never mind. I found what happened but not sure how it happened, but it's all good for now. Mods: please delete this thread if you'd like.


Weird. I don't understand what's going on. NTLite suddenly started making unbootable ISO images. I have not removed or disabled anything since earlier today, only changed a few settings. I even went back to early backups from this morning and from yesterday and images built from them now, won't boot, but saved ISOs made from the same backups earlier boot fine.



It's not the VM, I tried a new one; and, besides, they boot fine from older images from this morning and yesterday.

There is indeed no bcd file in \efi\microsoft\boot\ in any of the newly created images.

Older bootable image on the left, new unbootable image on the right.



If I copy the bcd file from an older ISO to the new one, it then boots fine. So what is the reason for the missing bcd file?

Any idea what is happening? Thanks!

 

[Anonymous Internet User]

Answering my own question, I guess the bcd file is missing from:

\NTLite\Cache\Images\Win11_25H2_English_x64\efi\microsoft\boot\

I've put it back there and now NTLite makes bootable ISOs again. I guess I'll never know what happened. It was not quarantined by Defender, so the only logical answer is that it was somehow omitted during recent backup or restore. I use FreeFileSync to make backup copies of NTLite folders. But it never failed me before. So, no idea.