Deployment Image Servicing and Management (DISM.exe) mounts a Windows image (.wim) file or virtual hard disk (.vhd or .vhdx) for servicing. You can also use the DISM image management command to list the image index numbers, to verify the architecture for the image that you are mounting, append an image, apply an image, capture an image and delete an image. After you update the image, you must unmount it and either commit or discard the changes that you have made.
The following commands can be used to mount, unmount, capture, append, and delete and query .wim, .vhd and .vhdx files. These options are not case sensitive.
/Append-Image
Adds an additional image to a .wim file. /Append-Image compares new files to the resources in the existing .wim file specified by the /ImageFile argument, and stores only a single copy of each unique file so that each file is only captured once. The .wim file can have only one assigned compression type. Therefore, you can only append files with the same compression type.
This command-line option does not apply to virtual hard disk (VHD) files.
Important
Ensure that you have enough disk space for the /Append-Image option to run. If you run out of disk space while the image is being appended, you might corrupt the .wim file.
Use /WIMBoot to append the image with Windows image file boot (WIMBoot) configuration. This only applies to Windows 8.1 images that have been captured or exported as a WIMBoot file. This feature isn't supported in Windows 10 and later.
Marks a volume image as being a bootable image. This argument is available only for Windows Preinstallation Environment (WinPE) images. Only one volume image can be marked as bootable in a .wim file.
/CheckIntegrity
Detects and tracks .wim file corruption when used with capture, unmount, export, and commit operations. /CheckIntegrity stops the operation if DISM detects that the .wim file is corrupted when used with apply and mount operations.
/Verify
Checks for errors and file duplication.
/NoRpFix
Disables the reparse point tag fix. A reparse point is a file that contains a link to another file on the file system. If /NoRpFix is not specified, reparse points that resolve to paths outside of the value specified by /ImageFile will not be captured.
The path and name of the FFU image file that will be applied
/ApplyDrive
The path to the phyisical drive that will be imaged
/SFUfile<pattern>
Optional, for split FFUs that are captured with no compression. Use /SFUFile to reference split FFU files (SFUs). Pattern is the naming pattern and location of split files. Use a wildcard character when specifying the naming pattern. For example, "E:\image\install*.sfu" will apply all of the split files in the E:\image directory named install1.sfu, install2.sfu, and so on.
For WIM, this command applies a Windows image file (.wim) or a split Windows image (.swm) files to a specified partition. Beginning with Windows 10, version 1607, DISM can apply and capture extended attributes (EA).
For FFU, this command applies a full flash update (.ffu) image to a specified drive. It doesn’t support applying an image from a virtual hard disk (.vhdx) file, though you can use this command to apply a full image to a VHD. FFU applies to Windows 10 only. While you can use this command to apply an FFU, use /apply-ffu instead.
This option doesn’t support applying an image from a virtual hard disk (VHD), though you can use this command to apply images to a .vhdx file that's been attached, partitioned, and formatted.
Detects and tracks .wim file corruption when used with capture, unmount, export, and commit operations. /CheckIntegrity stops the operation if DISM detects that the .wim file is corrupted when used with apply and mount operations.
/Verify
Checks for errors and file duplication.
/NoRpFix
Disables the reparse point tag fix. A reparse point is a file that contains a link to another file on the file system. If /NoRpFix is not specified, reparse points that resolve to paths outside the value specified by /ImageFile will not be captured.
/SWMFile
Enables you to reference split .wim files (SWMs). Pattern is the naming pattern and location of split files. Use a wildcard character when specifying the naming pattern. For example, "E:\image\install*.swm" will apply all of the split files in the E:\image directory named install1.swm, install2.swm, and so on.
/ConfirmTrustedFile
Validates the image for Trusted Desktop. This option can only be run on a computer running at least WinPE 4.0. When using /Apply-Image with the /ConfirmTrustedFile option in WinPE, always specify the /ScratchDir option pointed to a physical media location. This ensures that short file names will always be available. See DISM Global Options for Command-Line Syntax for more information about the default behavior of the /ScratchDir option. Beginning with Windows 10, version 1607, you can use /EA to apply extended attributes.
/WIMBoot
Use /WIMBoot to append the image with Windows image file boot (WIMBoot) configuration. This only applies to Windows 8.1 images that have been captured or exported as a WIMBoot file. This feature isn't supported in Windows 10 and later.
/Compact
Applies an image in compact mode, saving drive space. Replaces WIMBoot. For Windows 10 for desktop editions (Home, Pro, Enterprise, and Education) only.
Note: If you're applying an image in compact mode with the /ScratchDir option, make sure your ScratchDir folder is not on a FAT32-formatted partition. Using a FAT32 partition could result in unexpected reboots during OOBE.
/EA
New in Windows 10, version 1607. Applies extended attributes.
/ApplyDrive
Specifies the logical drive, using the DeviceID. to get the device ID from the command line, type "wmic diskdrive list brief". Note: a VHD may appear with the name “PhysicalDrive” in the description, for example, .\PhysicalDrive2.
/SFUFile
Use /SFUFile to reference split FFU files (SFUs). Pattern is the naming pattern and location of split files.
Captures the incremental file changes based on the specific install.wim file to a new file, custom.wim for a WIMBoot image. You can’t capture an empty directory. The captured files are converted to pointer files. The custom.wim is placed in the same folder next to the install.wim.
Important
/Capture-CustomImage only captures the customization files. It can’t be used to capture installation files into a new WIM.
Keep the install.wim and custom.wim files together. Don't switch out either the custom.wim file or the install.wim file.
You can only capture the custom image once. Don’t remove or recapture a custom.wim after capturing the incremental file changes.
Detects and tracks .wim file corruption when used with capture, unmount, export, and commit operations. /CheckIntegrity stops the operation if DISM detects that the .wim file is corrupted when used with apply and mount operations.
/Verify
Checks for errors and file duplication.
[/ConfirmTrustedFile
Validates the image for Trusted Desktop on a Windows 10, Windows 8.1, or Windows 8. This option can only be run on a computer running at least WinPE 4.0.
Example:
Dism /Capture-CustomImage /CaptureDir:D:\
/Capture-FFU
Captures an image of a physical drive's partitions to a new .ffu file.
You can capture the image as a full flash utility image (.ffu) file or a set of split ffu (.sfu) files;
Not needed for desktop capture. Specifies one or more platform ids (separated with semicolon) to be added to the image. If not specified, platform id will be '*'.
/Compress
Specifies the type of compression used for when capturing. If you'll be splitting the FFU, specify none, as DISM doesn't support splitting compressed FFUs.
Captures an image of a drive to a new .wim file. Captured directories include all subfolders and data. You cannot capture an empty directory. A directory must contain at least one file. DISM can also optionally apply and capture extended attributes (EA).
You can capture the image as a Windows image (.wim) file or a set of split Windows image (.swm) files, but this option doesn’t support capturing a virtual hard disk (.vhd/.vhdx) file. See /Capture-FFU if you are looking to capture an FFU.
Specifies the type of compression used for the initial capture operation. The maximum option provides the best compression, but takes more time to capture the image. The fast option provides faster image compression, but the resulting files are larger than those compressed by using the maximum option. This is also the default compression type that is used if you do not specify the argument. The none option does not compress the captured image at all.
/Bootable
Marks a volume image as being a bootable image. This argument is available only for WinPE images. Only one volume image can be marked as bootable in a .wim file.
/CheckIntegrity
Detects and tracks .wim file corruption when used with capture, unmount, export, and commit operations. /CheckIntegrity stops the operation if DISM detects that the .wim file is corrupted when used with apply and mount operations.
/Verify
Checks for errors and file duplication.
/NoRpFix
Disables the reparse point tag fix. A reparse point is a file that contains a link to another file on the file system. If /NoRpFix is not specified, reparse points that resolve to paths outside of the value specified by /ImageFile will not be captured.
/WIMBoot
Use /WIMBoot to append the image with Windows image file boot (WIMBoot) configuration. This only applies to Windows 8.1 images that have been captured or exported as a WIMBoot file. This feature isn't supported in Windows 10 and later.
/EA
Captures extended attributes. The switch must be explicitly specified to capture extended attributes. DISM will capture extended attribute bits if they are set in the components to be captured in the WIM image. If the bits are not set, DISM won't set them. Only the inbox components of CAB packages and drivers will have these extended attribute bits, not the AppX package components or Win32 application components. Extended attributes with prefix “$Kernel.” in name will be skipped because only user mode extended attributes are captured. If you use DISM in Windows 10, version 1607 to capture extended attributes and use an earlier version of DISM to apply the image, the operation will succeed but the extended attributes will not be set to the applied image.
Deletes all of the resources associated with a mounted image that has been corrupted. This command will not unmount images that are already mounted, nor will it delete images that can be recovered using the /Remount-Image command.
Detects and tracks .wim file corruption when used with capture, unmount, export, and commit operations. /CheckIntegrity stops the operation if DISM detects that the .wim file is corrupted when used with apply and mount operations.
/Append
Adds the modified image to the existing .wim file instead of overwriting the original image. The /CheckIntegrity and /Append arguments do not apply to virtual hard disk (VHD) files.
Example:
Dism /Commit-Image /MountDir:C:\test\offline
/Delete-Image
Deletes the specified volume image from a .wim file that has multiple volume images. This option deletes only the metadata entries and XML entries. It does not delete the stream data and does not optimize the .wim file.
This command-line option does not apply to virtual hard disk (VHD) files.
Detects and tracks .wim file corruption when used with capture, unmount, export, and commit operations. /CheckIntegrity stops the operation if DISM detects that the .wim file is corrupted when used with apply and mount operations.
Exports a copy of the specified image to another file. The source and destination files must use the same compression type. You can also optimize an image by exporting to a new image file. When you modify an image, DISM stores additional resource files that increase the overall size of the image. Exporting the image will remove unnecessary resource files.
This command-line option does not apply to virtual hard disk (VHD) files.
Enables you to reference split .wim files. pattern is the naming pattern and location of split files. You can also specify wildcard characters. For example, "E:\image\install*.swm" will export the split files in the E:\image directory named install1.swm, install2.swm, and so on.
/Compress
Specifies the type of compression used for the initial capture operation. The /Compress argument does not apply when you export an image to an existing .wim file, you can only use this argument when you export an image to a new .wim file. The maximum option provides the best compression, but takes more time to capture the image. The fast option provides faster image compression, but the resulting files are larger than those compressed by using the maximum option. This is also the default compression type that is used if you do not specify the argument. Use the recovery option to export push-button reset images. The resulting files are much smaller in size, which in turn, greatly reduce the amount of disk space needed for saving the push-button reset image on a recovery drive. The destination file must be specified with an .esd extension. The none option does not compress the captured image at all.
/Bootable
Marks a volume image as being a bootable image. This argument is available only for WinPE images. Only one volume image can be marked as bootable in a .wim file.
/WIMBoot
Use /WIMBoot to append the image with Windows image file boot (WIMBoot) configuration. This only applies to Windows 8.1 images that have been captured or exported as a WIMBoot file. This feature isn't supported in Windows 10 and later.
/CheckIntegrity
Detects and tracks .wim file corruption when used with capture, unmount, export, and commit operations. /CheckIntegrity stops the operation if DISM detects that the .wim file is corrupted when used with apply and mount operations.
Displays information about the images that are contained in a .wim, .ffu, .vhd or .vhdx file. When used with the /Index or /Name argument, information about the specified image is displayed, which includes if an image is a WIMBoot image, if the image is Windows 8.1, see Take Inventory of an Image or Component Using DISM. The /Name argument does not apply to VHD files. You must specify /Index:1 for FFU and VHDX files.
Returns a list of .ffu, .vhd, .vhdx, and .wim images that are currently mounted, as well as information about the mounted image such as whether the image is valid, read/write permissions, mount location, mounted file path, and mounted image index.
Example:
Dism /Get-MountedImageInfo
/Get-WIMBootEntry
Use /Get-WIMBootEntry to display WIMBoot configuration entries for the specified disk volume.
For more information about how to display WIMBoot configuration entries, see Take Inventory of an Image or Component Using DISM.
This only applies to Windows 8.1; this feature isn't supported in Windows 10 and later.
Syntax:
Dism /Get-WIMBootEntry /Path:<volume_path>
Example:
Dism /Get-WIMBootEntry /Path:C:\
/List-Image
Displays a list of the files and folders in a specified image.
This command-line option does not apply to virtual hard disk (VHD) files.
Sets the mounted image with read-only permissions. Optional.
/Optimize
Reduces initial mount time.
/CheckIntegrity
Detects and tracks .wim file corruption when used with capture, unmount, export, and commit operations. /CheckIntegrity stops the operation if DISM detects that the .wim file is corrupted when used with apply and mount operations.
This command should be the last command run against an image before the image is applied to a device, and can reduce time on the factory floor when building devices for build-to-stock scenarios.
/Boot tries to reduce the online configuration time that the OS spends during boot. This optimization may be rendered invalid if any servicing operations are performed on the image after optimizing it.
DISM /Optimize-Image /boot is available in the following operating systems:
Windows 11
Windows 10, version 1607
Windows 10, version 1809 and later
Windows Server 2012 R2 later
Use /Boot to try and reduce the online configuration time that the OS spends during boot. Note that this optimization may be rendered invalid if any servicing operations are performed on the image after optimizing it.
/WimBoot is for configuring an offline image for installing on a WIMBoot system.
For FFU, this command splits an existing full-flash update (.ffu) file into multiple read-only split .sfu files. DISM doesn't support splitting compressed FFUs. If you are splitting FFUs, make sure that your FFU was captured with the /compress:none option specificed.
This option creates the .sfu files in the specified directory, naming each file the same as the specified /SFUFile, but with an appended number. For example, if you use c:\flash.sfu, you'll get a flash.sfu file, a flash2.ffu file, a flash3.sfu file, and so on, defining each portion of the split .sfu file and saving it to the C:\ directory.
Specifies the maximum size in megabytes (MB) for each created file. If a single file is larger than the value specified in the /FileSize option, one of the split .swm files that results will be larger than the value specified in the /FileSize option, in order to accommodate the large file.
/CheckIntegrity
Detects and tracks .wim file corruption when used with capture, unmount, export, and commit operations. /CheckIntegrity stops the operation if DISM detects that the .wim file is corrupted when used with apply and mount operations.
/ImageFile
Specifies the path of a .FFU file, example: flash.ffu.
/SFUFile
References split FFU files (SFUs). Pattern is the naming pattern and location of split files.
For WIM, this command splits an existing .wim file into multiple read-only split .swm files.
This option creates the .swm files in the specified directory, naming each file the same as the specified path_to_swm, but with an appended number. For example, if you set path_to_swm as c:\Data.swm, this option creates a Data.swm file, a Data2.swm file, a Data3.swm file, and so on, defining each portion of the split .wim file and saving it to the C:\ directory.
This command-line option does not apply to virtual hard disk (VHD) files.
Specifies the maximum size in megabytes (MB) for each created file. If a single file is larger than the value specified in the /FileSize option, one of the split .swm files that results will be larger than the value specified in the /FileSize option, in order to accommodate the large file.
/CheckIntegrity
Detects and tracks .wim file corruption when used with capture, unmount, export, and commit operations. /CheckIntegrity stops the operation if DISM detects that the .wim file is corrupted when used with apply and mount operations.
/ImageFile
Specifies the path of an image file, example: install.wim.
Detects and tracks .wim file corruption when used with capture, unmount, export, and commit operations. /CheckIntegrity stops the operation if DISM detects that the .wim file is corrupted when used with apply and mount operations.
/Append
Adds the modified image to the existing .wim file instead of overwriting the original image. The /CheckIntegrity and /Append arguments do not apply to virtual hard disk (VHD, VHDX), or FFU files.
Applies one or more siloed provisioning packages (SPPs) to a specified image. This option is only available after running CopyDandI.cmd from the ADK, Version 1607 or later, and running dism.exe /Apply-SiloedPackage from the target folder created by CopyDandI.cmd.
Note
/Apply-SiloedPackage can only be run once against a Windows image, but /PackagePath can used more than once in the same command to apply multiple SPPs. SPPs will be applied in the specified order, so a dependency should be specified before the SPP that depends on it.
For more information about siloed provisioning packages, and how to use CopyDandI.cmd, see Siloed provisioning packages.
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