It's also possible that fixing it may require the original windows installation media matching your windows version build number - which means if you've since installed a major windows update there may not be an available installation iso that meets the requirement. Happened to me and I was lucky enough to coax an iso out of the windows installer download page that satisfied the repair tool (oddly enough downloading an iso using the Windows Media creation tool didn't work, but spoofing Linux on the page to directly download an iso gave me a different iso that worked)

These are the things I do to maintain my last windows machine.

[–] kubica@fedia.io 6 points 3 months ago (2 children)

Windows Media creation tool didn't work, but spoofing Linux on the page to directly download an iso gave me a different iso that worked

Sometimes I hate when I fix something in a way that I'm not supposed to. Like "If I didn't know about this thing that I don't have any particular reason to know, I'd be fucked."

[–] rotopenguin@infosec.pub 3 points 3 months ago

And then you dd the iso to a flash stick, boot it, start into the windows installer, and watch it shit itself because MS can't even make an iso that just fucking works.

[–] zaph@sh.itjust.works 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

You can also extract the media creation tool for the iso

[–] BakedCatboy@lemmy.ml 3 points 3 months ago

The creation tool also just lets you save the iso - but for some reason the media creation tool gives you a different iso than if you spoofed a non-windows user agent on the windows download website so that it gives you a direct link to the iso instead of getting you to install the creation tool. And for some reason only one of them worked with DISM to repair my system in order to be able to run windows update successfully.