Windows 8 build 7700

6.1.7700.0.winmain.100122-1900
	Build of Windows 8
OS family
Architecture	x64
Compiled	2010-01-22
Timebomb	2010-03-01 (+38 days)
Works in
About

Windows 8 build 7700 is the earliest available build of Windows 8, which was jointly shared by community members lucasm and Wheatley on 25 December 2019. Prior to its public availability, screenshots of this build were released by Russian Windows news website WZor on 29 January 2010. This build has been determined to be a Windows 8 build, due to its relatively high build number and presence of an extremely early version of Internet Explorer 9.

Assert strings have been changed to hide the full path, like in Windows 8. In addition, some executables are signed by "Windows Main Build Lab Account" (in short: wmbla) like later Windows 8 builds, unlike the standard "Microsoft Corporation" signer during the development and release of Windows 7. This build also calls itself "Windows 8" in the "Local Group Policy" utility, in "Filter options". This build reuses the "betta fish" default wallpaper seen in Windows 7 builds 6910-7231 and the Windows 7 Release Candidate EULA, which implies that Windows 8 was forked from a late Release Candidate build.

The Streaming SIMD Extensions (SSE) CPU instruction set is now required in order to run this build, dropping support for CPUs such as the Pentium II; although this is moot as there are no AMD64 CPUs that do not support SSE.

Due to its earliness, many areas still say "Windows 7" and the kernel version is still 6.1 (much like builds that predate 7875).

Editions and keys[edit | edit source]

Edition	Key
Home Basic	YGFVB-QTFXQ-3H233-PTWTJ-YRYRV
Home Premium	RHPQ2-RMFJH-74XYM-BH4JX-XM76F
Professional	HYF8J-CVRMY-CM74G-RPHKF-PW487
Ultimate	D4F6K-QK3RD-TMVMJ-BBMRX-3MBMV

New features and changes[edit | edit source]

Hardware compatibility[edit | edit source]

This is the first build of Windows to require SSE instruction support to boot, and is therefore the first build to be unbootable in 86Box.

Boot Manager[edit | edit source]

This build's Boot Manager introduces the following:

Boot debugging over serial improved with a driver for the Maxim MAX311 series (MAX3110E/MAX3111E/MAX3100/MAX3222E) SPI UART.
LdrProcessRelocationBlockLongLong handles several architecture-specific relocations: IA64, ARM, Thumb, Thumb-2, and MIPS.
When loading a PE file that is required to be AMD64, attempting to load a Thumb-2 PE will now return STATUS_INVALID_IMAGE_WIN_32.

Miscellaneous[edit | edit source]

The power service has been given a large overhaul, with the User-mode Power Services Extension DLL (umpoext.dll) being one of several DLLs added in this build, persisting to this day in Windows 11.
The On-Screen Keyboard was internally updated, with some functions being separated out into osksupport.dll.
Additional APIs were also added for Audio and Bluetooth services.
Additional error messages were added to System Restore.

Bugs[edit | edit source]

Installation[edit | edit source]

It is not possible to upgrade to this build without modification due to setup being unable to copy files required for installation, because of a signature validation error (0x80070241 == HRESULT_FROM_WIN32(ERROR_INVALID_IMAGE_HASH)).

To upgrade to this build, replace imageres.dll in each index of install.wim with a copy from build 7746.

Internet Explorer[edit | edit source]

The early version of Internet Explorer 9 (still branded as Internet Explorer 8) found in this build is known to be highly unstable and will often instantaneously crash when switching to IE9 mode or loading a page containing HTML5 content.