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I'd say this is kind of inbetween both SuperUser and StackOverflow, but I am writing a GUI application using Qt that I would like to run within WinPE. I am well aware that WinPE is a very limited environment in terms of libraries and subsystems, but I would very much like to find out what prevents my application from running in WinPE. I've built the application for the correct platform (x64) and I've used the windeployqt-tool bundled with Qt to add dependencies. When I try to launch the application in WinPE I get no reaction at all. No error, no window - it just doesn't start. It works within a "normal" Windows environment.

Any suggestions to what I could do to find out what prevents the application from launching? I was thinking a debugging tool of some sort may help, as to see what library/subsystem the application is looking for?

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  • If nobody else has a better suggestion, start by using the SystemInternals process explorer. Open your app where it works. Select your process after setting the lower pane view to DLLs. Copy all of the QT DLLs listed as loaded into your application directory. Try again on WinPE .. no workie? Look for OTHER DLLs that might be missing and do the same. Still not workie? Come back.. there are other things to look into. May 14, 2021 at 18:41
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    Also.. I find it easier to troubleshoot PE stuff using a VM. The turnaround is much faster. :) May 14, 2021 at 18:43
  • Thanks, I'll try that. Seems like a good way to find which DLLs are needed.
    – ddybing
    May 14, 2021 at 19:09

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I believe that WinPE supports OpenGL.

According to the Qt article Dynamically Loading Graphics Drivers:

In addition to the build time configuration, Qt supports choosing and loading the OpenGL implementation at runtime. To use this mode, pass -opengl dynamic to the configure script.

configure -opengl dynamic

Doing the above should make available the graphic mode. Ensure that you have these DLLs: opengl32.dll, glu32.dll and ddraw.dll.

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  • Thanks for your answer and sorry for the late reply. I must be doing something wrong - it won't launch in WinPE using the command you provided. And I was also sure to select the self-compiled version of Qt in VS, not the already installed one. On a normal Windows app it works great, but it WinPE it seems to just quit right away without any error.
    – ddybing
    Jun 19, 2021 at 22:14
  • You could post this as bug report in the Qt forums. You will need to supply much more details than in your post, including the fact that my above advice didn't work.
    – harrymc
    Jun 20, 2021 at 8:04

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