Windows PE Network/WinPE-Dot3Svc optional component doesn’t work in Windows 10 Version 1607 or Version 1703

When you use the Windows Assessment and Deployment Toolkit (Windows ADK) to create Windows Preinstallation Environment (Windows PE) boot media, you experience the following issues:

• In Windows 10 Version 1607, you can't add the Network/WinPE-Dot3Svc optional component that supports the IEEE 802.X authentication protocol on wired networks.

• In Windows 10 Version 1703, you can successfully add the Network/WinPE-Dot3Svc optional component to Windows PE media. However, when you start up the computer from this media, the network stack doesn't initialize.

How to get the update

An update is available to fix this problem in Windows 10 Version 1607 and Version 1703.

Microsoft Update Catalog

You can get a stand-alone package for this issue from the Microsoft Update Catalog website.

Note This update will not be offered through Windows Update.

How to apply the update

This update must be applied to your Windows PE boot media (boot.wim). The steps to do this are provided in the following Microsoft Docs article:

WinPE: Add packages (Optional Components Reference)

Note The process to add update to Windows PE is the same as adding an optional component package or .cab file.

Use the following commands in the appropriate steps in the procedure in the Docs article.

Mount the Windows PE boot image:

Dism /Mount-Image /ImageFile:"PathtoWinPEBootMedia\boot.wim" /index:1 /MountDir:"PathtoMountMedia"

Add KB4025632 to Windows PE:

Dism /Add-Package /Image:"PathtoMountMedia" /PackagePath:"PathtoKB4025632\windows10.0-kb4025632-x64_314363693ba41f63abedafb7be97f21e0c4994fc.msu"

Unmount and save changes to the Windows PE boot.wim:

Dism /Unmount-Image /MountDir:"PathtoMountMedia" /commit

Microsoft has confirmed that this is a problem in the Microsoft products that are listed in the "Applies to" section.