cableguy_uk Posted August 12, 2004 Share Posted August 12, 2004 Does anyone know which method is best overallObviously Imaged PCs are faster at rebuilding than Unattended onesAre imaged systems more reliable?, anyone else have any points on this as i'm really finding it hard to justify using Unattended disks over Imaged ones on our small network.please anyone have any info or links to where i can read up, cheers Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stuntgp2000 Posted August 12, 2004 Share Posted August 12, 2004 HD Image Pros :===========1) Fast Extraction that help you save many time in comparison to Unattended Installation.HD Image Cons :===========1) You always have to format your HD.2) Difficulties in making updates.Unattended Installation Pros :===================1) You don't have to format your HD2) Easy to update your Unattended CDUnattended Installation Cons :===================1) Normally takes much time than extracting an HD Image; However, today exists fast computers that take only 15-20Mins to install windows Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
prathapml Posted August 12, 2004 Share Posted August 12, 2004 Yes, imaging-wise, going with norton ghost images is not always the best:1. Your ghost images can't be restored on dis-similar hardware. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Skyfrog Posted August 12, 2004 Share Posted August 12, 2004 I think they kind of go hand in hand myself. The initial install using unattended so you can customize the OS however you like. When you are satisified with it make an image so you can get it back up as quickly as possible. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joebells Posted August 12, 2004 Share Posted August 12, 2004 yeah being able to use an unattended install on many different machines is a huge, huge advantage I think. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cableguy_uk Posted August 12, 2004 Author Share Posted August 12, 2004 THIS IS GREAT STUFF KEEP IT COMINGi'm not sure about formatting the pc before the image goes on, in the past i haven't done this.Unattended on the otherhand i do format, albeit only a quick format.With ghost for example you use a boot disk(ghost.exe) and then copy the image over, i don't think it formats but i could be wrong on this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eagle00789 Posted August 12, 2004 Share Posted August 12, 2004 ghost makes a sector-by-sector image, thus automaticly formatting (while copying) your partition (or harddrive if you made a hd backup instead of partition). this means that you don't have to format the drive before setting a ghost-image back Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gamehead200 Posted August 12, 2004 Share Posted August 12, 2004 I'd do an unattended CD over an HD image... However, I haven't made one since I just don't have the time... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CoffeeFiend Posted August 13, 2004 Share Posted August 13, 2004 Well, there's more to it than just speed. To be able to clone with ghost+sysprep, you have to have the same HLA, and not use diff mass storage drivers (scsi, raid or such).At work, I usually make the basic install with a unattended setup, then install most software, then sysprep/ghost and deploy. We do this for each major type of PC we have, as the hardware (and bundled software) changes and it's less hassle that way.Also, some software doesn't seem to like the way sysprep plays with the SIDs... Sometimes cloning like that causes issues.If you only cloned, you'd end up deinstalling and reinstalling software a lot, then running sysprep for the ?th time... and it's a pain, and it seems that PCs aren't so reliable anymore after playing that game for too long.You can easily update the software on your unattended setup, and all your basic images build from this will be up to date...There's many ways to deploy, many tools, and we all have preferences, there's not just one good answer when it comes to deploying.I guess it's a bit like patch deployment. Many ways to do it too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pianoman Posted August 13, 2004 Share Posted August 13, 2004 Considering tools such as CaptiveNTFS allowing Linux to access NTFS, and BartPE allowing a mini NT boot, simply boot one of these and InfoZip zip the entire partition, minus the swap file. To restore use your boot environment to format the partition and unzip.It has been gossiped that M$ uses XCOPY to "install" 64-bit OS's booted of of their OPK / WinPE CD.Just files guys, not brain surgery! Customize your CD, install, then zip and reuse over and over!PianoMan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cableguy_uk Posted August 13, 2004 Author Share Posted August 13, 2004 bump can anyone post any links to pros and cons of this type of installseems unattended is leading at the moment overall. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joebells Posted August 13, 2004 Share Posted August 13, 2004 piano man we are saying that if you have more than one machine and they don't have exactly the same hardware then you can't use that zip file for both machines. Also if you want to change any programs or settings its pretty easy to extract your unattended cd make the neccessary changes quick and then reburn and wolla you now have a cd that will work on any number of machines. If you go the zip file route then you have to install onto each machine type you have make the changes to each machine type and then make a new zip file for each machine.I think the zip file idea would only be good for a single machine type environment and even then I would still just go with an unattended cd because of the uid and other issues and ease of updating. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BeenThereB4 Posted August 13, 2004 Share Posted August 13, 2004 No links needed, it's pretty much settled for this site. You will notice that all the top experts here devote their time and talent to unattended. Long and painful experience has been their teacher. Only the others occasionally re-hash the case for imaging. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cableguy_uk Posted August 13, 2004 Author Share Posted August 13, 2004 I actually believe in unattended, but i'm in a position where i have to convince others to convert over.I just need more ammunition...unattended is better because.....But thanks everyone for your input Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
schalti Posted August 13, 2004 Share Posted August 13, 2004 I actually believe in unattended, but i'm in a position where i have to convince others to convert over.I just need more ammunition...unattended is better because.....But thanks everyone for your inputImaging is better because you can handle different hardware just as with unattended (just replace the hal.dll with DOS or Linux and you're done). Then again there ist the speed advantage of imaging.Still there are issues that make both unattended and imaging a PITA .M$ should FINALLY update their setupapi.dll such as it scans subdirectories. Integrating a large number of drivers has been a terrible mess since first version of Windows 2000. For 5 years now M$ was unable to add this feature...oempnpdriverspath=<dir1>;<dir2>;<dir3>...... ---> oempnpdriverspath=<dir1> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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