bsand

Fed up with having to babysit 5-10 XP reinstalls a week? I am and I want to find a solution. I'm looking for information on all the automation options for various stages of the Windows install and updating, and your recommendations on what would be best. Setup time is not critical, only the time spent on each install is. Version 1: All that is required to do a full install is connect a USB HDD or network cable to a PC, boot it from a CD and come back some hours later. Windows is completely installed patched and loaded with drivers. In the case of a reinstall on good hardware, No Product ID, Validation etc is required. It's all automated. What it will look like: Solution: 1. You backup the data on the drive (goal is to automate this in v2) 2. Plug in USB HDD/LAN cable. Boot computer from a CD which will load appropriate drivers and initiate the install off USB HDD or LAN. 3. Choose LAN or USB HDD for Windows source images. 4. Choose Windows XP Pro/Home (maybe even MCE) 5. Choose your situation: (A)New install/replaced HDD, or (B)reinstall on same, or similar hardware (no more than 3 changed components) with same HDD: A. You are asked for the Product ID. The system then creates an answer file on the USB HDD (the system will attempt to validate automatically) B. The system extracts the Product Key and validation files (wpa.dbl and wpa.bak), creates an answer file on USB HDD with the product key and scripts the replacement of the wpa.dbl and wpa.bak files after install has completed. 6. The system installs from your network share or USB HDD. Mechanisms: So far I'm aware of a few things that could help with parts of the process, although I haven't looked hard at any of them yet. http://unattended.sourceforge.net/ http://www.autopatcher.com/ http://unattended.msfn.org/ http://www.ryanvm.net/msfn/ Linux is my preferred environment so I'm not afraid of messing with Unattended (the first link), but I have been using and supporting Windows for a long time, just not in this volume until now. I am not looking for someone to do this for me, just recommendations on which set of systems to use to slipstream/automate patch installs and the big one: Driver installs. Also any options to automate the updating of the install source with more drivers and patches would be awesome, but I realise this could be tricky. Future: Version 2: Automate the backup, virus scan, spyware scan of user data and automate the recopying of that data (my docs, favourites, Outlook Express email and passwords) for one or more user names Version 3: Support for Vista. All suggestions welcome