<SparTacuS>

You can easily do this in your winnt.sif - read the helpfile ref.chm

Thanks for the comments folks. Yea, I think your all right about the shrinking - I just jotted down my own order of ops. I love Nlite - but I really think that folks should learn how to do stuff themselves first so that they understand what's going on. A bit like learning to do maths before buying a calculator.

There are probably several ways to do this but when I wanted to pass stuff into the user profile I found it unreliable to use the $OEM$ folders as often, the folder that you want to copy the files to doesn't exist yet. Instead I do the following for my Favourites folder, artwork templates and some program settings: RAR the files into a SFX Add SFX commands similar to: ;The comment below contains SFX script commands Path=%USERPROFILE%\Favorites\Links\ Silent=1 Overwrite=1 Title=Installing Internet Favourites Call the *.exe as one of the very last things you do before your "tidy up" script.

First let me say that I am not one of the experts. But in recent weeks I have noticed a lot of confused noobs getting a hard time because they are very uncertain about what they are doing. Now we all know that the various guides are excellent and yes I do know that they should search - but noobs are getting lost in the maze of different methods and projects - they are trying to do everything at once! The one thing that (IMHO) the various guides do not give is a simple outline of progression, an "Order of Operations" if you like. This is my attempt to help. No doubt others will add or criticize it - as they should - and it is not meant to be definitive. Before You Begin: You must keep testing at each stage, use VPC or VMWare to protect your machine and use either ISO images or CDRW's - but test. Remember that failure is just as important as success in the learning process. When you need help you should 1. Read the guides 2. Use the search 3. If it’s not there you can ask on the Board. Important Links The Guide Search MSFN Step One: Slipstreaming & Updating. Your first aim should probably be to take a vanilla XP installation CD and engineer it so that it includes all the updates, service packs and hotfixes that YOU require. It is tempting to go off at tangents with unattended applications, drivers, tweaks, cosmetics etc but until your base is right then you are almost certain to fail. **TEST. TEST then TEST again.** Step Two: Shrinking The Source My next step is to reduce the size of the source produced above, either manually or using one of the methods found via this board. NOTE: If you are using NLite then steps 1 & 2 can be done for you. **TEST. TEST then TEST again.** Step Three: Winnt.sif Much of the simpler customisation and UA engineering is done from your setup file. Read the documentation and any examples you can find on the board and this is fairly straightforward. **TEST. TEST then TEST again.** Step Four: User/s & Logon The instructions in the guide are very good for this and it will give you your first introduction to UA via cmdlines.txt. By this stage you should have a fairly slick, UA XP installation - just without applications, latest drivers etc. **TEST. TEST then TEST again.** Now you come to the point where you have to make a choice. Do you sort out UA drivers or applications first. It is personal choice dependant on what you are doing with your CD or which takes you longest to do manually. I find re-installation of apps more of a chore than drivers so that is MY next step. Step Five: Applications Again, the guide is excellent and the board of course helps a lot. Personally I use the RunOnceExe method, but by now you should know enough to make your own choice. Of course at this point testing does become a major chore since you really should try your build after each addition. Step Six: Drivers Pretty Much as Step 5, although driver integration is much less advanced at the moment than applications. My own choice at the moment is to place my drivers in the Install path so that they are “dumped” to the C: drive ready for quick installation once everything else is done. Step 7: Cosmetics I would place all the small and mainly trivial things under this description – setup screens, reg tweaks, window styles etc. The time to mess about with your build is when you KNOW that it is working. Otherwise you can undo a lot of work trying to fix something that ain’t broke. Important Links The Guide Search MSFN

Wow! OK bbrc, many of your issues may - or may not, be related to each other. The first thing that I would advise is STOP INSTALLING STUFF. Only very rarely can you fix it by putting in more sh*t - it usually makes things worse. Next - Backup ALL of your documents etc so that you have a fallback position if/when it all goes pear shaped. And virus-scan your backups, otherwise you may re-introduce any malware that could be causing problems. Now - take a careful and systematic tour of your machine and note (exactly) what it is doing - or failing to do. Make a list - then come back. Your connection problem seems like some form of hi-jacking? Personally I would cut my loses and format/re-install once I'd backed up. You can spend days or weeks trying to fix - or re-install and be going again in an hour (the Pavilions come with HP restore CD's don't they?)

Very slightly OT but when I tried using oversize CD's (Not Overburned) - I found that they burned fine, read fine on a running system but failed everytime when installing from them - at the GUI/39m stage. Maybe me, but I feel that for maximum compatability you need to stick to standard formats.

Hee, hee. I'm even more obsessive - c:\ -Documents and Settings -OPSYSTEM (My Windows Dir) D:\ -Applications (My Program Files Dir) -Archiving (Winzip etc) -Audio (Winamp etc) -Burning (Nero etc) -Coding (My progging Apps) -DVD (DVD Authoring Apps) -Graphics (PSP, 3DS Max etc) -Office (MS Office, Adobe Acrobat etc) -Online (Torrent, FTP Clients etc) -Reference (MSReader, Maple, Mathmatica etc) -Video (Power DVD, MPClassic etc) One of the reasons that I renamed Windows and Program Files Dir's was as a (pretty lame) attempt to short circuit some malware. A very few still install to the default locations - so they don't work and are easier to remove.

Thanks guys. I will try this out later tonight. Unfortunately I have a visit from the Outlaws looming right now!

Does anyone know if there is any way to get a RunOnceEx style dialog box without rebooting, What I would like to do is create a set of silent installs for various prog's (not for my UACD) that would install from a batch. What I have so far is done by calling a reboot and RunOnceEx.cmd.

Thank God for that - I thought it was me. I have been using the Connectix Virtual PC 5.2 for some time with no problems (VMWare just doesn't work properly for me). When I tried out the new MS version it sucked like a hoover. It was so slow I thought it had frozen. Way to go Microsoft!

Sorry I took so long to come back to you Mike. The guide does work. The only difference that I can see in your setup and the one that I use a dozen times every week is the way that you are using the [GuiRunOnce] to start your installs. Try automating instead from RunOnceEx (guide in the usual place) - you will find that you have to change very little. Just to show that it does work - here are my files to compare; winnt.sif [GuiRunOnce] EMPTY cmdlines.txt [COMMANDS] "useraccounts.cmd" "RunOnceEx.cmd" useraccounts.cmd net user "Ben Dover" XXXXX /add net localgroup Administrators "Ben Dover" /add net accounts /maxpwage:unlimited REGEDIT /S autologon.reg EXIT autologon.reg Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon] "DefaultUserName"="Ben Dover" "DefaultPassword"="XXXXX" "AutoAdminLogon"="1" RunOnceEx.cmd cmdow @ /HID @echo off IF EXIST D:\CD.txt set CDROM=D: IF EXIST E:\CD.txt set CDROM=E: IF EXIST F:\CD.txt set CDROM=F: IF EXIST G:\CD.txt set CDROM=G: IF EXIST H:\CD.txt set CDROM=H: IF EXIST I:\CD.txt set CDROM=I: IF EXIST J:\CD.txt set CDROM=J: IF EXIST k:\CD.txt set CDROM=k: IF EXIST l:\CD.txt set CDROM=l: IF EXIST m:\CD.txt set CDROM=m: IF EXIST n:\CD.txt set CDROM=n: IF EXIST o:\CD.txt set CDROM=o: IF EXIST p:\CD.txt set CDROM=p: IF EXIST q:\CD.txt set CDROM=q: IF EXIST r:\CD.txt set CDROM=r: IF EXIST s:\CD.txt set CDROM=s: IF EXIST t:\CD.txt set CDROM=t: IF EXIST u:\CD.txt set CDROM=u: IF EXIST v:\CD.txt set CDROM=v: IF EXIST w:\CD.txt set CDROM=w: IF EXIST x:\CD.txt set CDROM=x: IF EXIST y:\CD.txt set CDROM=y: IF EXIST z:\CD.txt set CDROM=z: SET KEY=HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\RunOnceEx REG ADD %KEY% /V TITLE /D "Installing Core Applications and Settings" /f REG ADD %KEY%\001 /VE /D "Preparing Installation..." /f REG ADD %KEY%\001 /V 1 /D "%CDROM%\Install\001-PREP\prepare.cmd" /f REG ADD %KEY%\001 /V 2 /D "%CDROM%\Install\001-PREP\rename.cmd" /f REG ADD %KEY%\002 /VE /D "Windows Components and Add-Ons" /f REG ADD %KEY%\002 /V 1 /D "%CDROM%\Install\002-COMPO\compo.cmd" /f REG ADD %KEY%\004 /VE /D "Media Codecs and Players" /f REG ADD %KEY%\004 /V 1 /D "%CDROM%\Install\004-MEDIAP\mediap.cmd" /f etc etc . . . For the more experienced - Yea I know that the CD lines can be shorter - but they were already working so wotdahell, and yea all my installs run from secondary batches - it saves on messing with pauses etc

If you have space on other partitions/drives the following will buy you time until your next setup (when you can re-think your partitioning); Relocate your swapfile to another partition. A drive on a different IDE channel would be best -but whatever you can manage. Use TweakUI to relocate some of the system folders that default to your system drive - My Document/Pictures/Music, Favourites and Document Templates can all be moved in this way.

You can't do better than using this section of the guide to create your user/s Create User & Autologon

I have also had trouble wih this one. I tried a repakage using InstallRite with the result that the program dows a wonderful, quiet install (no reboot) but I still have to manually enter the serial on first use.

I test install onto 2x2.5Gig partitions c:\ holds ONLY windows (inc' swapfile)+ Docs & Settings d:\holds Apps (inc' default "Program Files") This always works great 4 me but then I don't use the Hibernate function etc.

What settings you using in Nero - DAO or TAO etc? Also, did you test the ISO first (VMWare or VirtualPC)?

This will do it; On Installs visible entry points to Outlook Express. Off Does not install visible entry points to Outlook Express. [Components] OEAccess = Off Similar for Internet Explorer; [Components] IEAccess = Off

You can prevent the link being created in the first place using your winnt.sif. Under components, disable oulook express access points.

Bart's site workin' fine at moment. Try this for a direct link Bart'sPE

I had a similar problem. I solved it by calling a simple cmd file from my runonceexe, the cmd then call the startup.exe. I got the problem because my office install was RARed. The SFX would unpack and start the installation but my runonceexe carried on once the SFX was unpacked. The cmd file solved it. start /wait %CDROM%\install\005-OFFICE\1-OFFICEXP\officexp.exe start /wait c:\OFFICE\setup.exe TRANSFORMS=Custom.MST /qb- RD /s /q c:\OFFICE\"

Devil_666 - out of order with your advice. Echo what others have said - you should ask for your cd back. If your friend wants to learn direct them here.

-s works fine for me with an iss script. Are you compiling your iss in VM or VPC using a CLEAN machine? More importantly have you extracted the setup files?

You should check out the PE forums (both here and at the CD Forum) Almost anything can be persuaded to run "stand alone".

Thanks Tim, I was about to do the same thing for myself so you saved me a job.

You can restrict the running of names applications using the Group policy Editor. However, I've never managed to incorporate these settings into an UA CD - perhaps one of the more experienced members have looked at policies?