szwicker

Hope everyone had a good Thanksgiving. I think I'm in good shape on the PE/Imaging/Sysprep front. Here's the other front that's been plaguing me. I want to have an automated XP installation CD that's WINPE based where I can enter the system name, etc. at the outset of the installation. I know that people have posted some of the tools to do this in .hta form etc but they all seem to be built around containing the installation files on a networked server. I'd like to have it all on one self contained CD that I can take everywhere. Does anyone have anything they can post or files that might fly? Thanks again in advance.

So far so good. I've managed to successfully ghost an image using sysprep and then Ghost32. The issue I'm having now is on reboot, I'm faced with the "mini-setup" screens where it demands a CD key, etc. In my RIS days, this wouldn't be much of an issue with sif files, etc but I'm not sure how to deal with it here. Any suggestions?

Going one step further. How would get Winimage to work within WinPE?

So, I would be covered with 3 images: ACPI, non-ACPI, & ACPI-Muli. Between those 3, I would be able to cover any workstation, correct? Also, in my previous methods I had basically performed unattended installs with scripts & reg files that run towards the end of the installation or during the first reboot, etc. What's the best way to proceed here? Should I install the apps & reg files on the source system and then sysprep & image it? Or, should I keep the source extrmeley bare and put all that stuff in later doing the "installation part?"

I suppose if I were to use WinPE to deploy an IMAGE rather then use it to start a fresh WIN32.exe based setup, it would be faster, correct? I'm trying to find some proper procedures here for doing all this using WinPE but I haven't found anything yet. Most are centered around new setups. Would this be the proper procedure? 1. Fresh install of XP on a workstation 2. Install service packs & hotfixes, etc. 3. Use Ghost or Winimage to create the image. 4. Create new WinPE CD or RIS install containing Ghost32 or some sort of WinPE friendly "imaging program" and add the new image. 5. Copy the new image to the C: drive, etc and reboot to the image. I've been doing some other reading and it looks like the only thing I have to worry about in terms of hardware would be whether the workstation is ACPI or non ACPI and that I have the proper drivers, etc. Correct? I deal primarily with Dell workstations which (I assume) are all of a type.

Ok, I've done some imaging in the past with RIPREP, etc but that only works where you have identical machines, correct? Whenever I use WinPE, I perform an unattend by hitting a share on my server that contains the installation files, etc. What would be an example of performing an installaing based on "imaging" rather than setup?

I think I've seen some people here in the past post some GUI based "front ends" to these installations. At this point, I'm able to fire off an install from PE in RIS but I'd like to get my hands on a GUI so I can basically put the relevant info right away and then let it go on its own. Any ideas?

Thanks to Mbouchard for the response to my previous question. I guess what I'm trying to do at this point is to install Windows XP with the ability to name it, etc at the outset. It looks like there are a few GUI or "fill in the blanks" that have been created here that can be run at the beginning of the install. Also, I'm wondering what I can do to speed up the WinPE part of the install. It seems to take longer than I thought to boot over RIS. Some of those first parts seem to really drag during boot. Any suggestions?

I've only recently begun working with WinPE (latest version in as far as I know) and I've experienced limited success with it as an installation tool. Up until now I've been using RIS w/ .sif files & scripts, etc to perform my automated installations and I'm fairly pleased with it. I just started working with WinPE as an alternative. I'm currently booting to WinPE and then connecting to the distribution point on my server which contains the installation files, etc. Here's my questions: 1. I run Winnt32 /syspart:c: and the installation begins copying files. At one point it just stops. The installation window closes and I'm back in the WinPE Desktop. I type "exit" and the machine reboots into the familiar blue dos installation screen where it continues to copy files and complete the installation. Is this working properly? The installation does complete itself but I thought the whole idea of using WinPE would be to avoid the "dos aspects" of the installation. 2. What makes this superior to automation using RIS w/ a .sif files & a few scripts. How much faster should the PE method be? Thanks for any responses in advance.