[WINNT.SIF and leaving automatic updates off]

The AutomaticUpdates=no in winnt.sif never worked for me. This leaves the service enabled but just sets it so that au is off (I think.) If this doesn't work just export this key after setting it to your liking.

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\WindowsUpdate\Auto Update]
"ConfigVer"=dword:00000001
"AUOptions"=dword:00000001
"ScheduledInstallDay"=dword:00000000
"ScheduledInstallTime"=dword:00000003

[Multiple HALs on 1 ghost image]

Here is my attempt at this. http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?s=&amp...st&p=617727 Mysysprep seems like a great utility to me, but I want my image to update the hal regardless of what it is dropped onto. The limitations of my sysprepped image are that you must use windows pe to deploy otherwise the script won't run. Other than that I use my image on quite a few pcs with 3 different hals and have had good luck with it. Good luck to you and if you find a solution that works for you, post it.

[Unexplaned reboots]

I had an issue similar to this and mine turned out to be the hard drive itself. I had tested it numerous times with diagnostics software and it always passed. After changing every other component, I tried an old hard drive. It has worked fine ever since.

[[IR Remote Control] ReMap the buttons?]

I don't know of a way to remap the buttons but you can set windows to ask you what you want to do when pressing the sleep button. Control Panel - Display - Screen Saver - Power - Advanced and set when I press the sleep button on my computer to ask me what to do.

[Can't turn ON XP Firewall]

After a nasty virus infection in a friends computer I followed these instructions to get it to work.

http://forum.oscr.arizona.edu/showthread.php?t=2284

[Sysprep XPsp2 w/ driverpacks (and hal trickery maybe)]

Thanks iceman for the autoit script. I'm going to retry bashrats driver packs again or the ones for ubcd4win and see if it works. I just got too worn out with the clicking. As far as the deployment goes I have ideas but no way to test.

How about booting pe from RIS and run the scripted install I spoke of or for a little more interesting version with no RIS and no sitting in front of a pc...

Send magic packet to all computers in a lab. Have tftpd tell all these to pxe boot and run windows pe from ram and script ghost to drop down multicasted sysprepped image and then run the hal update script.

Granted I've never tried this full setup. I do use wolcmd to wakeup my pcs and currently use tftpd32 to boot pe into memory but have never tried multicasting ghost although I do know ghost is able to run in pe so I assume you can script that setup. I use imagex but it has no support for multicasting that I know of. I love the single instance storage though.

[Sysprep XPsp2 w/ driverpacks (and hal trickery maybe)]

Tron103 helped me with completing my idea/version of this particular project. The process I followed was just to use everybody elses ideas. Maybe this will be of some use to others.

1. I built windows pe 2005 with wmi and all scripting support and all mass storage drivers I need

2. I built an xp box ran sysprep on this image with the buildmassstorage set to yes

3. I extracted the sysprep.inf out of the image created in step 2 and added my own pci\ven codes to sysprep.inf by pulling them from files by using icemanND's script http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=71539 (you can use bashrats mass storage but some error out and I never let it complete because I got tired of clicking on popups) I would recommend only putting in what you'll need in addition to the ones populated from bmsd to save time and effort in running sysprep.

4. Before I ran sysprep on a new machine with my final sysprep.inf, I changed the image to Advanced Configuration and Power Interface (ACPI) PC HAL and a standard ide controller according to the instructions here (at least the hal) http://www.myitforum.com/articles/15/view.asp?id=8997

5. I sysprepped my machine and imaged the result

6. Booting using windows pe I can throw my image on any current box and run the script from step 4 and it will update sysprep.inf with the hal update section it needs, if needed

So there it is in theory, a universally ghostable xp sysprepped setup...at least as universal as the drivers that you add to xp and winpe.

[Registering NFO files to open with Notepad?]

I just registered the extension under my account and exported settings from the registry. You can change the following to default user by just changing the HKCU part. At least that's how I've always done it.

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\FileExts\.nzb]

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\FileExts\.nzb\OpenWithList]
"a"="nbpro.exe"
"MRUList"="a"

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\FileExts\.nzb\OpenWithProgids]
"nzb_auto_file"=hex(0):

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\FileExts\.nzb]

[HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\FileExts\.nzb\OpenWithList]
"a"="nbpro.exe"
"MRUList"="a"

[HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\FileExts\.nzb\OpenWithProgids]
"nzb_auto_file"=hex(0):

[Registering NFO files to open with Notepad?]

I import this during setup and if I double click on a nfo file it opens with notepad.

[HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\FileExts\.nfo]
"Application"="NOTEPAD.EXE"
[HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\FileExts\.nfo\OpenWithList]
"a"="Explorer.exe"
"MRUList"="ba"
"b"="NOTEPAD.EXE"
[HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\FileExts\.nfo\OpenWithProgids]
"MSInfo.Document"=hex(0):

[On my Desktop I can see written following:]

If you can't find the sr.inf I don't know what to tell you. I'm out of ideas at this point. Maybe somebody else will be able to assist you further.

[On my Desktop I can see written following:]

Click Start, Run and type in services.msc and hit enter. Do you see system restore service in the name column? If so, what is the startup type set to? If it is disabled change it to automatic. If you don't see it the service has been deleted.

Also follow these instructions:

* Click Start, Run and type GPEDIT.MSC

* Navigate to this path:

=> Computer Configuration

==> Administrative Templates

===> System

====> System Restore

* Set Turn off System Restore to Not Configured

* Set Turn off Configuration to Not Configured

Click Start, Run and type %windir%\system32\Restore\rstrui.exe and hit enter. Do you get an error? If so post this error or if you don't get an error you should be able to configure your system restore.

If none of this works you might try to reinstall system restore.

[Funny hover issue]

Thank you jeremy for the best reply I've seen on msfn yet.

[On my Desktop I can see written following:]

You should not have that message if it's from the original install disks, but this registry edit should fix it.

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[-HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\SystemCertificates\CA\Certificates\FEE449EE0E3965A5246F000E87FDE2A065FD89D4]

[-HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\SystemCertificates\ROOT\Certificates\2BD63D28D7BCD0E251195AEB519243C13142EBC3]

I found this here http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/regs_edits...topbranding.reg

Also in regards to your system restore, are you running service pack 2? When you right click on My Computer and choose properties do you have the system restore tab? Is the system restore service started?

[Formatting partetion C:]

If you have a copy of windows pe, follow the help file winpe.chm to make a custom copy of windows pe. You would add the line that you said format c: /fs:ntfs /q /y to the file startnet.cmd in the system32 folder. All this file is, is a batch file to execute when windows pe boots. By default it only has the following in it (plus a little message that I removed):

@ECHO OFF
START "Installing Components" /MIN OC2.bat
factory -winpe
@echo off

So yours would look like this

@ECHO OFF
START "Installing Components" /MIN OC2.bat
factory -winpe
@echo off
format c: /fs:ntfs /q /y

If you are familiar with batch files you can do such things as format the drives the way you want using diskpart (there is another way in pe to do it.) You could store your i386 folder on this disc and kickoff your install from there...x:\xp\i386\winnt32.exe /unattend....blah blah. You could kickoff the install over the network since pe supports networking. If you use images you can use ghost 8 in pe which would be the fastest way to get your system up and running. Store your image on another drive, boot to pe which automatically formats c: then loads your image using ghost. PE is a great tool and if you look around in the pe forum you'll find a ton of things you can do with it.

[Manually intergrate hotfixes]

I would think that you are actually integrating them. The process is to extract contents to your random directories then apply them. Did you check your svpack folder to see if there are files in there?

[Formatting partetion C:]

I would say you could just put that command in startnet.cmd. The only problem is that you need to make sure when pe boots that it assigns the appropriate letter to your c drive. No matter my boot order it would assign c to my ide hard drive instead of my sata drive which is not what I wanted.

[help! how can i get termsrv.dll build 2005]

These were not written by me but I've used them successfully on my mce box to administrate it and not bother the regular user that is watching tv.

Here's how to get Windows XP to accept multiple Remote Desktop Connections at one time.

THESE INSTRUCTIONS REQUIRE KNOWLEDGE OF THE WINDOWS REGISTRY AND ARE PROVIDED AS IS, WITHOUT RESPONSIBILITY OF DATA LOSS OR TECHNICAL PROBLEMS. DO NOT APPLY THE FOLLOWING SETTINGS TO SERVERS, COMPUTERS IN A PRODUCTION ENVIRONMENT, OR COMPUTERS WITHOUT FIREWALL PROTECTION.

Print this document before you start doing the following:

1. DISABLE REMOTE DESKTOP CONNECTION (RDC) AND TERMINAL SERVICES

a. Right-click 'My Computer' on the desktop and select 'Properties'

b. Click the 'Remote' tab, and make sure that the 
'Allow users to connect remotely to this computer' 
checkbox is UNCHECKED, then click 'OK'.

c. Start Menu > Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Services

d. Scroll down the list to find 
'Terminal Services'
right-click and select properties. Change the 'Startup Type' drop-down to 'Disabled' (if it is not already), and close the 'Services' window.


2. DISABLE WINDOWS FILE PROTECTION (WFP) TEMPORARILY

a. Open the Registry Editor: Start Menu > Run > 'regedit'
b. Navigate down in the tree to: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon
c. Change the value of the 'SFCDisable' key on the right to '1' and click 'OK'
d. Close the Registry Editor


3. RESTART THE COMPUTER


4. REPLACE THE RELEASE VERSION OF THE TERMINAL SERVICES DLL (TERMSRV.DLL) WITH A PRIOR UNRESTRICTED VERSION OF THE DLL.

a. Save this replacement file to your desktop. This version of termsrv.dll is from Windows XP SP2 RC1, and I have not had any security problems with it personally. 
b. Open Windows Explorer and type in the following location: C:\Windows\system32\dllcache
c. Rename termsrv.dll to something like termsrv1.dll
d. Copy the downloaded version of termsrv.dll into the above folder
e. In Windows Explorer, go up one directory so that you are now looking at: C:\Windows\system32
f. Delete the termsrv.dll file in this directory. Soon WFP will (most likely) re-copy the file even though we (think we) disabled WFP. If it does not re-copy it after about 10 seconds, go ahead and copy the downloaded version to the above directory just like you did in step D, only to the C:\Windows\system32 folder.


5. MAKE THE RDC SETTINGS IN THE WINDOWS REGISTRY ALLOW MORE THAN 2 REMOTE CONNECTIONS AT A TIME

a. Open up the registry editor: Start Menu > Run > 'regedit'
b. Navigate down in the tree to: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Terminal Server\Licensing Core
c. Add a DWORD Key called 'EnableConcurrentSessions' with a value of 1, then close the Registry Editor.
d. Open up the Group Policy Editor: Start Menu > Run > 'gpedit.msc'
Navigate dow in the tree to: Computer Configuration > Administrative Templates > Windows Components > Termina Services. Double-click the item in the list on the right entitled 'Limit number of connections'. Enable it, and set the number of connections to 3 (or whatever you need). Click 'OK'.


6. RESTART THE COMPUTER


7. RE-ENABLE RDC AND TERMINAL SERVICES

a. Go back and check that checkbox we saw in step 1.b, check it, then click 'OK'.
b. Go back to Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Services, find the 'Terminal Services' item, right click on it, and change the 'Startup Type' value back to 'Manual'


8. RESTART THE COMPUTER.

[Windows XP sp2]

I would say the easiest thing to do is to perform a repair installation of xp. Unless you know specifically what hal your computer uses.

[Can you make a Bootable XP CD using nLite]

I would suggest looking at bartpe for that purpose or a custom build of windows pe. Check out http://www.ubcd4win.com/ for a ready made version.

[[XPPRSECT.DAT] Where is it!? Where is this file?!]

Without reading the whole page I'm going to assume it's just a modified version of the bootable sector of a cdrom. Instead of pointing to the i386 folder it will point to another folder so that you may have multiple operating systems stored on 1 disc.

[Creat a defrag task in windows xp]

It shows an analysis first then defrags. It will also show an analysis when it's done. If you notice your hard drive light should show it is quite busy between the two. Type that same command into a command prompt window and you'll see what it does.

[is there anyway to slipstream KB900325 into the cd's?]

I've used this method and it works just fine.

http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=73305

[Multi-CD Install?]

Are you using cdimage or ultraiso to "optimize" the iso before you burn?

[external usb drives not recognized]

If you look under device manager in the usb section does it show an unknown device? Also, has this device been unplugged from the computer without "ejecting" it?

[Recover data from raid1]

Raid 1 means that the data is duplicated across both disks. You should be able to read the data in another computer without problem by just moving 1 disk.