gentoobox

That's stupid... Sorry, but I really think that it's stupid. Think about it, it would be easier for me to just crack the activation of Vista and never worry about it again. But HEY, when you buy the crap they make you jump on their command. Well, guess i need to call Microsoft a few times, if it costs me anything, I will remove the activation. About the second thing: Well, yes.... The first place I looked was in network. It's nowhere to be found. I only get a list of computers, but only see about 10. Some from other workgroups than myself. I'm in a network with 500 other people, i should be able to see more than 10 Just like I do in Windows XP and Gentoo Linux.

Hi. I just bought Windows Vista Home Premium 64bit OEM, but I have not yet activated it, because I don't know if there is an activation count. Do you know if there is such a thing in this edition of Windows Vista? I would become broke if there is since I reinstall often and don't have any money (I'm a 6'th year student) By the way, can it list the netowork workgroups? Windows XP Pro had a "View Workgroup" like inside my network places, but I can't seem to find it in Vista"

Dont forget that Linux users (Yep, they do exist) dont have IE as an option. The same goes for mac users.

any word on a Linux version yet ?

use VirtualPC - you can setup virtualpc to NOT save changes. or use deepfreeze to restore the OS back to it's defaults.

I saw someone on the forum doing that with BartPE (or WindowsPE) Install a version of BartPE on your RIS server (you should remove as much from the installation as you can for faster startup) make a script that deletes the partitions from the harddisk and then start the Windows XP installation. Do you know about UseWholeDisk, Repartition and autopartition options in the ris answer (.sif) file ? Are you deploying RISprep images or fresh installations with RIS ? Further discussion should be made in a new thread.

When a installation of Windows XP starts up with RIS, it starts by copying the i386 folder to the local harddrive. if there is a distribution folder, it will also be copyed. next it starts the normal Windows XP instalation, no diffrent to if it was started by a bootable CD. With your method of installation, all the driverpacks will get copyed to the local harddrive by the distribution folder. A script will be started, unpacking the drivers and found by Windows XP plug-and-play under the installation. That's nice, but not if you have a newer netcard than windows XP supports. You will get an error that your netcard is unsupported, and then the network administrator has to include the driver in the installation by copying it to the i386 folder. (no need to copy it to the distribution folder because of the driverpacks inclued) The text portion of the Windows Installation need the drivers because it swithes from PXE (UNDI) to SMB mode. I also dont see the point of compressing the pnf files as they are auto-generated by the binlsvc service when you include a new driver. We have 21 Windows XP installations and 5 Windows 2003 installations in RIS. we also have about 15 diffrent client netcards. When a new client arrives, we have to include a new network adaptor, and the driverpacks from BTS is a wonderfull source. ---- Are you sure it's a good idea to compress all those files (in the guide) netcards supported by a normal Windows XP SP2 RIS installation is no longer supported when i compress the drivers (sys, inf files) ---- My posts are ment to improve your guide and not to question your knowledge about RIS and unattended Windows XP installations.

Hi. 1. What is the meaning of including BTS DriverPack when it's not used for RIS? All the drivers are i packed stage when the RIS setup starts, and if you have a unsupport netcard, you will get an error telling you that windows does not support your NIC. [EDIT] Dont you have to extract all the drivers into the i386 folder before RIS can use them? [/EDIT] 2. Should the $OEM$ folder not be located in the i386 folder and not in the root of the RIS image ? or does windows search all folders (and subfolders) for the $oem$ folder and use %SystemRoot% as an alias ?