renthead Posted September 19, 2007 Share Posted September 19, 2007 My company has taken over a desktop situation that is a complete disaster. The users have myspaceim, video games, aim, some random wallpaper programs...pretty much a ton of bloatware. The machines are all different models and brands so I cant just reghost all the machines. Ideally, I would like to be able to retain the data on the machines (some of the machines have apps that need to be on there like their sql database front end and it is a pain to reinstall) and I also don't want to have to go to each machine and just clean each one up (I tried on one, it took almost an hour to uninstall all the carp they had on their machine, and that was a light one). I was thinking of setting up my ideal machine, using sysprep, and then run that to install, but...my question becomes, is that really going to remove the programs I don't want, it seems it just reinstalls windows, which doesn't really do much to aid in my issues of the third party apps. Is there another solution to "mass-clean" the workstations, its about 30-40 total. Any ideas for the brain storm? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jcarle Posted September 20, 2007 Share Posted September 20, 2007 My suggestion is to re-install Windows on each one and then lock the workstation so that the users can no longer modify them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eyeball Posted September 20, 2007 Share Posted September 20, 2007 wow that is difficult,my advice would be to do this in a phased approach, split the machines into 5's or something and do them a few at a time and give them time to use them and find errors. Identify problems as you go along and build the fixes into the next lot you roll out.It may take a while but it will work hope it helps Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tap52384 Posted September 20, 2007 Share Posted September 20, 2007 If I am not mistaken, is Vista HAL-independent, meaning that one image can be put on any machine regardless of hardware differences?Perhaps talk to your boss about upgrading to Vista to avoid these problems or getting identical computers for everyone. In the meantime, since you have to do something to clean these computers, why not set them up ideally and then take a snapshot with ImageX and store them on a server somewhere so that this problem can be more easily rectified in the future?Are there no machines that are the same there? Are these all personal computers? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tap52384 Posted September 20, 2007 Share Posted September 20, 2007 If I am not mistaken, is Vista HAL-independent, meaning that one image can be put on any machine regardless of hardware differences?Perhaps talk to your boss about upgrading to Vista to avoid these problems or getting identical computers for everyone. In the meantime, since you have to do something to clean these computers, why not set them up ideally and then take a snapshot with ImageX and store them on a server somewhere so that this problem can be more easily rectified in the future?Are there no machines that are the same there? Are these all personal computers? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eyeball Posted September 20, 2007 Share Posted September 20, 2007 (edited) u really think these users would be happy to go to vista?1) they wont have great hardware so it will be slow2) its different - scary for users3) their programs may not run properly on itim sure there are more reasons why not to move them all to vista. Edited September 20, 2007 by eyeball Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
renthead Posted September 20, 2007 Author Share Posted September 20, 2007 I flat out refuse to put them on vista, most of the machines are barely capable of running xp pro (256 RAM) and it is a non-profit, so I dont see them spending much money. Like I said, unless absoulutly necessary, I really want to avoid reinstalling/ghosting windows Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cluberti Posted September 20, 2007 Share Posted September 20, 2007 I flat out refuse to put them on vista, most of the machines are barely capable of running xp pro (256 RAM) and it is a non-profit, so I dont see them spending much money. Like I said, unless absoulutly necessary, I really want to avoid reinstalling/ghosting windowsThat's fine, but there's no real "automated" way to clean this, it's a one machine at a time per admin deal if you don't want to reinstall. You either spend the time creating / testing an image and deploying it, or spend time (likely the same amount) cleaning as best you can the machines in their current state.There are pros and cons to each approach, so you'll have to determine wich you want to do. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hazard_abio Posted September 20, 2007 Share Posted September 20, 2007 If anything that I can see build a Autoinstall CD with all the drivers and such on It, then go from there, basically cut down the amount of time you spend at each computer to a couple of minutes for starting the installation. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bbone Posted September 20, 2007 Share Posted September 20, 2007 I believe that it become necessary reinstall each of the machines, but then lock the users in their user modes......and create a backup when the machine is freshly installed and fully working for each one. That way you can later resume back to working state in just like 5 min...DriveImage is preffered, IMHO. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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