My discoveries about OOBE

[floko84]

Hello fellow unattenders,

I would like to share a few solutions for issues concerning the WinXP post-setup OOBE wizard.

1. Configure Automatic Updates screen wont go away.

Even with

;WINNT.SIF
[Data] AutomaticUpdates = Yes

many people still get that screen. Thats because youre probably importing regtweaks that change the AUOptions value in the registry.

Only if AUOptions is set to 4 (automatic install), OOBE will honor

;OOBEINFO:INI
[Options] SkipAutoUpdate = 1

so you should set the correct AUOptions in a RunOnce-event.

2. OOBE asks to confirm display settings.

You need to set at least

;WINNT.SIF
[Display]
AutoConfirm = 1
;actually ConfigureAtLogon seems to be NT4 legacy, i removed it in mine
;ConfigureAtLogon = 0
Xresolution = 800
Yresolution = 600

and additionally

;OOBEINFO.INI
[StartupOptions] ScreenResolutionCheck = 0

3. Disabling screen Connect me to the internet

Just add

;OOBEINFO.INI
[StartupOptions] Offline = 1

4. Disableing ISP signup

Just delete the [signup] section, #3 will always skip this.

5. Disabling Windows registration

OOBE actually recognizes the infamous registry flag if your Windows is already activated, #3 will always skip this.

To make sure, add

;OOBEINFO.INI
[StartupOptions] Registration = 1

6. OOBE wont get disabled

If you happen to have

;WINNT.SIF
[Unattended] UnattendSwitch = Yes

and OOBE wont go away, delete the line

;OOBEINFO.INI
[Options] IntroOnly = 0

I actually use this with the opposite intention.

7. Creating Users (just for completeness)

;OOBEINFO.INI
[UserInfo]
;000 will rename that standard Administrator account
Identity000="MyAdmin"
Identity001="MyUser1"
Identity002="MyUser2"

Maximun of 6 Users, be aware that all will get administrator privileges.

8. Placement of oobeinfo.ini

These all work fine:

• I386\oobeinfo.in_ (recompressed)
  
• I386\oobeinfo.ini (only if no compressed version present)
  
• $OEM$\$$\system32\oobe\oobeinfo.ini
  

Greetings from Germany,

Flo

Edited October 20, 2007 by floko84

[thepeterp]

Thanks floko84 for your solutions!

I wanted to ask something. I have made 3 different unattended windows installations, 2 with home and 1 with pro, all of them bypassed oobe.

The problem was that windows didn't create any users (just "Owner" for home and "Administrator" for pro) but I wanted to create my own users, didn't activate windows and didn't configure automatic updates.

I used the "$OEM$\$$\system32\oobe\oobeinfo.ini" to create users and the "[Data] AutomaticUpdates = Yes"without results.

I even used "UnattendSwitch = No". I now noticed that I have an "oobeinfo.in_" in my i386 folder. You think that this messed things up?

Thank you vry much!

[floko84]

Hi Peter,

$OEM$\$$\system32\oobe\oobeinfo.ini should overwrite the original one, but a common mistake is to place it in $OEM$\$$\system32\oobeinfo.ini which doesnt work - of course you need "OemPreinstall = Yes" in winnt.sif for it to start the copying.

nLite has the ability to remove the OOBE wizard completely, you should check if you have one to begin with.

This is my oobeinfo.ini, it will skip anything but user creation:

;OOBEINFO.INI
[StartupOptions]
Offline = 1
Registration = 1
ScreenResolutionCheck = 0

[Options]
IntroOnly = 0
NoIspPreconfig = 1
JoinDomain = 0
AdminPW = 0
SkipAutoUpdate = 1

Also i would like to add to #1, i use a batch of registry tweaks 2 times, once in Setup to get the default user, and once as RunOnce to set things that wont get copied from the default user profile. So for Automatic Updates, insted of going through the troubles of creating 2 registry packages, i just include

set RegKey=HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\WindowsUpdate\Auto Update

reg.exe add "%RegKey%" /v AUOptions /t REG_DWORD /d 4 /f

at the end of my cmdlines.txt batches.

Peter, i hope this helps a little.

Flo

Edited October 20, 2007 by floko84

[thepeterp]

Hello again floko!

Unfortunately oobe didn't show up again......

Thank you very much for the automatic updates help, the registry tweak worked fine!

This is my oobeinfo.ini file (I put it in the right folder )

[Options]
IntroOnly = 0
NoIspPreconfig = 1
JoinDomain = 0
AdminPW = 0
SkipAutoUpdate = 1
RemoveOwner=1

[UserInfo]
Identity000 = "Peter"

I also erased the oobeinfo.in_ from the i386 folder and put UnattendSwitch = No in winnt.sif... without results.

Anyway I will try to work with it to see what's wrong.

Thank again!

Edited October 27, 2007 by thepeterp