New to unattend.xml - 2 quick questions

[Stilez]

I'm enjoying my first toe dipping iinto sysprep, WAIK and MSIM. The actual final deployment ISO will be deployed attended but I want to make my life easy. Ideally I'd like to customise some settings and just set a more accurate default for others, so that mostly I can "default install".

I don't fully understand yet what stage to add an option when there's a choice. Two examples:

• "ShowWindowsLive" can be added to 4 different passes: auditSystem, auditUser, oobeSystem, specialize
• Synchronous commands/runsynchronous can be added in quite a few different ways.

Although the passes themselves are explained, Help doesn't give any obvious guide to figure out which section to put an item in, or what the effect would be of putting it in the other locations. I can't find a clear guide on google either.

What I'm hoping for is clear advice or a short tutorial (or link to one) that explains how to tell which section to add an option to, if there's multiple options, or the implication of adding to different sections.

Also a quick question on UI customising: of all the various unattend.xml UI options, which ones specify that by default this will be a user/system in Locale X and keyboard Y with regional settings Z, and make the finished installer default to that language/keyboard/regional setting, but allow the user to change/customise this during setup?

Thanks!

Edited July 28, 2011 by Stilez

[Tripredacus]

I'd put ShowWindowsLive in oobeSystem pass, but if it doesn't work, then try Specialize. You can ignore the other two passes.

[Stilez]

I'd put ShowWindowsLive in oobeSystem pass, but if it doesn't work, then try Specialize. You can ignore the other two passes.

Thanks Trip'. That was more intended as an example though. There's several commands that can be put in different places and I'm looking for general guidance more than help with the one specific setting.

Settings where it's not sure which pass to use, or the effect of putting them in the different passes:

• Name, ComputerName (ie default name for new deployment) - Specialize, auditSystem
• Reseal, ForceShutdownNow - auditSystem, auditUser, oobeSystem
• DriverPaths (extra mass storage + modem drivers) - offlineServicing, windowsPE
• InputLocale, SystemLocale, UserLocale, UILanguage - see above, I'd like to set a default locale and UI language for the installer and for the installed system, ideally with user confirmation in the installer.
• ShowWindowsLive - (answered already)

Not as many as I thought.

Edited July 28, 2011 by Stilez

[Tripredacus]

I never have seen the reason to specify anything in the Audit Pass. You'd only want Reseal to be used to go to Audit system. You would only use Reseal with oobeSystem in an answer file using sysprep and the /unattend switch.

For best examples, look at the sample files here:

[Octopuss]

Might as well post here insead of starting a thread.

In SIM, I can click around and add components to various installation phases. That's clear enough. But:

1) Under components, I see plenty of things. That makes sense (lol). But it looks like the same stuff, only some start with amd64, some with x86 and some with wow64. Do I need set a particular thing up in each of them? Or what's the deal here?

2) How do I know where to add a component when there are several phases available? This was asked before but not answered in a way that'd give me a hint.

3) Where am I supposed to find the values to type in? Of course some are covered in the help and some even have specific values to be chosen from. Some do not though. Is it just about Google then?

4) I already have a bunch of registry tweaks I apply to an image before I sysprep it. I see some of these can be set in the unattended file as well. Shall I not bother (setting something twice should not do any harm, shall it?) or shall remove them from the .reg file?

ad 4) example: in SIM I can set lots of options for IE, but I couldn't find the one that sets tabs options. If I go into audit mode and configure IE, and unattended settings are applied during the installation, will they overwrite anything I set before? (including reg tweaks I possibly import even before syspreping)

Edited August 6, 2011 by TheWalrus

[Stilez]

Under components, I see plenty of things. That makes sense (lol). But it looks like the same stuff, only some start with amd64, some with x86 and some with wow64. Do I need set a particular thing up in each of them? Or what's the deal here?

I figured that one out. The unattend.xml file has parallel settings to accommodate the different kinds of systems you might use it on. So if you create an unattend.xml and use it to install Win7 x32, the installer will look at the x86 items but ignore the "amd64" (MS-speak for x64) items, and if you're installing Win7 x64 the installer ignores the x86 items and looks at both amd64 and WoW64 and you probably want to set both of these. Why both amd64 and WoW64? Because 64 bit windows contains a "windows on windows" (WoW) system to handle 32 bit apps.

Example: On Windows 7 x32, IE9 will be affected by settings under x86 sections. On Windows 7 x64, IE9 can be run both 64 or 32 bit, it includes both versions. IE9 64 bit (and other 64 bit s/w) will be affected by "amd64" settings and IE9 32 bit (and other 32 bit s/w) will be affected by "WoW64" settings.

Edited August 6, 2011 by Stilez

[Octopuss]

Ouch, that sucks. I am sure I will forget to add some of those to wow

My 2) question is probably the biggest concern. Like "Microsoft-Windows-IE-ClientNetworkProtocolImplementation", which can be added to specialize and OOBE phases. I don't get that at all.

edit: Oh I see some of the values apply to one pass and some to another - just need to figure out whether there are such that can be applied to both!

Edited August 6, 2011 by TheWalrus

[maxXPsoft]

be careful adding anything, they crash you if wrong. Do not add Default values either

many many installs testing stuff told me this

Best to test in VM

Edited August 6, 2011 by maxXPsoft

[Octopuss]

That's what I do as well. Already found out about a few reg tweaks that completely screw installation up if they are added, like disabling WinDefender.

What kind of default values do you mean?

I am going through SIM atm, looking at stuff I can do there and eventually deleting those things from my tweaks if they are doable through unattended file. The pretweaks as I call them should be harmless enough in most cases, It's pretty much all those folder options, context menu items, etc. Gotta test more though, because I also set temp variables and page file there, which smells of trouble

[maxXPsoft]

Microsoft-Windows-Shell-Setup | OEMInformation | HelpCustomized

false

Specifies that Help is not customized. This is the default value.

<OEMInformation>

<HelpCustomized>false</HelpCustomized>

just right click on the setting and choose Help

Edited August 6, 2011 by maxXPsoft

[Octopuss]

I will add one more question. Getting close to being done with my image, but integrating drivers is left to do. I would like to do it in an elegant way, probably to have them on the DVD instead of manually injecting them into the image so I don't have to redo it in future. I guess I should use SIM, but I am a bit (quite a lot) confused about the process there.

[maxXPsoft]

Only .inf drivers can be added to a Windows image by using this procedure. Drivers packaged as an .exe file or other file types must be installed on a running Windows operating system.

$OEM$\$1\Drivers

     <settings pass="windowsPE">
        <component name="Microsoft-Windows-PnpCustomizationsWinPE" processorArchitecture="amd64" publicKeyToken="31bf3856ad364e35" language="neutral" versionScope="nonSxS" xmlns:wcm="http://schemas.microsoft.com/WMIConfig/2002/State" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance">
            <DriverPaths>
                <PathAndCredentials wcm:action="add">
                    <Path>%systemdrive%\Drivers</Path>
                </PathAndCredentials>
            </DriverPaths>
        </component>
    </settings>

I think that will work but haven't tried it. Using $OEM$ Drivers folder should be there when needed

Edited August 7, 2011 by maxXPsoft

[Octopuss]

Are you sure it's Microsoft-Windows-PnpCustomizationsWinPE and not the "nonPE" component?

[maxXPsoft]

nonPE goes in offline servicing. WinPE is <settings pass="windowsPE">

I am trying this as soon as my .msu finishes

Processing 16 of 48 - Adding package D:\Se7en_UA\HFixes\Windows6.1-KB2496898-v3-x64.msu

Use instead

<Path>%systemdrive%\Drivers</Path>

There are some other things I'll have after my VM test

[Octopuss]

I know, but I thought that adding drives in WinPE pass only applies to the setup...

Gonna try it anyway, we will see...