Windows 7 + Office 2007: Best Practices?

[daveryanschultz]

I'm looking for the best method for installing Office 2007 when installing Windows 7. My company wants me to create a universal method of installing Windows 7, Office 2007, Adobe Flash Player, Adobe Reader, Java, and SAP.

In the past I was using Windows Backup to create an image for every model of laptop that we have here at our main HQ. That's a pain because every image is different, sometimes they are out of date, and they are incompatible with new PC's as we get new models.

I'm using RT 7Lite to slipstream SP1 and around 100ish other updates into Windows 7 32-bit. I'm also using it to slip the drivers in for all our different PC models.

Where I am struggling is getting Office 2007 into the entire process. I want Office 2007 to install at the end of the Windows 7 installation. I want to use a custom installation I created using the setup.exe /admin command. I don't want to use network shares; it should all be contained on the USB stick. What is the best way to go about doing that? Is there a way to use RT 7Lite?

Thanks so much for your time/effort/help.

[cluberti]

If you're prestaging the files for the install locally on the disk, you could always use setupcomplete.cmd to install. I'd always prefer tools like MDT for creating installations, but if you just want a quick and easy way, you can always prestage the files on the hard disk of the image (so it's IN the WIM file) and run it from there - otherwise, if the USB key is attached, use setupcomplete.cmd to loop through drives until it finds the setup file and run it that way.