frustrated newbie.... cant get anything to work :(

[redax]

if you feel annoyed by newbie-questions that could have been answered by some old and hard to find threads, please stop reading HERE! and please post all those hidden links!!

hi guys!

i'm very new here and i need your help! my first intention was to find out how to change the default windows directories, but the more i read in your forum, the more i start liking all the rest that can be done with an unattended install.

but..

i havent even succeeded doing the simplest unattended install possible with the minimal winnt.sif documented in the ref.chm file! i always get blue screens or error dialogs. i tried different basic winnt.sif's, different slipstreamings and both virtualPC and vmware. --- should i even try a real installation!?

can anyone post a minimal and working winnt.sif and some basic instructions so i can experience one single errorfree and unattended installation? i would be so happy!!

my setup:

Windows XP Pro

SP1a

used tools:

setupmgr.exe

ref.chm

CDImage + cmd file by someone else

vmware, virtualPC

unattendedScript by DaveXP

Winntsif.exe

http://unattended.msfn.org/xp/reference.htm

if you feel annoyed by EVEN MORE newbie-questions that could have been answered by some threads EASY to find, please stop reading IMMEDIATELY!

Some other stupid questions, (if you like answering newbie-posts):

why not just writing one huge MASTER_BATCH_FILE, which i will doubleclick after a simple unattended install versus writing different scripts scattered through the whole installation process?

is there a GOOD GUIDE where all those "entrypoints" (cmdlines, guyrunonce etc.) are listed, explained and compared?

is this hive-editing thing something i should use?

when do i have to use quotation marks in the winnt.sif?

are the parameter-names case sensitive?

are the parameter-values case sensitive?

which parameters must be present in all winnt.sif's? all those in ref.chm?

i want to install via network or via second harddrive/partition. how is this done?

ok, thats it for now. thanx to everybody who is reading THIS!!

cu all in my next post!

- redax

[DarkPhoenix]

why not just writing one huge MASTER_BATCH_FILE, which i will doubleclick after a simple unattended install versus writing different scripts scattered through the whole installation process?

Because... that wouldn't make it unattended, now would it?

[redax]

it could be much more unattended anyway! ok. if its too stressful to start a master batch file, you can put this one in runonce. but my real question was that after that batch file question.

[Dustinwmew]

quotation marks are used so that the command line knows that it is one thing when you have gaps. (ex. "c:\documents and setings\").

The best way to start your 1st winnt.sif is to go to the SUPPORT\TOOLS folder on the CD open the DEPLOY.CAB, and run setupmgr.exe. After that makes a winnt.sif you can add things to it.

edit:: try the unattended home page, then after reading it goto the links on that site others.

[redax]

then i dont need quitation marks for param=YES or param=1 ? i was confused because both setupmgr.exe and winntsif.exe do use quotation marks at certain (random?) values which are just YES or 1

i tried to generate a winnt.sif via setupmgr, but this one brought up an error-dialog during the install.

[Stinger12348]

maybe you should tell us the error you are getting and maybe we can try to see what you are doing wrong. Or post your winnt.sif.

[redax]

this file was generated by setupmgr:

;SetupMgrTag
[Data]
    AutoPartition=1
    MsDosInitiated="0"
    UnattendedInstall="Yes"

[Unattended]
    UnattendMode=FullUnattended
    OemSkipEula=Yes
    OemPreinstall=No
    TargetPath=\WINDOWS

[GuiUnattended]
    AdminPassword="aaaa"
    EncryptedAdminPassword=NO
    AutoLogon=Yes
    AutoLogonCount=1
    OEMSkipRegional=1
    TimeZone=85
    OemSkipWelcome=1

[UserData]
    ProductID=XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX
    FullName="xxxxx"
    OrgName=""
    ComputerName=bbbb

[Identification]
    JoinWorkgroup=WORKGROUP

[Networking]
    InstallDefaultComponents=Yes

now ill try this with virtualpc.

[redax]

....

(see my attached file)

edit: the installation FAILED!! look at my screenshots

2.zip

[lpl]

hi..im a newbie myself but i've encountered the same problem before... this happened when i had installed xp successfully on VPC and tried to reinstall over it...

this article has some info you might find useful...

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?...3&Product=winxp

however that didn't solve my problem...in fact my problem never got solved. i just deleted the whole virtual machine file and created a new one..never had that problem again this way

hope this helps.

[redax]

thanks but this didnt help too.

again:

i copied the whole XPCD to harddisk

i used the file listed above as winnt.sif in the i386 folder.

i created an image with CDImage and the bootstrap image.

i used a fresh VirtualPC installation on a fresh w2k installation.

at T-39 i got some error messages.

where is my fault???

[lpl]

i googled, and this's the only url that popped up on your specific error...

http://www.sitepoint.com/forums/archive/index.php/t-88869

seems hard-ware (RAM) related. ?!?

[Lord Jericho]

Did you slipstream your sp1a into your xpcd folder before using the "Windows XP Service Pack 1 Deployment Tools" ?

Did you actually change the "XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX" by a working cd key? (we never know hehe )

Did you try partitioning your VirtualPC partition by yourself when testing installtation using "AutoPartition=0" ?

[redax]

thanks for all comments!

i tried a simple SP1ed unattended cd on another (real) computer (notebook) and everything went fine!

seems to be either VirtualPC or my first computer that caused the problems. i'm confused....