Unattend Problem: Monitor Drivers?

[Chireven]

I have a simple unattended install.

The HD is formated and the i386 directory is copied down to the C: (C:\i386). In the Unattend.txt, I specify the OEM Driver path to look in C:\Drivers\Auido;C:\Drivers\Video;C:\Drivers\Modems;C:\Driver\Network;C:\Drivers\Chipset

This way, I use it to install to multiple workstation types, I just have to extract the drivers to the proper location before I run the setup. Works great!

But I recently received a Dell D400 laptop and tried this method. Everything works fine, but I have one problem. While it is installing drivers, it prompts me for the location of drivers for new hardware. Turns out that this hardware is the display panel.

There are no special drivers; it use the standard plug and play driver. If I walk through the new hardware wizard, it picks up and continues unattended. This is the only model I've seen this happen on.

My goal is a totally unattended install. Anyone know why it stops and asks me for driver locations? Better yet -- any input on how to fix it?

I've looked for monitor drivers on dells site and they don't offer any additional monitors. Just seems weird to me that ever since I added the video drivers to the unattend, this has been happening.

Any input is appraciated!

Thanks for all your responces, and all the hard work you guys put into this forum. Much appreciated!

-joe

[rdalling]

Dell is notorious for doing this, I have had this and other similar problems and to date have been unable to resolve them.

The other problem I have had is trying to get the auto-build to install Dell based monitors rather than the Default Monitor.

Anybody have any ideas?

R

[Incroyable HULK]

Are you sure the setup is halting? I am asking because during my unattended install I get a New Hardware Wizard Panel but the thing is I don't have to do anything.

During this phase, Setup is looking to all your hardware and when the Video Card is detected, it ask for Monitor drivers.

So I am asking: Is it really halted or setup will continue and finish without any intervention?

[rdalling]

For me it stops completely and asks for a driver disk. I can click next and it will continue without a disk (the files it needs are already on the drive)

[Chireven]

I'm pretty sure it's halting, but I didn't let it sit long. I don't see any hard drive activity, and since both source media and destination are on the local C: drive, I'd expect to see quite a bit of it.

I will run through another install and let it sit for 10-15 minutes and see if it continues on. If it does, I'm not going to worry about it. If it doesn't, then I'm going to have people screaming at me! lol

Thanks for the input... I'll post an update when I get a chance. It could be a while, because I don't have any D400's left (had to deploy that one to a user!).

Thanks!

-joe

[keikun]

It is an old thread but I'm rising it now because I have the same problem with a laptop. It is not a dell but an unknown source (honk kong).

but it gives me the same wizard.

I will just try to change the resolution parameters in the winnt.sif.

but any clue about this ?

thanks !

[Shamwari]

I have the same issue with Dell laptop. Prompts to install driver during unattended install. Looking for PnP monitor. If I just ignor this message, setup continues eventually, and the driver seems to be installed correctly- i.e. generic PnP monitor with no exclaimation marks under Device Manager.

If I use the Dell restore disk, the exact same drivers are used, i.e. generic PnP monitor.

For me, this only happens on Dell laptops. What causes this prompt, I have no idea, but if I ignor it, the installation completes unattendedly as usual.

[RobMac]

Well, atleast I'm not the only one trying to overcome this issue.

But let me explain what is really happening. Setup **apears** to halt. It is actually still going i nthe background. I promise you, if you walk away and come back like 5 minutes later, setup will have moved on.

Yes, it's anoying, yes it's dells fault, but no, it's not stopping your unattend

I noticed the issue on latitude d610 's. We have a RIS server with a mess of stuff integrated, everything is unattended, office 2003, winzip, adobe, dells wlan drivers.

The only issue was that hardware wizard during setup. So i checked around, ALOT of people are having the same issue. But if you were to sit and wait, without clicking next, I'm sure it would continue, all of my RIS installs take off after about 3 minutes.

I have only noticed this on the latitude d610, it's never come up on the d810 once out of about a hundred or so. It appears to be when windows detects the video card, it automatically prompts for your pnp monitor driver. Eventually, if you don't supply one, it defaults to the generic one.

The kicker? the generic one IS the driver! It's just a dumb little glitch that wastes about 5 minutes of your time, but rest assured, everyone I know having this issue has the same results as me. Leave that window alone, 5 minutes later it continues setup, and the monitor is installed fine.

When you see that hardware wizard appear, go have a smoke, when you get back, if it's stil lthere, have another smoke, it will be gone by then

P.S. if anyone finds an easy solution for this other than forcing the drivers with additional files, please let us all know!

Edited November 25, 2005 by RobMac

[RogueSpear]

I've done both CD based and RIS based installs on a wide range of Latitudes and Inspiron laptops and have never seen this behavior during a setup. In fact Dell laptops are among the few units that I've run into that never give me issues. HP-Compaq laptops on the other hand.. well there isn't enough room here to go into all of that.