Some general unattended install questions

[PT145]

Greetings Everyone!

After reading anything I could get my hands on I've decided to attempt slipstreaming a CD but must admit I'm nervous as heck about it.

My situation is that for years I've progressed through the upgrade path where I started with Win95, then up'd to 98, 98SE, ME, XP Home, XP Home SP1 to presently running XP Home SP2 but along the way never did a clean install. As you've guessed things are starting to get unstable and don't know how I've managed this long. Anyway, my questions pertain to the Unattended XP guide hosted by msfn. I've made a CD following as much as possible the instructions in the Beginner Introduction section but only integrated SP2 into XP and did not apply any of the hotfixes, drivers, etc. Ran into problem with my Roxio Easy Media Creator 8 not wanting to make a bootable disk so used CDImage to make the entire disk an ISO image. Then tried installing it into a virtual machine made using EasyVMX. Though I set up a very plain winnt.sif file to do an unattended install still ran into some minor and then major problem. Since my XP Home was an upgrade I was asked to prove I had purchased one of the earlier versions, no problem after I produced one. Then, even though I was going to use a virtual machine I decided to manually format and now for some reason it asked for SP2 CD which I didn't have. Anyway, I digress. Here are my questions.

1. My impression is you can do this for XP Home though the guide seems to be directed towards XP Pro?

2. Given my experience, it's probably better to do this with a non-upgrade type version of XP?

3. In the Finalizing and Testing the CD section there seem to be no instructions on how to get the integrated files into the vitual machine without burning them first to a CD. Thought the whole object of the virtual machine was not to waste burning CDs?

What I suspect is that the best thing to do is probably just go out and buy a retail version of XP Pro and just avoid these problems entirely? Or, would a full version of XP Pro OEM also work and be less expensive. I'd like to tinker with XP since I don't think Vista is going to be ready for prime time anytime soon.

Any comments would be appreciated!

[ricktendo]

*bump*

This is a good question

Im no expert but I think you are fine slipstreaming and updating your XP Home Upgrade CD.

I searched and found this tread http://www.msfn.org/board/index.php?showtopic=72937&hl

Edited August 17, 2006 by ricktendo64

[legionaire]

Referring to question 3: If you're using VMWare Virtual Machine (trial version works fine), you can tell your virtual CD drive to use an .iso image file. Just double click the CD icon in the bottom right corner when the virtual machine is offline.

You stated that you had problems creating a bootable .iso - in this case, try using nlite. You just point it to your XP source folder and select "Create bootable Iso" as the only task. I've created many CD images for use with VMWare this way.

As for the upgrade CD: Of course it would be a lot easier if you just had a XP Professional CD that you could work with. However, that way you'd be paying twice for using Windows XP so I'd rather reproduce the upgrade path (there are unattended installation techniques for Win95-ME available, too) if neccessary. Truth is, Windows ME has very little in common with XP so your upgrade CD will have pretty much the same files as an ordinary retail CD would.

You said that you were asked for the licence key (?) of an older Windows version for the upgrade CD to work - that means that you really need not have Windows ME preinstalled anyway. Regarding the SP2 CD - probably you made a mistake during the slipstreaming process. It could also well be that your upgrade CD won't allow SP2 to be slipstreamed. In that case, you could easily incorporate an unattended installation of SP2 into your unattended CD using a .cmd file (start /wait SP2.exe /q /n /z)

[Triel]

Ok, I am also no pro but I have completed the Unattended install portion and have moved in the Advanced portion of Unatttended. This is how I did mine.

I followed everything the guide stated till i got to what program to use to burn it. I created the boot.bin file with-in 'nLite" and the moved to PowerISO 3.1. That is when I created the ISO, making it bootable with the boot.bin file. I then moved to testing the OS with VMware (a virtual machine). I then corrected any and all errors and created a final ISO with PowerISO. I know many in this forum will say not to use PowerISO for this since they have had issues, but I have experienced no issues what so ever with PowerISO and will continue to use it.

Ok, now that I have the ISO created, tested, and true I moved to burning it. I first used PowerISO to burn it and had no issues. Just for luck I switched to burning it with Roxio Easy Media Creator 8, just for the slower burn speed. One note is to never burn a Windows OS using higher then 4Mb sec since it may cause errors. That is why I used the 1Mb sec in Roxio. I right-clicked the ISO and choose "Burn with Disc Copier", I think that is what it is called. Then I choose the slowest speed possible. For me 1Mb sec since I used DVD was the choice but I do not think CD burning will allow that slow of speed in Roxio.

Anyway, that is how I did it. Now maybe others with add their 2 cents in on this and we can get you through the process as painless as possible.

[Takeshi]

1. The process also works for XP HE.

3. Make the iso first, then use the iso as the CDROM.

Edited August 17, 2006 by Takeshi

[tbs]

PT145, firstly I'm impressed you managed to upgrade so many windows versions on top of each other, microsoft would be proud ;-)

As for the upgrade cd these are fine to use, although as you have discovered you need to provide a cd of an older windows version. Not a real problem.

you are taking the right approach by testing first in vm, keep it simple and make sure the process works well before you move onto the next stage. I'd suggest slipstreaming the cd to SP2 & using ryanvm's update pack (which will save you time on windows update & ensure the system is up to date patch-wise before you start going online). Then concentrate on winnt.sif and don't move on until that is working correctly. You can then start on your system tweaks & adding applications etc. By then you'll have caught the unattended bug and for that you need time & patience. This forum is not the cure, it’s just a symptom!

When you come to install on a live system I'd suggest the following;

Back-up anything you don't want to lose. Back-up the back-up!

Insert your slipstreamed cd and boot to it. windows will copy some files.

swap the cds when asked to confirm your previous windows version.

When asked where to install windows, delete all partitions on the hard drive - you backed everything up right? format with ntfs file system

Setup will then ask you to insert the sp2 disc - this is normal, you slipstreamed the xp home cd to SP2 remember?

Setup will continue and tell you how great windows xp is going to be....

The main problem you may run into is with hardware drivers. Remember a virtual machine is virtual, if you have a raid setup or SATA drivers you'll need the drivers for these to install on a real machine. The unattended guide covers how to include drivers on your cd.

If you have questions - read the guides and forum as much as you can and if you can't find an answer search for it here on the forum, or post a question (sometimes it’s difficult to search if you are new to the terminology).

most of all have fun, tbs

[PT145]

I would like to thank everyone who responded to my questions. Your comments are very constructive and I will be checking each one of them out. As recommended, my plan is to start slowly and as each iteration works out to continue building upon it until I have the CD I want. You've answered my main concern and that is that I can continue doing this with the upgrade version of the XP disk so you've saved me some dollars!

As I've been researching this topic I have been collecting the information and software recommend and have been saving it to a folder I titled "slipstream" for easy access. It's just that, and I don't fault the authors, some of us have varying levels experience or should I say inexperience and some authors write at different levels and assume the audience can fill in the blanks on what could be construed as simple basic stuff. It's those blanks sometimes that often require clarification and I appreciate you taking the time to help me.

This looks to be a valuble and fun exercise to do and I hope to contribute later on how things work out.

Regards to all!

[PT145]

Greetings all, hope you had a nice weekend! I spent mine trying to narrow down what updates I will need to get that have come out since WinXP Home SP2 became available.

Again, I’m trying to make my XP Home work unattended before I give up and buy a full XP Pro.

To put together my list I went to the MS TechNet site and used their Search By Product form:

Product = Windows XP Home Edition

Service Pack = Windows XP Service Pack 2

[Didn’t check the box for “Show only bulletins … recent update.]

[Did check boxes for “Critical” “Important” “Moderate” and “Low”]

Bulletin release date: “All”

This search produced 84 items. Then out of curiosity I ran the above search exactly the same way except for Windows XP Professional. This search produced 85 items with 84 items being exactly identical to the XP Home run.

Put this information into a spreadsheet as the baseline (included the XP Pro item from above). By leaving that one box unchecked above it showed what had been replaced and by what.

Now I merged RyanVm’s Windows XP Post-SP2 Update Pack Version 2.1.1 as best I could. As a double check against Microsoft I also used RyanVM’s Update Pack Changelog to see what had been replaced. I could be wrong but suspect RyanVm’s product is also geared towards XP Pro.

Next I merged the August Full release of AutoPatcher though there was no way to figure out what replaced what but nonetheless was very helpful.

Finally, and again the list was geared to XP Pro SP2, I merged Incroyable HULK’s one stop post for Windows critical updates as of today.

Naturally, there were some differences between the sources, as was to be expected. Using Microsoft as the baseline, since one would think they should know what they’re doing, the differences include some KBs being omitted; others included even though they had been replaced; and some listed but not on the baseline.

One more thing I intend to do, once I get my virtual machine going, is visit the Microsoft Update site using a CD with only SP2 applied but with no post SP2 updates, I want to see the list they generate.

But as a result of the exercise today, I have more questions.

1. As I firm up what the SP2 post updates are can I just install them or do I also have to install the ones that had been replaced because they might leave something behind or just need to be there to get moded or update somehow?

2. I have what looks like some legacy stuff showing as being installed prior to SP2. Probably showing up because as I mentioned in my earlier post I’ve been doing continuous upgrades basically without a clean install. Now my question is can I uninstall any of this without a major breakdown since I thought when SP2 came out it included everything prior to it in its install?

I was going to try to upload my spreadsheet but system didn't like Excel file extension. If anyone is interested to see it how can I do it. What file extensions are acceptable?

[Takeshi]

One more thing I intend to do, once I get my virtual machine going, is visit the Microsoft Update site using a CD with only SP2 applied but with no post SP2 updates, I want to see the list they generate.

That's I believe, how Incroyable HULK lists come about and that can be relied upon. You shouldn't need to add older hotfixes that have since been replaced with newer versions. There're also updates that aren't security hotfixes, but merely optional software updates.

You can zip the file before uploading.