Deploying Windows 7 - Part 1. Capturing and Deploying an Image of a Reference Computer. If you would like to read previous articles in this series, please go to: Tip: You can find more information about automating LTI deployment in the Windows 7 Resource Kit from Microsoft Press. I'm the lead author for this Resource Kit and I also maintain the Unofficial Support Site for the Windows 7 Resource Kit where you will find the latest updates and other useful information.
This series of articles on deploying Windows 7 continues with a walkthrough of how to capture and deploy an image of a reference computer. Make the most of your screen captures. TinyTake gives you all the tools to capture, annotate, and share screen captures and screen casts for free. Updated: October 20, 2013. Applies To: Windows 8, Windows 8.1, Windows Server 2008 R2, Windows Server 2012. Create and Capture Windows 10 Reference Image with Windows Deployment Services on Windows Server 2016. The simple steps to capture the reference PC with WDS.
Introduction. In articles 6 and 7 of this series we examined how to perform a simple, automated deployment of Windows 7 Enterprise by performing a Lite Touch Installation (LTI) using MDT 2. Then in article 8 we examined the Custom. Settings. ini and Bootstrap.
In larger organizations however, performing one- off installs of Windows is too simplistic. Instead, you will want to do first create a reference computer, that is, a computer that is configured exactly how you want your users' computers to be configured. Then you will want to capture the image of this reference computer and import the captured image into your deployment share. Finally, you will want to deploy this captured image to your users' computers, that is, the target computers for the deployment. This is what we will look at in this present article. Step 1: Install the Reference Computer and Capture its Image.
After your planning work has been done, the first step in image- based deployment is to install your reference computer. As discussed in article 9 of this series, we are going to focus here on deploying Windows 7 Enterprise x.
So begin by opening the Deployment Workbench on your technician computer, expand your deployment share, right- click on the Operating Systems folder, and select Import Operating System. Then follow the steps of the Import Operating System wizard to import a full set of source files from your Windows 7 Enterprise X6. DVD. Once you have finished the import process, your Deployment Workbench will look like Figure 1 below: Figure 1: Windows 7 Enterprise x. Tip: To speed the OS import process, first copy all the files and folders from the Windows DVD to a local folder on your technician computer, then import the OS from this local folder instead of from the DVD itself. Next, create a new task sequence for deploying Windows onto your reference computer.
In your deployment share, right- click on the Task Sequences node and select New Task Sequence to start the wizard. Type WIN7. EX6. 4. Then on the Select OS page, select the Windows 7 Enterprise x. Figure 3): Figure 3: Associating an operating system with the task sequence. Complete the New Task Sequence Wizard in the usual way. Your new task sequence will be displayed in Deployment Workbench along with other task sequences you previously created (see Figure 4): Figure 4: There are two task sequences in this deployment share. Now, before you deploy Windows to your reference computer, you need to make some changes to the Custom.
Settings. ini file on your technician computer. Right- click on your deployment share and select Properties, then select the Rules tab to display the contents of Custom. Settings. ini. Modify what you see here so that it looks like Figure 5 below: Figure 5: Modifying the Custom.
Settings. ini file for deploying Windows to the reference computer. Let us compare our new Custom. Settings. ini file with the one we previously used in article 7 of this series for performing a completely unattended install.
The table below shows these two configuration files side by side with the new file on the left and with differences highlighted in bold: Custom. Settings. ini file for deploying Windows to reference computer. Customsettings. ini file for performing a completely automated LTI. Making this change means that the Select A Task Sequence To Execute On This Computer page of the Windows Deployment Wizard will be displayed on the client (the reference computer) when the install is performed. Second, note that the value of Skip. Capture has been changed from YES to NO. This means that the Specify Whether To Capture An Image page of the Windows Deployment Wizard will also be displayed on the client when the install is performed.
Also, note that the Join. Domain and related properties are no longer specified. This is important. If you do not omit these lines, the Specify Whether To Capture An Image page of the wizard would not be displayed. Now update your deployment share to create a Lite. Touch. PE. To speed this up, you can clear the x. General tab of the properties of your deployment share as shown in Figure 6 below.
When you do, this MDT will only create a Lite. Touch. PE. This will speed up the process of updating your deployment share if you are only deploying the 6.
Windows. Figure 6: Configuring MDT to only create a 6. Windows PE image. At this point, you will want to add applications, packages and (if needed) out- of- box drivers to your deployment share. The goal here is to perform any customizations needed before you deploy Windows onto your reference computer. We will examine how to perform such customizations in a later article of this series. At this point you are ready to deploy Windows onto your reference computer, so boot your reference computer, insert the 6.
Win. PE CD created by MDT, and wait for MDT to do its magic. When the Select A Task Sequence To Execute On This Computer page of the Windows Deployment Wizard appears, select the WIN7. EX6. 4. Then when the Specify Whether To Capture An Image page appears, select the Capture An Image Of This Computer option and accept the default capture location and file name, which in this example will be: Location: \\SEA- DC1\Deployment. Share$\Captures. File name: WIN7. EX6. 4. Note that the install will take quite a bit longer than a simple LTI because once Windows has been installed on the reference computer and has been sysprepped, MDT will capture the image and upload it to the Captures folder of your deployment share, and capturing the image as a . When the capture process is completed, the OOBE will be displayed on your reference computer (since it was sysprepped by MDT). Step 2: Importing the Captured Image The next step is to import the captured image of the reference computer.
This captured image has been uploaded to the Captures folder of the deployment share as shown in Figure 7 next: Figure 7: The captured image of the reference computer. To import this captured image into MDT, right- click on the Operating Systems folder in your deployment share and select Import Operating System. On the Source page of the Import Operating System Wizard, select Custom Image as shown in Figure 8: Figure 8: Importing a custom image. Click Next. On the Image page, browse to select the captured image (Figure 9). If you need to conserve disk space on the technician computer, you can select the checkbox to move the captured image instead of copying it. Figure 9: Selecting a custom image to import.
Click Next. On the Setup page, leave the default option of Setup And Sysprep Files Are Not Needed selected (Figure 1. Figure 1. 0: The Setup page of the Import Operating System Wizard. Now finish the wizard, accepting the defaults, to import the captured image into your deployment share.
The captured image will be displayed in the Operating Systems folder of your deployment share (Figure 1. Figure 1. 1: The captured image is ready to be deployed.
Step 3: Deploying the Captured Image to Target Computers. You are now ready to deploy the captured image to target computers. Begin by creating a new task sequence with WIN7. EX6. 4. To do this, open the Rules tab of the properties of your Deployment Share and restore the Custom. Settings. ini file to the way it was before (see the right side of the table earlier in this article) with the exception that the Task. Sequence. ID property should have WIN7.