WINDOWS XP PROFESSIONAL

AUTOMATING THE WINDOWS XP INSTALLATION

Bilal Munir MughalChapter-2

1

Key Topics

Choosing Automated Deployment Options Create unattended answer files by using

Setup Manager to automate the installation of Windows XP Professional.

Install Windows XP Professional by using Remote Installation Services (RIS).

Install Windows XP Professional by using the System Preparation Tool.

Manage applications by using Windows Installer packages.

2

Choosing Automation Deployment Options

The three options for Automated Deployment of Windows

Unattended installation, or unattended setup, which uses the Winnt32 and Winnt command line utilities and options to automate the Windows XP Professional installation

Remote Installation Services (RIS), which requires Windows 2000 Server or Windows Server 2003 for deployment

System Preparation Tool (Sysprep.exe), which is used to create and deploy disk imaging or cloning

3

An Overview of Unattended Installation

Unattended installation is a practical method of automatic deployment when you have a large number of clients to install and the computers require different hardware and software configurations.

With an unattended installation, you use a distribution server to install Windows XP Professional on a target computer.

You can also use a Windows XP Professional CD with an answer file on a floppy disk.

4

Advantages of Unattended Installation

Save time and money because users do not have to interactively respond to each installation query.

Can be configured to provide automated query response, while still selectively allowing users to provide specified input during installations.

Can be used to install clean copies of WinXP Pro. or upgrade an existing operating system to WinXP Pro.

Can be expanded to include installation instructions for applications, additional language support, service packs, and device drivers.

The physical media for WinXP Pro. does not need to be distributed to all computers that will be installed.

5

Disadvantages of Unattended Installation

Requires more initial setup than a standard installation of Windows XP Professional.

Someone must have access to each client computer and must initiate the unattended installation process.

Does not allow you to use reference computer images to automate the installation of specific configurations and applications.

6

An Overview of Remote Installation

Remote Installation Services (RIS) allows you to remotely install Windows XP Professional

A RIS server installs Windows XP Professional on RIS clients

The RIS server must have the RIS server software installed and configured.

RIS clients are computers that have a Pre-boot eXecution Environment (PXE) network adapter or use a RIS bootdisk.

The network must have a DHCP server, a Domain Name System (DNS) server, and Active Directory to connect to the RIS server.

7

An Overview of Remote Installation

The RIS server can be configured with either of two types of images: A CD-based image that contains only the Windows XP

Professional operating system. You can create answer files for CD-based images to respond to the Setup program’s configuration prompts.

A Remote Installation Preparation (RIPrep) image that can contain the Windows XP operating system and applications. This type of image is based on a preconfigured computer.

8

Advantages of RIS

Windows XP Professional installations can be standardized across a group or organization.

The physical media for Windows XP Professional does not need to be distributed to all computers that will be installed.

Uses a technology called Single Instance Store (SIS) to reduce duplicate distribution files, even if you store multiple distribution configurations. This greatly reduces storage requirements for distribution servers.

End-user installation deployment can be controlled through the Group Policy utility. For example, you can configure what choices a user can access or are automatically specified through the end-user Setup Wizard.

9

Disadvantages of RIS

Can be used only if your network is running Windows 2000 Server or Windows Server 2003 with Active Directory installed.

The clients that use RIS must have a PXE-compliant network adapter or have a remote boot disk that can be used with a PCI-compliant network adapter.

RIS images can be created only from the C: partition of a hard disk.

RIS can be used only for clean installations and can’t be used to upgrade a previous version of Windows.

10

An Overview of the System Preparation Tool and Disk Imaging

The System Preparation Tool (Sysprep.exe) is used to prepare a computer for disk imaging (aka disk cloning or disk duplication), which can be done with a third-party image software or with disk-duplicator hardware.

Disk imaging is the process of creating a reference computer for the automated deployment.

The reference, or source, computer has Windows XP Professional installed and is configured with the settings and applications that should be installed on the target computers.

An image is then created that can be transferred to other computers, thus installing the operating system, settings, and applications that were defined on the reference computer.

11

Advantages of the System Preparation Tool

For large numbers of computers with similar hardware, it greatly reduces deployment time by copying the operating system, applications, and Desktop settings from a reference computer to multiple cloned computers.

Using disk imaging facilitates the standardization of Desktops, administrative policies, and restrictions throughout an organization.

Reference images can be copied across a network connection or through CDs that are physically distributed to client computers.

By default, it does not perform full Plug and Play re-detection, which means that the Plug and Play process that is run at the destination computer is greatly reduced (therefore, is faster) compared to the standard Plug and Play detection process.

12

Disadvantages of the System Preparation Tool

You must use either third-party imaging software or hardware disk-duplicator devices.

The Hardware Abstraction Layer (HAL) must be the same on the reference and target computers.

Will not detect any hardware that is non–Plug and Play compliant.

If you use a CD to distribute the reference image, you will be limited to the capacity of the CD (approximately 650MB).

Can be used only for clean installations and can’t be used to upgrade a previous version of Windows.

13

Installing Applications with Windows Installer Packages

With Windows XP, you can easily distribute new applications through Windows Installer packages, which are special application distribution files.

To use Windows Installer packages, you must have a Windows Server 2003 configured as a domain controller (so that Active Directory is running).

Windows Installer packages work with applications that are one of the following file types: Microsoft Installer (MSI) format files, which are usually

provided by the software vendor. They support components such as on-demand installation of features as they are accessed by users.

Repackaged applications (MSI files) that do not include the native Windows Installer packages. Repackaged applications are used to provide users with applications that can be cleanly installed, are easily deployed, and can perform self-diagnosis and repair.

ZAP files, which are used if you do not have MSI files. ZAP files are used to install applications using their native Setup program.

14

Q & A?

15