I'm tired of setting up a new machine when we get it.. What's the best way to image a machine and use it as the basis for any other machines that we buy? Norton Ghost? Remote Install Service from or W2K3 domain controller?
b_sinning said:Now we use Novell Zen imaging from a pxe server. Works great and everything is pretty automated. Just enter in the image name and that's it.
fly said:We used to use Ghost + Sysprep, but unattended installs + pxe server is the way to go. If you're really interested, I can probably get you a copy of the shell + files that I'm using.
Or is this for home?
I have silent installs for most of it, but the learning curve can be kinda steep. How many installs are you talking about here? Ghost + sysprep may be better if its for a smaller volume. I have some great scripts for that too. Will allow you to have 1 image for every PC in your building...SpangeMonkee said:work. I would like the files very much. Is it hard to add software installs to it? I have to add some workorder/custmore service software and acrobat to the install. not to mention Office and Firefox.
fly said:I have silent installs for most of it, but the learning curve can be kinda steep. How many installs are you talking about here? Ghost + sysprep may be better if its for a smaller volume. I have some great scripts for that too. Will allow you to have 1 image for every PC in your building...
Ghost + sysprep is def what you need then. do you ever reimage old machines? If so, you'll need to build the image on the oldest machine you have, specifically with the smallest hard drive as well.SpangeMonkee said:well, we get a new machine about every month or two. I can easily spend several hours getting the machine to where it needs to be. Since we buy Dell, that means uninstalling all the bullshit apps, setting it up on the domain, install Office from our bulk licenses, install Firefox, install the two workorder apps, install the Retrospect client (backup) and install all the printers and network shares. I made a VB script for all the shares and printers, but that only cut down a small portion of my time. It just takes too much of my day to setup a new employee. I would love any scripts that you have and anything else you can get together.
I wish I had Zenworks. I pretty much had to build my own with off the shelf equipment. Even had to code my own app to push out software installs/upgrades. Probably ended up costing the company waaay more in my time than actually getting ZenWorks.b_sinning said:Sysprep is a good tool. We use to use it.
Now we have standard images for set computer types with all the common apps (office, firefox, adobe, etc.) preinstalled on them and any of the specialized apps for individual departments is installed through Novell Zenworks.
We can do that becuase we only buy Dell PC equipment and try to buy lots of one type of model at a time.
reverendsaintjay said:Our imaging team uses a combination of technologies, most of which mentioned in this thread.
Sysprep (Allows you to preinstall all standard apps, network settings, etc)
Ghost (Create an image that can be dumped on any new system)
Bart's PE (bootable CD that will allow you to connect to your remote Ghost server)
Cleanimage.vbs (site specific script that provides locale settings, software updates, etc.)
This allows you to boot up a new system, dump an image and set it up within about 30 minutes. Fly has some great advice, build on your oldest system with the smallest disk drive. Also include drivers (and possible automated driver installation in your cleanimage script) for your newer systems.
I'll see if I can grab source code from our scripts to give you a guidline for setting up your own.
have you tried XPE? Gives you the whole windows interface. And I'm trying to get MicroPE working so that I can boot PE to image PCs in less than 40mb.b_sinning said:Bart's PE is a great little program. I use to use the hell out of it.