Image Server

[Else89]

Hi everyone,

I am looking to speed up the installation of windows in my work environment by using a network image.

I am having issues figuring out what the best way to do this is. I am only wanting to have the image contain windows 10 and a few other applications such as office etc.

Can anyone advise on the easiest/best way to do this so all we have to do is boot from the NIC on the new PC

 

Thanks in advance.   

[Droidbot]

A tip: instead of doing this and fooling around with networking and FTP, etc., just make a flash drive with unattended access on it. Plug it in, boot up, it starts the install immediately. You may need to set some crap before the end user touches the machine, but hey, it's almost automatic. 

 

Waaaait. Sorry, no, you'll need to use NTLite to create a bootable flash drive with unattended access. https://www.ntlite.com/features/

[NelizMastr]

If you want to deploy multiple images at a time unlike the option presented above, then your best bet is WDS and MDT2013 update 2 on Windows Server 2012R2/2016. You can create a deployment task sequence that'll deploy the Win10 image and install Office afterwards. It's pretty simple to set up with plenty of tutorials around. I've done it a few times and it works like a charm. No real options from a client OS, gotta use WinServer.

[Mikensan]

Setup a machine the way you want it, patch it.

Then use sysprep on it.

Create a bootable disk, ideally a dos bootable disk to give you shell. 

Use imagex to capture and write it to a WIM file

 

Now any computer you want to image, use that dos disk + imagex to image the machines.

 

 

Or use Clonezilla which is a one stop shop for the entire solution. Put the CD in, plug in a hard drive. Clone a machine. Now going forward you just use the cd + disk to image computers. Make sure the computer is off the domain (assuming there is a domain).

 

(I would still sysprep the computer before using clonezilla)

[samiscool51]

it's possable to to it with just windows server, it had the word "Deploy" in it

if you check server manager and check what features you can add i think it's at the bottem of the list

i think it allows non-bootable iso's to be used, but i'm not sure

[ultimatemythbuster]

On 11/1/2016 at 10:28 AM, NelizMastr said:

If you want to deploy multiple images at a time unlike the option presented above, then your best bet is WDS and MDT2013 update 2 on Windows Server 2012R2/2016. You can create a deployment task sequence that'll deploy the Win10 image and install Office afterwards. It's pretty simple to set up with plenty of tutorials around. I've done it a few times and it works like a charm. No real options from a client OS, gotta use WinServer.

This is the way it is set up in my department.  Once you learn the process of doing LiteTouch deployments with WDS and MDT, it's not too difficult.