Creating a customized image of WHS2011–Part 1

I got a comment on the post ”Installing WHS 2011 on “headless” hardware using AutoUnattend.xml” with a question in the direction of sysprep and WHS2011.

If you don’t now “Sysprep.exe” here is a short explanation:

Sysprep.exe is a tool u can use to prepare a customized Windows installation for capturing and distributing to other computers. The reason you would want to do this is if you are going to deploy a lot of systems with the same drivers, and/or software configuration. Sysprep.exe is a “Online” tool that you run from a booted Windows OS, it´s located in “C:\Windows\System32\Sysprep\”. IMPORTANT – Do NOT run this tool on you workstation, there is a good chance that you will destroy your installation. Of course, if you already have a WHS2011 that would not be a problem, you can just restore you system

If your not a IT pro dealing with tons of systems there can still be good reasons for making you own customized image of Windows. Looking at client OS it make sense to have a image with the most common software installed, and keeping you image updated with the most common NIC drivers also make things easy. Also if you are the “family go-to IT guy”, you will quick learn to love a USB stick with a couple of customized images.

When we are talking WHS2011, to be honest, I don’t see a lot of reasons for creating images, unless you plan to build/sell systems. On the other hand, I always find a excuse and this time I decided to make a image of WHS2011 with my favorite screen capture software installed.

In the first part of the guide I will focus on creating the image. In order to use the image we also have to capture it and find some way of deploy it, I will do that in separate blog posts.

Here we go…

Installing WHS 2011 on “headless” hardware using AutoUnattend.xml

As a follow up on my previous post “Installing Server 2008 R2 unattended” here is a follow up on how to install “Windows Home Server 2011” on “headless” hardware.

WHS 2011 is a bit different when it comes to running setup.exe, and its therefore not enough to just put a AutoUnattend.xml in the root of the installation media. Also, for reasons I don’t know, Microsoft have decided to implement the possibility to automate the installation with use of a Cfg.ini file, in fact most of the “how-to” I found on the web is based around the Cfg.ini solution.

I think the Cfg.ini solution is okay, but having a mindset focused around xml files I decided to write a guide based on AutoUnattend.xml. Notice I have yet to find the (big) advantage compared to Cfg.ini, so for now the only “exclusive” settings I will do is around Internet Explore.

Let´s go!

 

Installing Server 2008 R2 unattended

I stumbled over a post on wegotserved.com, explaining how to install Windows Server 2008 R2 on a HP WHS box. I will give the author credit for being creative but I would like to point out an alternative, the AutoUnattended.xml.

This post is a basic “how-to” and I am not going to explain the whole concept and all the tools around “Windows Automated Installation Kit”. Also i will add that i don´t own a HP whs box, the following is a general description and should work on all systems that´s capable of booting on a USB drive. (From what I understand, the HP hardware will boot on USB if no boot info is found on the hard disk)

WARNING – After creating the USB stick, booting on this stick WILL clean your hard disk, so be careful rebooting you workstation if you are not sure on the boot order.

To get started you need the following:

· A (properly licensed) Windows Server 2008 R2 DVD.
· An empty USB stick, minimum 4GB.

Let´s get started!