Remote Installation Services (RIS)

[RobC]

No problem. I'd be interested to know if it works...

[Ric_]

I used Gdisk a couple of times and you can proper blitz a disk with it!

[Inox]

kingwood, it may be that u have some software installed on the laptops (being a managed solution n all that) which automatically replaces anything that has changed since the image was made and locked. I have trial'd a few of these myself and the symptoms sound similar.

Do you have a complete list of the software thats on them?

All I have done to get rid of partition's is put in my Win XP CD (volume licence copy) and when it asks me where to install windows I deleted the c and d drives so I had a load of unpartition'd space and the EISA partition and then told windows to install into the unpartition'd space.

It created a single drive that filled this space and installed windows to it.

Now I have an EISA partition and a C partition and thats it.

I have used both ghost and RIS and they both work fine.

[kingswood]

No problem Inox- I'm thinking that GDISK will probably work.

We actually have *no* managed software on the laptops at present- they are factory installed and we've only unpacked one of them to try the ghost image we have already got.

Using the XP disk method you mention (AFAIK) utilises Diskpart, and during the XP install this is indeed a workable method. The OS boots in etc., and we find only one partition in "My Computer". When we boot using Ghost though (so that we can place a ghost image on the machine), the three partitions are back again! And so it goes on.

Thanks for your help in any case- much appreciated.

Paul

[ChrisH]

Im just playing with RIS at the moment and I have set it up just to do the base install so far with the added NIC driver. Problem is that it doesnt seem to be joining the domain. The computer is managed and receives the it's hostname correctly but just sits in the workgroup. I tried adding ghe lines I usually add to join the domain in a sysprep setup but that doesnt do much either. Any ideas?

[kingswood]

Hi ChrisH.

When you say that your computer is "managed", do you mean that you have prestaged it within AD?

Would you mind posting a copy of your RISETUP file so that we can have a look? Even if the machine hasn't picked up this information via your setup file, you should be able to join the domain manually by the usual method. I mean- (silly question I know)- have you checked your IP address and NIC driver status etc?

Hope it works out for you!

Paul

[mac_shinobi]

prolly a stupid Q but where do you get gdisk from ?

[Dos_Box]

I have never had any success getting a client pc to join off the base image with scripts, but if you create a new image and ripprep it then use the script I posted at the beginning of this topic to replace the generic one in the templates folder of the new image it will work just fine. Don't ask me why but base images are just set in stone. I suppose it is so you acn use them agin and again for various purposes and configurations, ripprepping any each time.

P.S. Sysprep syntax does not work with RIS. Try using the automatic config scripting kit from the XP disk support tools folder to create customised RIS .SIF files for you.

[Ric_]

@Dos_Box: Technically you have had success with this since it works for me and you helped set up RIS!

[Dos_Box]

I did! Wow. I thought I just setup the ripprepped images to be scripted?

[ChrisH]

I could use netdom as a run once or something if its going to be a pain like you say but to do it the way intended would be good though ...

@Kingswood

It's definately ok on the network because its picking up the correct hostname.

So for locking this down a bit what would user permsissions would the user need just join machines to the domain type permissions?

[Inox]

gdisk comes with Symantec Ghost

[ajbritton]

I don't think anyone has mentioned the change in default behaviour of the SIS service on Win2K since SP3. SIS no longer 'grovels' the entire volume where RIS is installed, only the RemoteInstall folder and contents. This means you don't necessarily need to dedicate a partition to RIS. Unless of course you want to.

[ICTNUT]

Hi All,

We have just dumped Ghost for RIS however came across a problem, we could not use riprep as we have a wide flavour of PC's so we have put together the following:

A base stock image (XPSP2)
Depending on the installation type required (XPSP2, XPSP2 with Office, XPSP2 For ICT Room 12 apps in total etc.) we created a custom .sif file for each scenario
Depending on the selection made RIS would run the relevant .sif file and within it we would have an entry for GUIRUNONCE which would execute a .cmd file which would then add entries into the registry under the RunOnceEX option.

The steps that are followed by RIS are:
1 - Base install of XPSP2
2 - Once the base install was finished RunOnceEx registry entries are added and pc rebooted
3 - Upon restart the PC would auto login and run the RunOnceEx entries in order and install required software from a central install share.

We have also used the following method to intergrate over 2500 drivers covering LAN, AUDIO, VGA, WLAN, CHIPSET into the base install so there is no longer a requirement to worry about drivers for the various flavours of PC we have.

Friday, just gone, we RIS'd 60 PC's simultaniously, took 1hr 40mins and only 2 failed not bad I think.

If anyone would like a copy of the scripts used to automate this process simply shout.....

[kingswood]

RIPREP is great. Especially when you integrate driver folders and have one image that contains drivers for your hardware. Cool.

But you can get away with Ghost on top of RIS which is actually pretty good too- giving you the flexibility of SYSPREP and the delight of being able to use PXE and grab your image from an RIS server.

Even so, I'd like a copy of your scripts if you don't mind. I might be doing this over the summer so all help appreciated...

Paul