Windows 10 "Cloud" Laptop

[JasonNVSD]

Has anyone deployed low-cost Window 10 laptops for students? By low-cost, I mean the 32/64 GB eMMC laptops that every manufacturer has now for around $300. We're wanting to use them with Office 365 for Education (as an alternative to GAFE). Trying to deploy them with SCCM isn't working so well.

[NviGate_Systems]

You are talking about those Acer Cloud/HP Stream devices that are in the 13" form factor?

 

I'm not familiar with SCCM, but I do know these types of machines need to use WIMBoot unless you get the 64GB models, and even then after a healthy dose of updates, software and recovery drive, you only have about 10-15GB left.

 

Was there specific error messages you get when deploying?

[Arthur]

these types of machines need to use WIMBoot unless you get the 64GB models

I thought Microsoft stopped using WIMBoot after Windows 8.1 due to various issues with it?

 

For Windows 10 wouldn't you use the "Compact OS" feature to reduce the size of installation?

 

https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/hardware/commercialize/manufacture/desktop/compact-os

 

Windows 10 includes tools to help you use less drive space. You can now compress the files for the entire operating system, including your preloaded desktop applications. Compact OS lets you run the operating system from compressed files (similar to WIMBoot in Windows 8.1 Update 1), and single-instancing helps you run your pre-loaded Windows desktop applications in compressed files. The new processes helps maintain a small footprint over time by using individual files, rather than combining them in a WIM file.

 

http://arstechnica.co.uk/gadgets/2015/07/faster-booting-smaller-footprint-make-windows-10-an-easy-upgrade-for-old-pcs/

 

When you upgrade a Windows 8.1 with Bing system that uses WIMBoot to Windows 10, two things happen. First, you just get a regular Windows 10 Home license with the Bing branding removed. Second, the WIMBoot partition still exists, but all the data on it is deleted since it isn’t needed anymore. You can go ahead and reclaim it using Disk Management.

 

A clean install of Windows 10 Home on the Stream 11 uses about 15.5GB of space, about the same amount as the combined system and recovery partitions under Windows 8.1 with Bing. Again, this number might go up as more updates are released for Windows 10, but the file compression should keep it from getting too out of hand.

Edited July 20, 2016 by Arthur

[JasonNVSD]

You are talking about those Acer Cloud/HP Stream devices that are in the 13" form factor?

Hello Delta. North Van here. Yes, 11" or 13" typically. Dell is on board now with the Inspiron 3162.

 

I'm not familiar with SCCM, but I do know these types of machines need to use WIMBoot unless you get the 64GB models, and even then after a healthy dose of updates, software and recovery drive, you only have about 10-15GB left.

 

Was there specific error messages you get when deploying?

I know in the past, SCCM seems to require a drive 3-4x larger than the image file. Plus, I doubt these things can even PXE boot.

 

Anyway, so far it sounds like no one here has gone down this road. Microsoft better step up before Chromebooks take over.

[NviGate_Systems]

I wondered where in BC you were located. North Van is an awesome place, lots to see.

 

As far as the Cloud Books, here is what you will need:

 

For your deployment system, you will need to create a bootable USB with USB LAN drivers enabled plus the eMMC/Storage Driver of the unit. There is a free program DriverBackup on Sourceforge that can help with backing up drivers. Always check the INF of the driver to ensure all files are present, sometimes it will miss a few but it's easy to search for the missing ones in c:\windows\system32\driverstore. Don't try to get WiFi working, it's a pain in PE. Most PXE booting is simply booting WinPE from a server, so a USB should do the trick. Pick a USB LAN card and stick with that model. I use the Best Buy brand Insignia USB 2.0 adapter as most PE's from 8 and up typically have a driver included since it uses a fairly common chip. I haven't tested the new USB 3.0 version.

 

Always make sure you create at least one copy of the original factory OS (Win + R recoverydrive.exe) so that if and when they are retired, they are back to factory and can go to secondary markets.

 

Once this is done you should be able to boot from USB Flash, use the USB LAN to connect to your network resources and image the unit. Voila! Job done.

 

Here are some reference links I found while searching.

 

Supporting PXE over USB Deployment Scenarios for tablets and ultrabooks | Plugable

JaLaBlog » Blog Archive » How to deploy Windows 7 on non-PXE Ultrabooks with MDT LiteTouch…

 

Oh, and my bad I realize that Windows 10 changed to a new compression scheme, you may want to research if this will help your deployment scenarios or if you have a 64GB model, you simply may never need to worry. I'm assuming all versions of Windows 10 support Compact, but you may find it unnecessary. Even at 32GB per unit, with the changes in Windows 10 structure it's unlikely storage will be an issue unless your users are actively downloading.