Windows 10 MDT Failing

[yhttech]

I'm starting to test Windows 10 Education and I'm getting stuck during the deployment of my test machine. MDT starts, and after the first reboot it starts to continue with setting up devices and services. Then I get a pop-up that says "Windows could not parse or process the unattend answer file for pass [specialize]. The settings specified in the answer file cannot be applied. The error was detected while processing settings for component [Microsoft-Windows-Shell-Setup]. I cannot press shift-F10 to open up a command prompt to pull the logs - it's stuck and the only thing I can do is reboot.

[mullet_man]

Have you got the very latest Windows ADK installed?

[snagrat]

What version of Windows 10 you deploying? 1511 or 1607?

[yhttech]

Yes, I've got the latest ADK installed and updated my deployment share. As far as the version goes, it's 1607.

[thimon]

As luck (or not) would have it mine has stopped working too. Starts the initial deployment process, starts deploying drivers then comes up with "litetouch deployment failed return code 2147467259 0x80004005" error.

[mullet_man]

Have you deployed other versions or is the first? Never had that issue before.

[yhttech]

Yes. I just re-tested it with a Windows 7 task sequence and it worked normally. I then deleted the W10 TS and re-created it, same error at same spot.

[mullet_man]

Is it 32bit or 64bit?

[yhttech]

x86 workstation from server 2k12 x64. Same configuration works like a charm for W7.

[mullet_man]

Ah OK I think this is your issue then.

 

You need to open the WIM file in Windows System Image Manager and create a catalog file, but you'll need to do this on a 32bit machine with Windows System Image Manager installed on it, and make sure .clg file is saved in the same folder as your captured wim.

[yhttech]

I will try it, but it's not a captured WIM that's failing, it's an OS only deployment for testing purposes before I add apps to deployment and capturing of the image.

[mullet_man]

I've never deployed an OS only, always captured ones. But I guess it's worth a shot.

 

Although the latest MDT doesn't even let you do a sysprep and capture due to a bug.

[yhttech]

I tried that - still failing at the same spot.

 

Here's the interesting twist - Windows System Image Manager doesn't show any warnings or errors in my unattend.xml file.

Edited December 22, 2016 by yhttech

[mullet_man]

No idea what's happening. Is it a psychical machine or virtual your a testing with?

 

Have you imported any 3 party drivers?

[yhttech]

It's a physical machine. Nothing out of the ordinary about drivers. Card reader, chip-set and stuff like that. Could a driver incompatibility be causing it? I'm going to try installing the OS straight off a DVD, see if that works.

[mullet_man]

Am not sure but it would be what I'd check next, have you imported drivers into MDT?

 

I'd maybe tell your TS to not install drivers or if you have access VMware or Hyper V maybe try deploying to a test VM. Or even try a different machine.

 

I had a strange issue when deploying windows 7 to Fuji machines where it would fail if I kept the same computer name, could never pin down what the exact problem was just had to make sure I removed the computer from AD if I needed to reimage. So i wouldn't rule anything out.

[yhttech]

It's a fresh box, never on our domain. Good thought about drivers, although disabling the step in the TS didn't help.

[mullet_man]

Have you tried this?

 

Looks like it's the same error you are experiencing?

 

http://mickitblog.blogspot.co.uk/2016/05/windows-10-windows-could-not-parse-or.html?m=0

[yhttech]

Bingo.

[mullet_man]

Is that it?

[MartinT]

We always deploy a master Volume Licence ISO, rather than capture a build (this is Microsoft's recommended method for MDT). We're deploying W10 Education x64 1607 with drivers for all our machines and Office 2013 as well as many other standard apps. After experiencing a problem with Windows updates hanging, we disabled that step in the Task Sequence and the deployment is successful with no errors. We do have to perform all the updates afterwards, though.

[yhttech]

Yes, that allowed the TS to complete. Now to figure out how to re-add that deleted step to the XML file.

[mullet_man]

What steps were needed to be removed?

[yhttech]

What steps were needed to be removed?

 

You have to remove that sequence from the answer file using WSIM like Mick's blog suggests, then re-add it from the catalog to the answer file. I'm still having issues with it taking the proper name from what I enter in the TS. It's still coming up with a generic name, and what's listed in AD is totally different than what the PC shows.