[fog] W7 Multiple Machine Types and Drivers

[Jiser]

We are having issues finding the best way to get all the drivers for our multiple machine types on one master image. This is for W7 and we are using the latest version of FOG / AIK - sysprep (unattend file).

 

Not really up for having a different image for each type or going to each machine type and respreping every time.

 

pnputil –a \*.inf - I saw somebody used this once... Also having a driver store and loading that up on the unattend script.

 

So my question is how are you going about it ? What is the best way.

[Jiser]

My question above is still valid if anyone wants to add any of their info?

 

In the interests of time as we couldn't find any simple way to get get drivers on one machine for all our types, we went down the root of trying to install as many drivers as we could on one machine type then going to others and re syspreping each time. Then ran into the sysprep limit. Skip rearm option in unattend xml and KMS are things we used to sort it.

[ChrisH]

Mdt with driver injection is more flexible for injecting drivers. The deployment features aren't as good as fog though unless you pair it with sccm but you could live with it for the flexibility. In mdt I use the driver path method and the model variable according to wmi and it works fine.

[Modus]

Here was my process

 

Make the unattend.xml file and place that in the sysprep folder then

 

Do a basic install of the os, office, patched up, av install, drivers galore then make a image as the model for the future

 

Next sysprep (OOBE & Generalize) then run the sysprep driver scanner(which saves the location of all your drivers in the registry) and upload image to be deployed out

 

Works!

[TheScarfedOne]

I sit firmly in the MDT, System Centre Essentials, SCCM camp. As said, it does the driver injection stuff - and you can cover off the app deployment too. If you do go system centre - you have the advantage of heading off with Forefront for your AV....

[morganw]

I think you can just copy all drivers into the driver store on the master image and they should get installed during deployment. If you need more flexibility then MDT2010 is the easiest way although I believe that FOG is getting functionality to modify sysprep.inf and unattend.xml files during the deployment process - initially just for modifying the hostname but it should be possible to adapt this to also change driver install paths on the fly.

[Modus]

I copied all my drivers to a drivers folder and used the sysprep driver scanner(which saves the location of all your drivers in the registry) and upload image to be deployed out. I have 2 images and thats it the one i deploy has 5 gigs worth of drivers and that image works on any hardware with no problem.

[morganw]

I copied all my drivers to a drivers folder and used the sysprep driver scanner(which saves the location of all your drivers in the registry) and upload image to be deployed out. I have 2 images and thats it the one i deploy has 5 gigs worth of drivers and that image works on any hardware with no problem.

 

That what I used for XP but I don't think there is a need for it with Windows 7 as the pnp process is now recursive in it's search for anything new that you've added into the image (as long as it's in the right place).

[Modus]

true but i like doing it that way so i know for sure that its gonna work

[afillmore]

Our organization deploys Win7 using WDS and we have added all of our drivers to our WDS server. When we PXE boot a machine and choose an image from the list, the computer queries the server and picks out the drivers it needs.

 

Basically our steps are to make a "base" image that includes updates and some basic software everyone in our organization uses. Then using sysprep we generalize the image.

 

I think including all the drivers in an image could be bad especially if you have a lot of different computer models. Unless there is some way to remove all the unneeded drivers, you would have a bunch of useless drivers lingering on your computer.