Complete guide to WDS...question

[agarabaghi]

still haven't messed with the GP...

 

SO now onto a different beast what about printers? Specifically network printers?

[Gatt]

Somewhere in the deep dark bowels of Edugeek there is an excellent VBScript..

But again GPP can handle this too...

[agarabaghi]

Gatt is that for the printers?

[Gatt]

Sorry yes it is

[sted]

software shortcut (sorry multiple posts appeared while typing)

 

true but thats splitting a software deploy in 2 if you have a script to copy the files may as well make it do the shortcut(s) as well so theres only 1 place to look if it plays silly beggers

 

printers

 

ive found gpp is good for per user pants for per pc but others milage may vary

Edited May 23, 2012 by sted

[Gatt]

I 'think' this is the printing script..

 

http://www.edugeek.net/forums/scripts/394-printer-script.html

 

Been a while since I used it so not sure if its still the current favourite

[agarabaghi]

So here is another question. When i enabled windows update PRE APPLIATION and POST APPLICATION in the task sequence , it takes a really long time. Is there not a way to make this process faster. I wish MS would release a .msi with all the updates since SP1 release so you could just run that as an application install. Or maybe theres a way to update the OS image so it has at least a few more updates since SP1?

[themightymrp]

Do you have a WSUS (Windows System Update Server) sitting on your network? If you dont know what this is, it is basically a server that downloads all of the updates to a server local to your network so that it doesn't have to go out to the internet to download them. You can point the MDT to your WSUS server which is quicker (but still not amazing).

 

You can also, if you can be bothered, download all the seperate updates as .MSU files and import them to the "packages" folder of the deployment workbench

[Gatt]

I gave up with doing updates pre and post installation during MDT/SCCM as it severly increased the time it took to do the installations.

Now, I prefer to do the updates once it has finished and let the user use the PC whilst its updating

 

SCCM works better with this as it really suppresses reboots, whereas WSUS is a bit hit and miss..

[themightymrp]

Yeah, I have to admit Ive only added the WSUS parts in recently and am debating taking them back out due to the slowness! I think as you say, letting the users have the machines and let the updates run as standard is better

[agarabaghi]

Hmm. Ill have to explain this to my director. We have a WSUS server, so ill give that a try. Ive basically walked into an area with a lot of tools but not many people know how to use them / implement them haha.

[agarabaghi]

hmm so i though the option to add the path to the WSUS server would be in the Task Sequence properties but im not seeing it. How do you setup WSUS in MDT?

[themightymrp]

In the deployment workbench, right click the deployment share and go to properties. Under the rules tab (this is actually the customsettings.ini file), somewhere under the [default] heading add a line:

 

WsusServer=http://servername:port 

(you don't need a port if you are using the default setup)

 

You may have to rebuild the deployment share after editing this file

[agarabaghi]

gotcha. I found an offline WSUS updater which downloads all the updates from MS and makes them .msu i think. Im triying it right now, will report back

[agarabaghi]

When i enter that line, do I still disable the Windows update pre and post install in the task configuration properties?

[themightymrp]

If you want to use WSUS with it then you will still need both of those options enabled. Otherwise it will skip the windows update stage completely

[agarabaghi]

gotcah, cool. Will test it as soon as i finish injecting all our laptop drivers.

[agarabaghi]

Is there anyway to order the applications, like so they list alphabetically when the tech does to select whats software to install?

[themightymrp]

I use this free tool to reorder the Apps list into the order I want:

 

MDT 2010 Application ordering (New Tool) « Xtreme Deployment

[agarabaghi]

customsettings.ini = bootstrip.ini?

[themightymrp]

Seperate thing.

 

The 'Rules' tab IS the customsettings.ini

 

At the lower right of this page is a link to open bootstrap.ini (which only has a few lines in it)

[agarabaghi]

gotcha! testing WSUS server now.

 

Took 59mins with Office 2010, adobe x, flash, java, vlc, windows updates pre and post, firefox... not terrible i guess.

[themightymrp]

Nah not terrible, mine takes a fair bit longer TBH but I have a bunch of extra apps included such as Adobe Photoshop Elements, Audacity, SMART Notebook, iTunes, Nero, K-Lite codecs and a bunch of others

[agarabaghi]

the wsus server seemed to have sped up the imaging. will time another one soon.

[agarabaghi]

so for some reason after the machine has joined the domain, the administrator account wont log in.

 

During MDT it asked for Administrator password so i enter it

 

Then It logs in and does all the program in stalls. when i reboot and login with an admin account it works, but then i log off and try to log in with a local admin account

computername\Administrator and the password i entered in MDT it says incorrect password.