jkuzo

Actually there is a line in the unattend file that you need to add to "Persist all device drivers install". This will solve your intel problem. Activation should happen automatically if your using the recommended KMS solution by microsoft and not trying to authenticate all machines with a MAK key.

Actually that is not true... You can sysprep more than 3 times as long as the product is activated when you sysprep.

Our main drive behind deploying this summer is we are on a four year computer refresh and this summer is when all teacher laptops are replaced. If we don't make the move now, it will be too difficult to make the move in the next four years since we will have to work with each teacher to image their laptops. Now that I'm working with Vista for over a year, when I have to work on an XP computer it just feels dated.

We have been testing Vista out on about 200 computer this year with very limited problems which have been resolved quickly. Most teachers and students like Vista more than XP and without a doubt like Office 07 more than 03. Many people dismiss Vista talking about incompatibility, but I have found software is more compatible with Vista than XP. You may have to change to compatibility mode on the installer, but after that the apps run flawlessly. We will be deploying Vista to to 3000 computers this summer and already have a 08 server in place. If you put in the work to learn about deployment with Vista its not that bad. Many school districts would rather dismiss it without fully evaluating it or reading rumors. If you have the proper knowledge in your staff its a fairly seamless transfer. It should come down to your students experience on the newest technology and not down to the IT staffs lack of wanting to learn something new. We use Altiris Deployment Server for all our deployments with "zero touch".

I don't think there is a GPO for this, but if you create images and configure a profile using a default user you can set it there and copy that default user profile to all users and in turn all users will look identical.

Nevermind. I just need to use the Persist all pnp drivers be installed. Fixed my problem.

I'm trying to deploy a few new laptops (Dell D630). I never ran into this issue with other models, but when I sysprep, it is stripping the video driver and upon reboot it is not reinstalling even though its part of the image. I've tried to point the unattend file to the local driver store but its still not installing. Where in the answer file can I put a command line to silently install the video driver software from the .exe? Just not sure what pass this would go under and also what component I need to use.

While the above posters method may work there is actually a better solution if we are just dealing with printers. Again it will resource GP. Under user config, admin temp, control panel, printers. You want to enable point and print restrictions. Enter the fully qualified domain name where the printers will be installed from. Then there are two drop down menus. You want to change those to "not prompt for elevation". This will fix your problem.

When i copy the msi and files from the temp directory and use the 523ea15.msi /quiet . It installs, but it doesn't create program groups or desktop shortcuts for all users. Any advice?

How do I extract the msi from the exe? Sorry i'm new.