Computer imaging for depolyment
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@coliver said:
Have you looked into bulk refurbed desktops? You can generally get them at 50-70% off retail. Bump up the RAM and you can generally get 4-5 years out of them if not longer. This would go a long way to standardizing your systems and save some money.
We do this, works great.
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@scottalanmiller said:
You can build a lot of drivers and such into a base image. Although standardizing on a model is a good first step. You want to reduce "Model Sprawl" whenever possible.
I haven't made model specific images since the early 2000's when Win98 and Ghost ruled the land. Since about 2005 or so I've stuck with creating a universal image in Vmware and deploying it to machines.
And since the consolidation of all the hardware with AMD and Intel it's been much easier to keep OOBE in line on boot. Used to be lots of different drivers would need to be deployed, but now I can just lay down basic Windows drivers, put the updated ones on a directory, then deploy it out.
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To get your Windows 10 upgrade (home or Pro) you have to do the upgrade manually first. That process will attach the Windows 10 license to your machine via MS servers.
Then once you have upgraded it, you can blow it away and push your image onto the machine.
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@Dashrender said:
To get your Windows 10 upgrade (home or Pro) you have to do the upgrade manually first. That process will attach the Windows 10 license to your machine via MS servers.
Then once you have upgraded it, you can blow it away and push your image onto the machine.
But is the FREE upgrade allowed on machines that will be joined to the domain??
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But I will still need to buy a VL version of Win10Pro and Win7Pro so I can use the generic key to create and deploy the image onto machines?
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@hobbit666 said:
@Dashrender said:
To get your Windows 10 upgrade (home or Pro) you have to do the upgrade manually first. That process will attach the Windows 10 license to your machine via MS servers.
Then once you have upgraded it, you can blow it away and push your image onto the machine.
But is the FREE upgrade allowed on machines that will be joined to the domain??
Yes as long as they are Professional not Enterprise. If you are using volume media you need to install OEM then do the inplace upgrade. You can then blow it away with a clean install of windows 10 Professional using Retail or Volume media if imaging.
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@hobbit666 said:
But I will still need to buy a VL version of Win10Pro and Win7Pro so I can use the generic key to create and deploy the image onto machines?
Just one copy.
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@Jason said:
@hobbit666 said:
But I will still need to buy a VL version of Win10Pro and Win7Pro so I can use the generic key to create and deploy the image onto machines?
Just one copy.
Agreed, you don't need both, only VL for Win10, you get downgrade rights if you really need Win7
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Can you image home machines, even with a VL?
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Couple of the most key points I've learned about deployment(s)
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Have one replacement laptop & desktop at minimum ready to roll 24/7, 365. You will need it most when you least expect it.
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Have a base image, update it a week after patch Tuesday every month
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Buy all the same model of laptop / desktop. There is no good reason to have more than 1 model of desktop and AT MOST two models of laptop purchased in a year.
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Make a checklist for deployment and stick it on each computer. Tick all the boxes as you complete them and sign it, date it, and leave it on the computer until it gets deployed.
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Have a standardized method of data xfer/backup and stick to it.
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Label/serialize laptops/desktops and keep a list of it all. More details the better.
.... more as I think of them.
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@Dashrender said:
@Jason said:
@hobbit666 said:
But I will still need to buy a VL version of Win10Pro and Win7Pro so I can use the generic key to create and deploy the image onto machines?
Just one copy.
Agreed, you don't need both, only VL for Win10, you get downgrade rights if you really need Win7
Probably not. You probably have to start with Windows Pro on that machine. Physical location doesn't matter.. just are you running Win 10 Home or Win 10 Pro.. I'm sure you can only apply VL to Pro because the imaging rights only apply to the same version that exists within VL.
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@Dashrender that was my feeling too. But sometimes "Home" is considered a lower version of "pro".
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@scottalanmiller @Dashrender are you not allowed to sysprep and change the key on a home license? I swear you could, but yeah no VL for sure.
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@MattSpeller said:
@scottalanmiller @Dashrender are you not allowed to sysprep and change the key on a home license? I swear you could, but yeah no VL for sure.
As only VL offers that right, if VL doesn't apply then it can't be done for Home.
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@MattSpeller said:
Couple of the most key points I've learned about deployment(s)
-
Have one replacement laptop & desktop at minimum ready to roll 24/7, 365. You will need it most when you least expect it.
-
Have a base image, update it a week after patch Tuesday every month
-
Buy all the same model of laptop / desktop. There is no good reason to have more than 1 model of desktop and AT MOST two models of laptop purchased in a year.
-
Make a checklist for deployment and stick it on each computer. Tick all the boxes as you complete them and sign it, date it, and leave it on the computer until it gets deployed.
-
Have a standardized method of data xfer/backup and stick to it.
-
Label/serialize laptops/desktops and keep a list of it all. More details the better.
.... more as I think of them.
Thanks for all the tips there, all along my way of thinking.
So how do I start making a deployment image now
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I was in the same boat as you not so long ago...until I did a trial of SmartDeploy. Much like PSX mentions above, we have one VM that is our master image, and we are able to use the platform packs SmartDeploy makes to push our image along with the drivers we need onto different model PCs without much trouble (PXE boot SmartDeploy with a thumb drive that has the right drivers and pull down the image over the network). We are primarily a Dell shop, even when we buy refurbished machines. I love the product, and it has saved us many a man hour. The licensing for 250-300 PCs is probably about $30 per station plus about 20% per year for software maintenance. Talk with CDW, SHI, or your favorite reseller to get a quote. But even before that, I recommend doing an evaluation of SmartDeploy. You won't be sorry, and then hardware standardization will no longer be a roadblock for you.
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I will also say SmartDeploy has released / will release a product called PointFlip that creates layers on your end user PCs, allowing you to install an application on a reference computer and then push that application install to another computer running PointFlip. I believe you can also use it to upgrade the OS of a machine from 7 to 8.1 or probably to 10 at some point. I did some beta testing for this product earlier in the year but ran out of time to test it as much as I wanted. But it looks like it will be something very useful. It might be worth a look also down the road.
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Right so where do I start??
I've got a blank VM ready to fire up.
The Windows 10 Pro Volume license is on order.Do I just install Win10 onto a VM, setup applications etc sysprep it then image that out? Any good how to guides for beginners in this game?
@NetworkNerd - Looks good but as I'm only going to use this going forward and not deploy/upgrade existing machines licensing SmartDeploy may be confusing
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@hobbit666 said:
Do I just install Win10 onto a VM, setup applications etc sysprep it then image that out? Any good how to guides for beginners in this game?
Pretty much, just that simple. If you want to make your life a little easier, you can download all of the drivers for any computer you plan to deploy this image to, extract them into a folder structure (\drivers\video\card1, drivers\video\card2, drivers\camera\cam1, etc)
then add the path to \drivers to the needed registry key (don't know it off the top of my head).Don't forget the generalize the sysprep.
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The registry key is DevicePath in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc731664(v=ws.10).aspx
We do this with our image.
