• Registered: 2008-11-04
  • Posts: 2

Topic: universal image newbie help!

Hello!

Some questions to all you master image builders!

I have been making master images for all our dell laptops and desktops and now would like to combine them into 1 universal image.

I would not like to use a bootabe cd/dvd with the image on it.  Instead I'd like to continue having the image on a server and use a ghost boot cd to boot clients to the network and apply the image after logging onto the server, using ghost.  I have already created a ghost boot cd.

I am now creating the universal image on a Dell GX280 tower pc.  I have it set up to the point of now getting the drivers ready, working with sysprep etc.  I am using Vernalex's video guide as help.  I'm confused as to how to proceed.  He says to get all the drivers MANUALLY (that have to be certified by MS to work in sysprep) and put them into folders (c:\drivers\sound, etc.) and then use sysprep driver scanner to add them to the registry.  Then to add mass storage drivers by running sysprep -bmsd, and then to add things manually etc.

My questions (finally) are, can I extract the driver packs to c:\drivers INSTEAD of manually looking around for all the drivers for the dell pcs like Vernalex does?  I'm trying to follow "kickarse"s directions (universal image form topic - "How do you use driverpacks") and that's what he does.   I'm noticiing that many of the older Dell drivers aren't WHQL certified that I was going to manually download, so they wouldn't work in sysprep.  Are all the drivers in the driver packs WHQL certified?  Will it hurt my image to have all these drivers in the registry?

Lastly, I'll have to add PnP ids and there locations for all these dell laptops and desktops.  I'm not even sure where to begin and how best I should approach this.  But most importantly I'd like to know if I need to manually find drivers for these machines or if they will be covered by the 10 driver packs.

Much thanks in advance!

  • Registered: 2008-04-02
  • Posts: 26

Re: universal image newbie help!

i think you need mysysprep that will get around the problem of WHQL, which is well mentioned many times here in these forums,

not sure what you mean when you say "My questions (finally) are, can I extract the driver packs to c:\drivers INSTEAD of manually looking around for all the drivers for the dell pcs like Vernalex does?"

if you mean without sub directories, no because of the ini (inf) files will clash

my sysprep scanner documentation should tell you about it's limitations, but to my knowledge the sysprep scanner was designed to get around the registry limitations entirely,

driverpacks always looking to expand it's database, if you do a roll out and you notice a driver was not found, then find the HWIDS and let driverpacks know, and they will no doubt add it in at a future date,

note, whether they will add specific DELL hardware drivers in or not i'm not sure,

Last edited by Registered (2008-11-16 12:17:38)

  • Registered: 2008-08-31
  • Posts: 7

Re: universal image newbie help!

As to installing drivers that don't pass the certification, you should be able to get around that fine by adding the following line to your [Unattended] section in the sysprep.inf file:

DriverSigningPolicy = Ignore

Otherwise XP will not, no matter how hard you try, install non-certified drivers.