OfflineSysPrep, Offline sysprepping of Windows XP/2003

Usage of SysPrep Offline :

• For SysPrepping a Windows XP or 2003 32-bit partition that is hardware independent (yes, hardware independent!) while offline (yes, a non-booted Windows partition!)
• For SysPrepping a Windows XP or 2003 32-bit partition that is hardware independent while booted in Windows but with a partition/drive to sysprep attached and assigned a drive letter (ie a non-booted WinXP/2003 partition).
• You can use an unattended solution by locating sysprep.inf in the \userfiles\ directory of the OfflineSysPrep plugin or in the \userfiles\ folder of the Windows version.

Using OfflineSysPrep :

1. From 'Select Drive to SysPrep' options, select the XP/2003 partition/drive you want to sysprep (you are only presented with those that have boot.ini in root to cut down options);
2. From 'Select User Profile from Drive', select a user account;
3. Select a HAL update option from those listed;
4. Optionally select a path to be recursively scanned for inf drivers for pnp to detect. Fixed drive letters will be altered to %SystemDrive% (eg 'z:\sysprep\drivers' will be altered to '%SystemDrive%\sysprep\drivers') so it is advisable that the path to be specified is one which is located on the offline system's %SystemDrive%. File scanning recursion is performed internally or by SetupCopyOEMInf. SetupCopyOEMInf is used if the 'Advanced' option 'Complete OfflineSysPrep operations without running sysprep.exe' is selected. If sysprep is to run, internal search function will be used. However, if it is desirable to not have sysprep itself perform the pnp (ie, 'PnP/Detect non-plug and play hardware' will not be selected from sysprep's interface), then select 'Use SetupCopyOEMInf (if not selecting sysprep pnp)' from the 'Advanced' options;
5. Optionally specify 'Advanced' options by clicking 'Advanced' and then the desired options from those listed;
6. Click 'Apply';
7. Now use SysPrep as usual, which should automatically start.

On Sysprep:

· Sysprep versions 5.1.2600.0 or later can successfully sysprep both XP and 2003.

· Sysprep files may be found on a XP\2003 install disk in a file called deploy.cab.

· Sysprep version 5.1.2600.2180 may be downloaded here.

· Sysprep version 5.2.3790.1830 may be downloaded here.

· Useful documentation on sysprep may be found here.


On the updating of HAL files:

· Windows XP/2003 usually makes use one of these three HAL types on current hardware:
- Advanced Configuration and Power Interface (ACPI) PC - ACPIPIC
- ACPI Uniprocessor PC - ACPIAPIC_UP
- ACPI Multiprocessor PC - ACPIAPIC_MP

Obviously, this creates a problem if an image to be deployed has been configured for one hardware type, but the hardware of the new system is different. To get around this, all the HAL files can be refreshed with new files (this is needed due to the renaming of files by Windows on first boot) -- from either sp2.cab, sp1.cab, or drivers.cab depending on the setup -- and then (either manually or automatically) set to required HAL.


On the haldetect script: [Note: only applicable for versions prior to 1.3]

· Script has been modified for BartPE from that provided here.

· Script determines current hardware and updates sysprep.inf (or, in its absence, creates that file) accordingly so that sysprep can dynamically change the HAL type. In this way, the horrid BSOD may hopefully be avoided when applying an image to a machine differing in hardware configuration.


Additional comments:

· If using compressed versions of files, note that SRV.SYS cannot be compressed as SRV.SY_ otherwise sysprep will not complete its task successfully

· Using OfflineSysPrep under Windows resets c:\boot.ini to read-only and timeout to 'timeout=0'

· If the partition to sysprep does not have boot.ini located in its root (in the case of some multiboot scenario) or a directory called 'windows', create a 'dummy' boot.ini and then the drive should appear as an option to select.

Screenshot:



Source: Original page for this artcile - download link