Ghost Story Part 5

Run Setup manager. This is like a simulated Windows setup where you respond to questions you would normally be presented with during a real setup of a fresh installation of Windows. The result is an answer file, named sysprep.inf, which you can use when preparing the model computer for replication using sysprep. Run (Double Click) on setupmgr.exe in the directory you extracted the files to (e.g. deploy). You will be presented with a series of screens where you will make the choices that would normally be made during Windows setup. You will be able to enter specific choices, accept defaults or skip items entirely.

Here are the selections we made:

Type: Sysprep Setup
Product: Win XP Professional
Do not fully automate
Skip name, organization
Accept default for Display Settings
Set Time Zone
Skip Product Key
Select auto generate computer name
Enter standard Admin password and encrypt
Select typical network settings
Accept workgroup
Skip telephony setup
Accept default regional settings
Select language

When finished enter location where you want sysprep.inf file saved. The default is installation directory for the support tools.

The resulting sysprep.inf files will look something like this:

;SetupMgrTag
[Unattended]
    InstallFilesPath=C:\sysprep\i386

[GuiUnattended]
    AdminPassword=5edc1c052f954a98aad3b435b51404eebeca4ef5df2dbb9940447a8399ba8438
    EncryptedAdminPassword=Yes
    OEMSkipRegional=1
    TimeZone=35

[UserData]
    FullName=""
    OrgName=""
    ComputerName=*

[SetupMgr]
    DistFolder=C:\sysprep\i386
    DistShare=windist

[Identification]
    JoinWorkgroup=WORKGROUP

[Networking]
    InstallDefaultComponents=Yes

Note that Microsoft states that the ExtendOemPartition entry should be used in the sysprep.inf file if you are cloning to larger disk than the source. Symantec says that the Ghost imaging process adjusts to differences in hard disk size. Provided the data will fit on a smaller drive than the source, Ghost will create the image. And, similarly, will expand the partitions on the destination computers if they are larger than the orginal image. Microsoft states that the destination hard disk must be at least as large as the source and that if the destination hard disk is larger, steps should be taken in the sysprep.inf to prevent future problems. (See information on Microsoft website.)