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Author Topic: Looking for advice on cloning XP systems David Stambaugh Film God Posts: 4021 From: Eugene, Oregon Registered: Jan 2002 posted 03-22-2004 05:57 PM                        I'm going to be setting up 11 identical high-end graphics systems using XP Pro. I've never tried cloning XP. Anyone have any tips on doing this, particularly given the XP activation issue and the unique 96-bit system identifier that each system has. I haven't done much research yet but I figure someone here has probably done this. A quick look at the MS Knowledge Base shows they want you to use their SysPrep Tool to do this. Ewww!!! Any advice will be appreciated.  |  IP: Logged Adam Martin I'm not even gonna point out the irony. Posts: 3686 From: Dallas, TX Registered: Nov 2000 posted 03-22-2004 06:07 PM                     Yeah, you have to use sysprep. That means that all of the user information and a bunch of other crap has to be entered into XP the first time it boots. I was going to do this to upsize my hard drive, but found out in the middle of everything that I was going to lose my user info on both the new AND original drives. Luckily, I backed up my user directories to another drive on the network and still had my data files. So I ended up just doing a fresh install and used the import-settings-and-files-from-another-computer wizard. XP Pro does not require you to "activate" through Microsoft, however.  |  IP: Logged Mark J. Marshall Film God Posts: 3188 From: New Castle, DE, USA Registered: Aug 2002 posted 03-22-2004 06:26 PM                    There is a way to set up a "standard build" CD that installs XP, and every setting you wish preconfigured a certain way. I created one for my company, and basically, all you have to do is insert the CD, power on, press any key, and come back in a half an hour to a fully configured PC. But the documentation to do that correctly is scattered all over the place, and if you're only setting up 11 PCs, it's probably not worth the trouble to do that. If they need to be trully identical, I'd suggest starting with one PC, and creating a check list of everything you do to set it up. Then once the checklist is complete, wipe that drive and do it again, this time following the check list. Keep doing that until you polish off the checklist, and you're sure its right, then build the rest of the PCs off that checklist.  |  IP: Logged Ron Lacheur Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 650 From: British Columbia, Canada Registered: Feb 2002 posted 03-22-2004 06:36 PM                     I assume this is all for XP Pro Corporate Edition and not for any of the Retail or OEM versions?  |  IP: Logged Mark J. Marshall Film God Posts: 3188 From: New Castle, DE, USA Registered: Aug 2002 posted 03-22-2004 06:45 PM                    Yeah I probably should have mentioned that. I can't speak for others, but in my case, anyway, I'm talking about the XP Pro Corporate/Enterprise edition CD.  |  IP: Logged Daryl C. W. O'Shea Film God Posts: 3977 From: Midland Ontario Canada (where Panavision & IMAX lenses come from) Registered: Jun 2002 posted 03-22-2004 06:46 PM                        Use ZENworks! You know you want to. ZEN is fun. Otherwise, sysprep and Ghost are your friend. Actually for real fun, use all three.  |  IP: Logged David Stambaugh Film God Posts: 4021 From: Eugene, Oregon Registered: Jan 2002 posted 03-22-2004 07:13 PM                        This is probably going to be the retail version of XP Pro (don't know for sure yet, and I have no control over what they buy). Turns out someone here has a copy of Ghost 2003, so I'll be exploring that option. Some of the MS tech notes actually recommend using 3rd-party s/w [e.g. Ghost] for cloning XP... Thanks for the advice.  |  IP: Logged Adam Martin I'm not even gonna point out the irony. Posts: 3686 From: Dallas, TX Registered: Nov 2000 posted 03-22-2004 09:22 PM                     My first try at cloning to the larger drive was with PowerQuest Drive Image. Didn't work.  |  IP: Logged Mark J. Marshall Film God Posts: 3188 From: New Castle, DE, USA Registered: Aug 2002 posted 03-22-2004 10:20 PM                    Actually, Daryl, we use Zenworks, and you're right. It is the way to go. We install the PC from the CD, and when the users login to NDS, Zen creates a local account for them and logs them into the PC. Novell Rules! Now if we can only get them to create some server side APIs for GroupWise, so I can tie my webapps to it I'd be in heaven. Ghost is great if you have exactly identical PCs, which we don't. But our CD works on all of them.  |  IP: Logged William T. Parr Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 823 From: Cedar Park, TX Registered: Nov 2000 posted 03-22-2004 10:23 PM                     Dave You will want to set up one P/C completely the rest set up all the way down to the Applications that will be common across all of them, then run the Ghost utility and ghost the image onto a slaved Hard Drive. Word of caution though, the Ghost Image will only work in a FAT partition so do not try to save it in a NTFS partition.  |  IP: Logged Daryl C. W. O'Shea Film God Posts: 3977 From: Midland Ontario Canada (where Panavision & IMAX lenses come from) Registered: Jun 2002 posted 03-22-2004 10:56 PM                        FAT Bah! http://www.ntfs.com/boot-disk.htm Besides, Ghost broadcasting is more fun anyway.  |  IP: Logged William T. Parr Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 823 From: Cedar Park, TX Registered: Nov 2000 posted 03-23-2004 12:08 AM                     Nifty tool there Daryl. That is another Idea Dave. Do a Ghost Multicast session.  |  IP: Logged David Stambaugh Film God Posts: 4021 From: Eugene, Oregon Registered: Jan 2002 posted 03-23-2004 06:29 PM                        Received the first 3 systems today. They have XP Pro, retail edition. Adam said: quote: XP Pro does not require you to "activate" through Microsoft, however. We customarily buy Dell PCs with XP Pro. The machines come with a Dell-logo XP SP1a CD, which can be used to do a nuke and pave type install (they are not the dreaded image CDs that other manufacturers supply which are the devil's spawn ARE YOU LISTENING HP AND SONY??!!!) If the OS is reinstalled from that Dell CD, it never asks me for the product key, and it doesn't require activation. But the retail version of XP seems to require both the product key and activation. Still devising the best way to do the cloning. Now I'm being told all the systems will not necessarily be identical either. Anyway I appreciate everyone's advice.  |  IP: Logged Brad Allen Jedi Master Film Handler Posts: 688 From: Evansville, IN, USA Registered: May 2000 posted 03-23-2004 06:36 PM                     I put my vote in for Ghost. I use it as a backup method, and knock on wood, hasn't failed me yet. But it has saved my butt a couple of times when HD's crap out.  |  IP: Logged Daryl C. W. O'Shea Film God Posts: 3977 From: Midland Ontario Canada (where Panavision & IMAX lenses come from) Registered: Jun 2002 posted 03-23-2004 06:53 PM                        If it's only a difference of video cards, etc. and not main boards, you could install the drivers for all cards on one machine, then run sysprep, then clone the drives via your preferred automagical method. BTW, my current favourite method of cloning IDE drives is to mirror them with a Promise TX 2000 IDE RAID card (very inexpensive). Not only is it fast, it's resumable. Absolutely awesome for recovering data from failing drives. I'd steer away from PowerQuest's software for mirroring drives. It's good for resizing partitions, but it's certainly not the leader in cloning.  |  IP: Logged

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