T.J. Schmitz.com » disk imaging

Zenworks 7 Imaging

T.J. — Mon, 26 Sep 2005 23:04:34 +0000

“evilzenscientist :: thoughts � ZENworks 7 imaging: “ZENworks OS imaging has always been based on the Linux kernel – it’s fast, efficient, has a great networking stack and is also extensible. None of the problems of DOS and getting NDIS drivers etc.

Earlier versions of ZENworks – (ZfD 3.x, ZfD 4.0, ZENworks 6, ZENworks 6.5) – spawned a slew of sites dedicated to tweaking this Linux environment. Notable is the Novell Forge Project zfdimgdrv. The imaging environment has also been extended by the likes of ENGL.

ZENworks 7 changed to a SLES 9 SP2-based kernel; this provides extensive hardware support (and real support; things that have been tested).”

(Back to T.J.’s Thoughts:) I think this is another excellent reason to upgrade – matching drivers – especially with the Dell Optiplex line – has been a nightmare with previous versions of imaging. I know most of these machines are supported well with SLES 9 – I’ve been running it on a couple in test senarios on and off for a while. I do have ZenWorks under my SLA, so the cost is nill for me, and the benifits are starting to far overweight the potential problems.

Zenworks Imaging boot cds

T.J. — Fri, 26 Aug 2005 14:09:00 +0000

I’ve been having fits getting zenworks imaging to work with Dell Optiplex GX280s and GX510s. I finally came up with a solution that works 100% of the time.

Set the SATA drive to compatibility mode in BIOS, and use the BCM57_v753 boot disk. This is the only version that seems to work with the SATA drives and broadcomm driver reliably. There is a new version based on the 2.6.11 kernel that I’ve tested with a bit, but it won’t install the Zen partition or LILO on the SATA drive reliably.

Using Sysprep to Extend Disk Partitions

T.J. — Fri, 08 Jul 2005 16:42:00 +0000

Just found out that there is a command – ExtendOEMPartition – in sysprep that will allow you to expand NTFS disk partitions. From the Microsoft site:
Using Sysprep to Extend Disk PartitionsWhen installing Windows XP Professional, you might find it necessary to extend the partition of the destination computer. You can use Sysprep with the appropriate entries in the answer file to extend an NTFS partition. You might want to extend an NTFS partition for the following reasons:

To create images that can be extended into larger disk partitions and take advantage of hard disks that might have greater capacity than the original hard disk on the reference computer.
To create images on smaller hard disks.

Review the following steps and choose the method that works best for you, based on the third-party tools that you are using to create an image of the operating system.

Caution

Make sure that you do not accidentally delete the Setupapi.log and Hyberfil.sys files (if applicable) when modifying the image. These files are recreated when the MiniSetup Wizard runs on the destination computer. Deleting these files on an active system can cause the system to function improperly.

When used in an answer file, the ExtendOemPartition key causes Setup to extend the destination partition into any available unpartitioned space that physically follows it on the hard disk.

The values for ExtendOemPartition are 0, 1, and extra size in MB

where:

0 Setup does not extend the partition.
1 Setup extends the partition to fill out the hard disk.
extra size in MB Setup increases the current partition size by this amount.

ExtendOemPartition automatically leaves the last cylinder on the hard disk free to allow dynamic disk support. ExtendOemPartition can be set to a number other than 1 to indicate a specific disk size for extending the hard disk. This is useful if more than one partition is requested on a computer.

Important

Only NTFS partitions can be extended. If the destination partition you plan to extend is FAT or FAT32, run convert.exe /fs:ntfs from the command line before running Sysprep. The file system is converted when the image is applied to the destination computer before the MiniSetup Wizard starts. Setup does not extend FAT16 and FAT32 partitions.
ExtendOemPartition can be used with both the Unattend.txt and Sysprep.inf Setup files.
When used in Sysprep.inf for imaged computers, the destination computer’s hard disk must be the same size or larger than the reference computer’s hard disk.
To enable the extension, the partition to be extended must have contiguous unpartitioned space available.

To extend a hard disk partition when using a third-party disk-imaging product or a hardware-imaging device that supports the version of NTFS that is used by Windows XP Professional

Create a partition on the reference computer hard disk that is just large enough to install Windows XP Professional with all the components and applications that you intend to add. This helps keep the size of the reference image file to a minimum.
If the destination partition you plan to extend is FAT or FAT32, run convert.exe /fs:ntfs from the command line before running Sysprep. The file system is converted when the image is applied to the destination computer before the MiniSetup Wizard starts.

Note

ConvertNTFS does not work in Sysprep.inf because this is a text mode-only function and Sysprep does not go through text mode.

In the [Unattended] section of Sysprep.inf, include the statement:

ExtendOemPartition = 1

You can also set the additional size in megabytes to extend the partition.

Install Windows XP Professional on the reference computer. Sysprep shuts down the system automatically.
Generate the image.
Place the image on the destination computer where the destination computer has the same size system partition as the reference computer.
Restart the destination computer.

When you place the reference image on a destination computer, drive C is converted to NTFS when the computer starts. The computer then restarts and starts MiniSetup. During MiniSetup, Windows extends drive C to the rest of the unpartitioned space on the hard disk. The destination computer then restarts, and the end user can log on and begin using Windows XP Professional.

The MiniSetup Wizard starts and the partition is extended.

To extend a hard disk partition when using a disk-imaging product that does not support NTFS used by Windows XP Professional

In the [Unattended] section of Sysprep.inf, include the statement:
```
ExtendOemPartition = 1
```
Or additional size in megabytes to extend the partition.
Use Cmdlines.txt to convert short file names.
Run Sysprep.

The following actions occur when you restart the destination computer:

The computer initially starts in conversion mode to convert the system partition on the destination computer to NTFS.
The computer automatically restarts.
The MiniSetup Wizard starts, and the partition is extended almost instantaneously.

Sysprep across multiple machines

T.J. — Wed, 22 Jun 2005 14:48:00 +0000

I came across this post on Joshers Weblog and it fixed a bunch of problems for me. Disabling the soundcard was a great help – I’ve been trying to get audio to work for about a month, and the solution is as easy as this. Aren’t blogs great?from the weblog:

I have a single image for Dell OptiPlex GX1, GX110, GX150, GX200, GX260, GX270, and several Dell laptops, plus Gateway E-3200, E-4200.

Key elements of cross-hardware platform compatibility:

Before saving your image, change the hard drive controller to “Standard Dual PCI IDE Controller” (or something like that, I may not have stated it 100% correctly but you’ll find it). Afer installing the image on a target computer, change the HDC to the correct one for that platform (can be scripted using the MS devcon tool).

Set Sysprep to run a hardware detection at startup (sysprep.exe -pnp -mini -reseal -quiet).

For the GX260 and GX270 you’ll have to download the chipset drivers and extract them with the -a switch, then put them in a location in your image and tell Sysprep to look for them there (OemPnPDriversPath=”\Drivers\GX260;\Drivers\GX270″) where “drivers” is a folder off the root of C:.

When creating your image, disable the sound card (onboard) or remove it (add-in) during image creation on your master computer.

For profiles:

Install all programs under the same user name when creating the image. Set up desktop icons, Internet Explorer settings, everything you want to be customized, under that profile. Before saving the image, copy that profile on top of the Administrator profile, then delete the profile you used to create the image (you can’t copy to/from or delete a profile that’s in use, so you’ll need a third user ID to do this). After your image is deployed to a target computer, use the Administrator profile to over-write the Default User profile. This is the only method I’ve found to have a customized profile survive Sysprep.

To have sysprep join your domain:

[Identification]
DomainAdmin=
DomainAdminPassword=
JoinDomain=

In the above, you must use a username that is a domain user name (i.e., not a local account) and that has admin rights on the computer.

I’ve got this down to an art, there’s probably more stuff I could put here. Feel free to contact me if you have any questions.

Posted by: Richard Benke at June 11, 2004 02:36 PM

I used the wrong e-mail address in the post above (we just changed). This one is correct: Richard.Benke@wwrc.virginia.gov.

Posted by: Richard Benke at June 11, 2004 02:37 PM

isolinux.cfg tweak for bootable CDs

T.J. — Tue, 26 Apr 2005 17:02:00 +0000

I ran across this interesting article on configuring the isolinux.cfg on ZenWorks imaging CDs to allow booting to the local hard drive after a timeout.

Using USB Drive with ZENworks Imaging

T.J. — Wed, 30 Mar 2005 15:11:00 +0000

Very simple clear instructions for using a USB Drive with ZENworks Imaging. Worked for me, although on some machines I had to replace “MOUNT /dev/sda1 /mnt/usbhd” with “MOUNT /dev/sda4 /mnt/usbhd” or sometimes /dev/sda3.

Script to ensure renaming of imaged Mac

T.J. — Wed, 23 Mar 2005 16:58:00 +0000

I ran across this interesting script that checks to make sure that a Mac has been re-named after imaging, and queries for a new name if it hasn’t. Neat little tool, and I think it supplements my vb script that renames our PCs after imaging to their Dell service tag #.