using Offline Mode in Windows PE using USMT 4 via a task sequence in SCCM 2007 SP2

[anyweb]

hi all,

 

Note: This post has been reproduced in a webcast, so if you'd like to see a video of Offline Mode in WinPE then click here

 

 

 

well this feature in USMT 4 is handy, as it allows you to do a scanstate while in Windows PE in other words, not in the OS so no problems with services running or applications running meaning that you get to backup everything you want without any locked files stopping from doing so.

 

Offline mode does however have some restrictions, read this page on Technet for details of that. To get around these restrictions and to migrate wallpaper see here, to migrate your network printers see here.

 

 

Great, but how do I do Offline Mode in Windows PE using SCCM ?

 

according to Microsoft, we can use the /offlinewindir switch in USMT 4 with scanstate.

 

/offlinewindir: "path to a windows directory"

 

 

This option specifies the offline Windows directory that the ScanState command gathers user state from. The offline directory can be Windows.old when you run the ScanState command in Windows or a Windows directory when you run the ScanState command in Windows PE. This option is incompatible with the /offline option.

 

However, implementing it isn't so straigtforward as you've probably already discovered and documentation about getting it to work within SCCM is as far as I can see pretty much non-existant,

so here courtesy of windows-noob.com is one way of doing it, feel free to show us other ways.

 

The theory behind this:-

 

As the Capture User State Step in a standard task sequence can only run in Windows, we cannot use that step to do our scanstate while in Windows PE, therefore we will use some tricks to run scanstate from WinPE.

 

To do this we create two special packages, the first package contains a batch file which calls the scanstate.exe file and the second package is the entire USMT X86 scanstate files and folders, (note: in this example we are using scanstate from the X86 folder).

 

This means that we create a separate package to the normal USMT4 package and this is only because this example is a workaround or proof of concept to prove that Offline Mode in Windows PE can be done via a Task Sequence in SCCM.

 

Update: If you would like sample code to check for and use the correct USMT architecture in offline mode then see Peters post here

 

 

Get your lab ready

 

We need a Windows XP client machine to test scanstate on and you should enable the F8 command prompt option in your boot.wim (you'll need it).

 

 

The Task Sequence

 

You can use this Task Sequence in SCCM by importing it. Please note this task sequence only has the 4 groups in it, if you want the 4 groups plus OSD then use the other Task Sequence further down.

 

Offline Mode in Windows PE using USMT 4.xml

 

The task sequence depends on three packages, the X86 bits from your USMT 4 (ie: copy everything in the X86 folder from C:\Program Files\Windows AIK\Tools\USMT folder. There are two versions, one for 32bit (X86) and one for 64bit (amd64), we are only using the X86 bits in this guide), the Batchfile

 

 

 

I break up my task sequence into four distinct groups, Set, Create, xcopy and Run

 

SET

 

 

In the Set group I set SystemDrive to c: (otherwise it will try and do this on the windows PE x: drive)

 

 

Next we set the OSDStateStorePath Task Sequence Variable to %systemdrive%\USMToffline which translates to c:\USMToffline, this directory will store our migration data during scanstate operations and when the new os is being applied.

 

 

Finally we set the hardlink load parameters

 

 

 

CREATE

 

In the Create group we just create two folders, c:\USMToffline,

 

 

and c:\USMTbits\X86

 

 

 

the c:\USMTbits\X86 will store all our scanstate native files.

 

 

XCOPY

 

In the xcopy group we do the clever stuff, we copy the X86 USMT stuff to the newly created folder, and then we copy our batch file for later user.

 

 

The batch file itself has the following contents

 

 

@set USMT_WORKING_DIR=%~2%\USMTbits\x86

"%~2\USMTbits\x86\scanstate.exe" "%~1" /c /o /hardlink /efs:hardlink /nocompress /offlinewindir:c:\windows /v:5 /l:%~2\windows\TEMP\SMSTSLog\scanstate.log /progress:%~2\windows\TEMP\SMSTSLog\scanstateprogress.log /i:%~2\USMTbits\x86\miguser.xml /i:%~2\USMTbits\x86\migapp.xml

 

 

You can download the batchfile below however you must rename it back to .bat

 

runscanstate-offlinewindir.bat.txt

 

 

RUN

 

The Run group does the actual running of the batch file and passes two variables to the file.

 

 

 

 

Testing Offline Mode.

 

Create an optional advertisement to a Migrate XP to W7 X86 collection for the Task Sequence and PXE boot your XP client (press F12 first....), select the Task Sequence when the wizard appears,

 

 

at this point press F8 to bring up the command prompt, you are doing this to verify that your data is getting migrated in OFFLINE mode. So here we can see the command prompt is open.

 

 

Ok switch back to the TS and start the task sequence. You will see it starts creating the folders, copying the USMT stuff and our batch file(s) and then actually running the scanstate command.

 

 

 

Once it is completed your migrated data will now be stored in C:\USMToffline\USMT

 

browse it and verify

 

 

If you want to see a working SMSTS.log file from the above test see below

 

smsts.log

 

 

Ok now what ?

[Peter van der Woude]

Correct. The settings of the Advertisement has to stand on "Download..."

[mvrabel]

Thanks for the quick response Peter

[anyweb]

take a look at this post to see why

[pwoodall]

I have been testing your Task Sequence and most of it is working. The part that fails is the "Restore User Files and Settings". It does join the domain before that task is run. I also have the advertisment set to "Download". Do I need to add any "Set" task before I run the "Restore" task? The log shows:

 

The task sequence execution engine failed executing the action (Restore User Files and Settings) in the group (Restore User Files and Settings) with the error code 2147942402

Action output: \sms\client\osdeployment\osdusmt\userstateaction.cpp,130)

VerifyUSMTBinaryVersionAndUpdateUSMTPath(sUsmtBinary, m_eUSMTVersion), HRESULT=80070002 (e:\nts_sms_fre\sms\client\osdeployment\osdusmt\userstateaction.cpp,558)

SetUSMTBinary(), HRESULT=80070002(e:\nts_sms_fre\sms\client\osdeployment\osdusmt\userstateaction.cpp,1011)

usmAction.Init(::GetCommandLineW()), HRESULT=80070002 (e:\nts_sms_fre\sms\client\osdeployment\osdusmt\main.cpp,235)

Invoking ReleaseSource on USMTPackagePath C:\_SMSTaskSequence\Packages\CHG000F5

Entering ReleaseSource() for C:\_SMSTaskSequence\Packages\CHG000F5

reference count 1 for the source C:\_SMSTaskSequence\Packages\CHG000F5 before releasing

Delete source directory C:\_SMSTaskSequence\Packages\CHG000F5

VerifyUSMTBinaryVersionAndUpdateUSMTPath failed (0x80070002).

UserStateMigrationAction::GetUSMTBinary failed (0x80070002).

Failed to initlialize, (0x80070002)

Released the resolved source C:\_SMSTaskSequence\Packages\CHG000F5

OSDMigrateUserState finished: 0x80070002. The operating system reported error 2147942402: The system cannot find the file specified

 

I am sure it is something simple that I missed, I have read every word on this post at least 5 times to find my mistake with no luck.

 

I have also looked at Peters examples, but was unable to follow all the steps. I like the added steps to clean up the drive. Screen shots for each task would fill in the missing information. It would also be great if he added his xml for download.

 

Thank you for all the help you are providing to all of us!

 

pwoodall

[pwoodall]

One more thing I did not add to the last post is that adding steps for Bitlocker will help with the migration that we are working on. I have followed other posting for it but have not been able to get it to work with this type of upgrade/migration on a single partition.

 

Thank you again for everything you are doing,

 

pwoodall

[Prabhu J]

How to advertise this TS? because it has graded out on "Make this TS available to boot media and PXE" while advertising

[anyweb]

if its greyed out then add a boot image to the task sequence.

[jamitupya]

Yup, as anyweb says, just right click the TS, select properties. select your boot image.

[netemule]

hi, i tried the method with a little modification. i have some problems. i am stucked!

 

1. i created an operation system image from win7 cd and apply this wim to the "apply operation system from captured image" step in the task squence,

problem: window 7 was installed and joined domain with the original xp's pc name, but the system partition became D instead of C, and the user profile was left in usmtoffline folder.

 

why it used D as the boot partition? can i use the original win7 wim file?

 

2. i created an operation system image by using the captured image created by TS with microsoft deployment tool pkg, so this image was not been syspreped

problem: the win7 was installed and the user profiles were copied but the system did not apply the xp pc name, and it did not join the domain, so it did not restore the user setting

 

i do not want to sysprep my pc, because we are using Dell oem cd, we do not have key for these cd. if we sysprep our systems, we will have to enter volumn license. is there a way to upgrade to 7 without using a syspreped image?

 

3. i also created an operation system image by using a captured cd on my golden win7 system, so this image was been syspreped, and this one worked

[Peter van der Woude]

1. It is default behaviour of the install.wim of the original DVD/ISO to apply to D.

2. Why not using a ComputerVariable to add the License Key?