I've been using MDT for a couple of years now, and I feel pretty comfortable with it. I've been using to to build server images, then image them to the servers and run the task sequences, aka New Server. In the past, I have task sequences that specialize each machine by prestaging them in the MDT database by either the MAC Address or Serial number. We have three separate domains they can join that are chosen before the machine is built, and different OU's to be placed in on the domains depending on what project they are to be a member of. So, we're relying on the task sequences pretty heavily, and I've created many custom PowerShell scripts, and database variables to help specialize each build.
So, here is my problem. Our environment is taking a drastic change, and taking 25 minutes to build a server from scratch is no longer acceptable. It isn't just that, but we are pushing a sysprepped virtual disk image out now instead of allowing MDT to reinstall Windows on each new machine or VM. As you could tell from my previous paragraph, using an unattend file would result in many separate sysprepped virtual disk images to choose from. Would it be possible to start a task sequence to finish off a build, from a prebuilt OS? Say, I have a blank slate OS that just finished OOBE. Truthfully, I want to unattend the OOBE and jump right into a MDT task sequence. Do all the things I said above, then reboot to finalize the settings. I'm leaning towards a Refresh build, but I'm not sure that is really what I need. I want to prep the system to kick off an automated task sequence on next reboot. Before I reboot, I want to sysprep/generalize/enter OOBE/shutdown then clone the virtual disk. Start up the virtual disk a hundred times, and kick off a task sequence on each one. Does that sound pheasable? I can see how to map the deployment share, and kick off Scripts\Litetouch.wsf to start the Wizard. I'm just toying with the idea of a custom UDI or some other tool to kick off the scripts to automate them.
Thanks for your help! This looks like a cool community, I think I'll lurk around a bit.
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I've been using MDT for a couple of years now, and I feel pretty comfortable with it. I've been using to to build server images, then image them to the servers and run the task sequences, aka New Server. In the past, I have task sequences that specialize each machine by prestaging them in the MDT database by either the MAC Address or Serial number. We have three separate domains they can join that are chosen before the machine is built, and different OU's to be placed in on the domains depending on what project they are to be a member of. So, we're relying on the task sequences pretty heavily, and I've created many custom PowerShell scripts, and database variables to help specialize each build.
So, here is my problem. Our environment is taking a drastic change, and taking 25 minutes to build a server from scratch is no longer acceptable.
It isn't just that, but we are pushing a sysprepped virtual disk image out now instead of allowing MDT to reinstall Windows on each new machine or VM. As you could tell from my previous paragraph, using an unattend file would result in many separate sysprepped virtual disk images to choose from. Would it be possible to start a task sequence to finish off a build, from a prebuilt OS? Say, I have a blank slate OS that just finished OOBE. Truthfully, I want to unattend the OOBE and jump right into a MDT task sequence. Do all the things I said above, then reboot to finalize the settings. I'm leaning towards a Refresh build, but I'm not sure that is really what I need. I want to prep the system to kick off an automated task sequence on next reboot. Before I reboot, I want to sysprep/generalize/enter OOBE/shutdown then clone the virtual disk. Start up the virtual disk a hundred times, and kick off a task sequence on each one. Does that sound pheasable? I can see how to map the deployment share, and kick off Scripts\Litetouch.wsf to start the Wizard. I'm just toying with the idea of a custom UDI or some other tool to kick off the scripts to automate them.
Thanks for your help! This looks like a cool community, I think I'll lurk around a bit.
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