VM /ETC

Brian Desmond’s Blog : How to Sysprep in Windows 2008 documents the new sysprep process for Server 2008. In this post, Brian explains that the current tools for Windows 2000 and 2003, using setupmgr.exe to create sysprep.inf, no longer exist.

“The first step is acquiring the Windows Automated Installation Kit (WAIK) from somewhere. You can get it from Microsoft’s website, MSDN subscriber downloads, and probably the volume licensing downloads site too I’d guess (though I haven’t checked). The ISO is available at http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=94bb6e34-d890-4932-81a5-5b50c657de08&DisplayLang=en, and is about an 800MB install on my 2003 SP2 x86 box.

You’ll also need to copy the install.wim from your 2008 DVD sources folder to the hard drive as the tool won’t work with it if it doesn’t have write access.

The tool of choice is the Windows System Image Manager (WSIM)”

Check out Brian’s full post for screenshots and instructions of the entire 2008 sysprep process.

My thoughts after understanding this new sysprep process are now what changes to VirtualCenter will have to be made in order to include customization of Server 2008 in the deploy from template and clone VM wizards?

Will the virtualization community come to the rescue again with a plugin, or will VMware release an update or a new version of VC to support native sysprep? Can it even be done? Maybe administrators will just have to manually create the unattend.xml, place it in a new directory on VC for 2008, and then VirtualCenter will use new syntax to reference the file location during deployment.

I decided to go ahead and submit an idea request over at viplugins.com (also known as lostcreations.com) for this. My request is ticket #69 in the VI Plugins and Extension Ideas table.

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