creating an image

Welcome to Ten Forums Deheugden.

Everything works pretty much as it has been working since Windows Vista. Myself a great Hyper-V virtualization fan I use it instead of VMware, creating all my deployment images with it.

Instead of capturing the image with DISM I use in my opinion a much faster and easier way. After Sysprep I just shut down the reference virtual machine, boot it with Macrium Reflect boot device and create a system image. This image I then deploy to all my computers, again booting the machines up with Macrium Reflect boot device and restoring the image.

You might want to make a pot of coffee, turn of the phone for 15 minutes and read this tutorial through: Windows 10 Image - Customize in Audit Mode with Sysprep - Windows 10 Forums

I really recommend first reading it completely through, not starting the procedure and stopping every minute or so to read next paragraph. Tutorial is done using Hyper-V as virtualization platform but method told in it works on other virtualization platforms as well.

The third of the videos in beginning of the tutorial is not too long, I recommend you watch at least it if time does not allow you to watch first two. the third one is a recap, covering about everything.

If you have any questions after reading the tutorial, we will do our best to give you correct answers.

Kari

Yes, I use the free version.

The first two videos, a bit long I admit, will show how I am doing it. I'll attach an extra VHD (virtual hard disk) to virtual machine to capture the image.

Anyway, any available storage will do. You can capture it to any disk available for Macrium Rescue environment, local or network. When I'm done I then copy the image to a USB stick, plugging it and Macrium boot USB to each computer, boot from Macrium boot disk and restore the image from the another USB.

When doing a deployment image I use the /generalize switch with Sysprep command (shown in tut & vids) which removes all hardware related information and drivers from the Windows image, meaning I can then restore / deploy that image to any hardware. Windows 10 is bloody good in finding then correct drivers on each machine I deploy the image.

My deployment image continues three additional language packs, full Office 2016 suite (about 3 GB), Windows ADK (7 GB) and full Visual Studio 2015 (24 GB) plus a lot of other software, all which I want to be installed on each of my Windows 10 machines, meaning my images are quite big, between 40 and 50 GB:

For this, to prepare Windows image, from the moment I begin installation of Windows 10 on reference virtual machine, to the point when I am ready to boot to Macrium to create the image, it will take for me quite exactly 90 minutes.

Add 12 to 14 minutes to create a system image with Macrium, I'm done in a bit less than two hours. When deploying Macrium needs about 10 to 15 minutes to restore the image, Windows initial OOBE boot after that another 10 minutes (generalized image, Windows setup needs to find and install all drivers), in other words one PC has my image deployed and is ready to run in less than half an hour. I usually do two USB sticks with the image, meaning I can deploy two machines at the same time. Deploying over the network would be easier but take a lot more time.

deheugden said:

So, because i already have a reference pc, i think i need to start with part 6 of the tutorial, skip 7 and continue with 8.

Correct.

deheugden said:

Only one thing(for now) isnt really clear, should i run sysprep before using Macrium or after?

If you think it logically, you need of course run Sysprep first. Sysprep shuts down the reference machine after it's done, image captured then is ready to be deployed, already sysprepped.

If you would capture the image before sysprepping then you would need to run Sysprep on each machine after the image was deployed.

deheugden said:

Also, in vid3 you had to click the next button a few times, cant that be done unattended?

That's the only con in using Macrium (or any other imaging application) as a deployment tool, it's not fully automatic and unattended. If you want a completely unattended deployment then you have to use more professional tool to capture and deploy the image.

Just to make this clear, the tutorial in question as most of the content here at Ten Forums is intended for private users. The tutorial is just showing an example how to use professional methods on private networks and computing with free, easy to use and to most users familiar tools.

deheugden said:

Yeah, thought so it still would be like that. Wanted to be for sure.

Anyway, Reflect with sysprep works fine. Now need to find a way to migrate/backup userprofiles and try to restore the created image in Macrium within my virtual environment.

You can test deployment on a virtual machine simply by creating a new vm, booting it with Macrium boot device and restoring the image. Just remember that as with physical machines, also the test virtual machine needs a disk at least as big as the one you imaged.

In other words if your reference machine has a 256 GB primary disk which you imaged, containing the BIOS / UEFI system partitions and partition C: for Windows, the target machine on which image will be restored must have a primary disk 256 GB or bigger.