MDT 2010 Lite Touch, Windows XP and VMware Workstation 7.0

Recently I have received quite a number of emails from people having problem using VMware Workstation 7.0 to build reference images with MDT 2010 Lite Touch. Here is a guide…

Verify the XP media, the VM, and get the drivers

First, verify that the Windows XP Pro Media is working correctly, and that your vmware workstation VM happily will deploy XP. And as a bonus – get all the vmware drivers unpacked and ready to import later on.

1. Download the Windows XP Pro SP3 ISO from Microsoft
    
2. Create a Virtual Machine with the following Settings
    
   Hardware Compatibility: Workstations 6.5-7.0
   Install From: I will install the operating system later
   Guest operating system: Microsoft – Windows XP Professional
   Processor Configuration:
   Memory: (512 MB)
   Network Type: Use host-only networking
   SCSI Adapter: Buslogic
   Virtual Disk SCSI:
   Disk Size: 40 GB
    
3. Take a snapshot of the virtual machine
    
4. Configure the VM to use the Windows XP Pro SP3 iso 
    
5. Start the VM, and boot from the Windows XP iso, during setup start, press F6 to load a third party mass storage driver
    
6. When prompted for additional mass storage drivers, connect the VMware SCSI Driver Floppy (C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware Workstation\Resources\vmscsi.flp), and press S to specify additional drivers and select the VMWARE SCSI Controller.
    
7. After the textpart of the setup is complete, disconnect the SCSI Driver Floppy.
    
8. After the Windows XP Pro SP3 Setup is complete, install the VMware Tools
    
9. From the VM, copy the following folders from C:\Program Files\VMware\VMware Tools\Drivers to your deployment server
    
   mouse
   scsi
   vmxnet
   vmxnet3
    
10. From the VM, copy the following folders from C:\Program Files\Common Files\VMware\Drivers to your deployment server
     
    video
    vmci

Configure the Deployment Server

1. On your MDT 2010 Lite Touch deployment server, extract the Windows XP Pro ISO file to a folder.
    
2. Then, using the MDT 2010 Deployment Workbench, Create a deployment share
    
3. Import the Windows XP Operating System (Unattend setup)
    
4. Import the vmware drivers
    
5. Create a task sequence
    
6. Update the deployment share
    
7. Copy the LiteTouchPE_x86.iso to the host PC
    
8. Revert the XP VM back to its snapshot, configure it to boot from the LiteTouchPE_x86.iso, start it and complete the deployment wizard (select WORKGROUP and to capture to an image)
    
9. MDT will now deploy Windows XP, inject the vmware drivers, run sysprep and create a Wim file on the server.

Tip!

If you want to reduce the time it takes to run sysprep to just a few minutes, do the following:

1. In the folder where you have the XP operating System, create a $OEM$\$1\Drivers\Ref_VMSCSI folder and copy the VMware SCSI driver to that folder.
    
2. In the Task Sequence, disable the “Add mass storage drivers to sysprep.inf for XP and 2003” action.
    
3. Configure the [Sysprep] and [SysprepMassStorage] sections in sysprep inf to look like below.

   [Sysprep] ;   BuildMassStorageSection = Yes

   [SysprepMassStorage] ;
   ; Added for VMware VMSCSI Support
   ;
   PCI\VEN_104B&DEV_1040 = C:\Drivers\Ref_VMSCSI\vmscsi.inf
   ;
   ; Below driverlist is Common XP builtin drivers
   ;
   Primary_IDE_Channel=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   Secondary_IDE_Channel=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCMCIA\*PNP0600=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   *PNP0600=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCMCIA\KME-KXLC005-A99E=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCMCIA\_-NinjaATA–3768=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCMCIA\FUJITSU-IDE-PC_CARD-DDF2=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   *AZT0502=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCI\CC_0101=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCI\VEN_10B9&DEV_5215=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_2441=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_244A=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_244B=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCI\VEN_10B9&DEV_5219=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCI\VEN_10B9&DEV_5229=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCI\VEN_1097&DEV_0038=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCI\VEN_1095&DEV_0640=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCI\VEN_1095&DEV_0646=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCI\VEN_0E11&DEV_AE33=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_1222=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_1230=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_7010=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_7111=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_2411=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_2421=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCI\VEN_8086&DEV_7199=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCI\VEN_1042&DEV_1000=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCI\VEN_1039&DEV_0601=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCI\VEN_1039&DEV_5513=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCI\VEN_10AD&DEV_0001=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf
   PCI\VEN_10AD&DEV_0150=%systemroot%\inf\mshdc.inf

Deploy the image

To test deploying the new image.

1. Import the Windows XP Pro SP3 Custom Image.
    
2. Create a new task sequence
    
3. Revert the XP VM back to its snapshot, configure it to boot from the LiteTouchPE_x86.iso, start it and complete the deployment wizard (don’t select to capture the image)
4. MDT will now deploy the Windows XP Pro SP3 Custom Image