Hi all, I am doing a server 2008 r2 OSD - we need to support various editions of server - enterprise, standard, dc, etc.. Using SCCM SP2 R3 + current MDT. I can run an individual deploy and capture for each flavour of the OS, and then combine them into a single WIM on the server for use in the actual deployment task sequence. Basically there are 4+ deploy and capture task sequences. We will be supporting reference images with and without SP1, and there will be a requirement to rebuild the reference images every quarter to keep things up to date. As you can imagine, I would like to streamline this process as much as possible. What I am trying to do is combine all of the current deploy and capture task sequences into a single TS. The logic is: Format the drive Install OS1 Capture, reboot Format the drive Install OS2 Capture, reboot And so on. (It is not relevant to the question, but I will probably just use a script run on the storage server to combine the WIMS, rather than writing a custom script to imagex the images together on the fly). The first OS installs fine and then captures, machine then reboots, formats the drive, the fails at the point where it is getting ready to lay down the next OS package. OSDApplyOS.exe starts off for the second OS install, then looks for a hard drive to apply the image to - scans C: and says "Volume C:\ has already been used" Then "There are no more volumes available for use", then "GetNextAvailableVolume HRESULT 80004005" Obviously, it has remembered that an OS as already been applied to C:, and even though it has been re-formated, it won't let it be used again. Questions: How can I work around this issue - is there a TS variable that I can overwrite? Is the the best approach for what we are trying to achieve? How do you do it in your shop? Thanks!

The new version of SCCM will remove the need of recapture as you can inject the updates directly into the Image. So I understand you are creating a task sequence to install the SOE image, install the updates, and then recapture it for all of your images? I’d be interest to see the best solution within SCCM 2007 for this. I assume just adding the step install windows updates at the end of the task is not what the client wants? They want the updates within the image?Blair Muller

Sometimes I just use a VB script which prompt for some questions at the start of the deployment. The answers to the questions are stored in variables. For example I have multiple domains, in the VB script I ask which domain where you can type the domain name. In my TS I have multiple join domain steps with a condition based on a variable. You can use this where you ask for which type of OS and so on and just have one TS. Follow me through my blog and Twitter!

Is the the best approach for what we are trying to achieve? How do you do it in your shop? I would use MDT Litetouch and virtual machines (Hyper-V) to build the reference image(s). Why? Its easy, and it's FAST.... Create a virtual machine and a task sequence for each version of the OS you need... Make sure to add a "pause" (LTISuspend.wsf) to the Task secquence. Deploy the Server OS to the virtual machine (and patches), and create a snap shot. Now you can revert to your snapshot, and resume the build process (sysprep and capture). Some pepole like to do the patching manually... some like to automate it... What ever you perfer this solution can help you get there... And the best part... you can build new images in just a few minutes.... :-) Ronni Pedersen | Configuration Manager MVP | Blog: http://ronnipedersen.com/ | Twitter @ronnipedersen

Ronni, You probably have the closest answer of all of the above... This is not just about patching. Yes, I can create 6 seperate task sequences to capture each flavour of each OS. Yes, it is 'fast' in a virtual environment. Yes, if the only updates I need to add are nice, clean OS MSU updates I can inject these offline. Even with the current version of SCCM. What I want is a single task sequence that will instal and create 6-8 new WIMs - surely I am not the first person that has approached this issue. I know that the 'easiest' solution is to simply create 6-8 task sequences and then launch them one after the other - I can even non-mandatoriarly advertise them to the same collection - no need for a script Jannes to select your TS (store the vars in the collection) - run each TS one by one. This is a process that will be repeated every three months to incorporate the latest MS OS patches - and other software updates. Really, I just want to run multiple build and captures within 1 TS... how hard can it be? Thanks...

It's not quite what you are asking for and I don't even know if it would work but in theory..... First create A virtual machine for each diffrent wim you want. I hink you could create one TS and use Wmi based querys as conditions on the TS Steps that needs to be unique for each different wim. Since app-nstall steps and so on would be the same your update job would be reduced. For example we could use the mac-addresses from the VM:s to apply WIn7-swedish to VM number one and W7 English to VM number two with the same TS.