Win10 Image is Fine till I use FOG and upload it.

Hello everyone,

Just wondering if anyone has run into a issue where you create a image of a machine after doing the ctrl+shift+F3 command and installed all your software and tweaks and then when I run sysprep and upload it to FOG (our imaging solution) all seems fine.

When I download it to another machine it gets to the basic setup screen asking country,etc...and it reboots....then when I go back to the reference machine it does the same thing now.

What is sysprep doing to the machine that causes this to happen???

Yes the machine is a Dell Optiplex 990 and is not on the compatibility chart, however it does not error out when I load it normally, just when I am trying to image it and using sysprep.

Any help would be grateful on this. I have been scratching my head over this for 2 days now and even though it is the beginning of summer here at our district I would like to get it done soon.

Idaho Tech

When I download it to another machine it gets to the basic setup screen asking country,etc...and it reboots....

Hi, welcome to the windowssh blog.

Not knowing FOG, never even tested it, I have not had any issues in deploying a Windows image when it has been customized in Audit Modeand then sysprepped using Macrium Reflect Free(for home and other small networks) or Windows ICD(for bigger corporate networks.

As I said I don't know FOG and my suggestion might not interest you but I would either use Macrium Reflect Freeor Windows ICD, based on the size of the network / number of computers the image needs to be deployed to.

• The Macrium method for smaller networks: Windows 10 Image - Customize in Audit Mode with Sysprep - Windows 10 blog (suitable to small networks up to 10, maybe 15 machines)
• The Windows ICD method for bigger corporate networks: Build and deploy an image for Windows 10 Desktop - Windows 10 hardware dev

Kari

Thanks for the info Kari,

I have imaged another Dell 780 and all seemed to work on that one, so kinda curious why this one will not work properly. I will check out your suggestions, but I will try to keep hitting my head against the wall as well. I will let you know which one pans out.

It is just weird that even on the source machine that the image came from if I boot it up after running sysprep it does the same as the new imaged machine.

Thanks for reading my post and getting back to me.

Jim

It is just weird that even on the source machine that the image came from if I boot it up after running sysprep it does the same as the new imaged machine.

Usually a reboot loop after sysprep means that something is wrong in the answer file used for sysprep.

The two most common faults / errors in answer file are:

• Processor architecture is wrong
• A drive is not found (Answer File for instance tells system to relocate the Users folder to D: drive but ID letter D: is assigned to CD / DVD drive when Windows goes to OOBE)

Being old school, I would forget a tool / method (FOG in your case) as soon as I had found out that using another tool / method causes no issues.

Kari

Crap, I think you just asnwered my problem.....I will let you know if it is what I think it is. I am getting close to creating yet another image so I will let you know as soon as I do this one and then if that is it I will let you know what I find.

Thanks for getting back to me so quickly on that before I shot this one out one more time, it may be the last with that bit of info....

Jim

Hey there Kari,

Well it is either one of 2 things that could of caused the problem with the image. It seems to be working now. It does take another set of eyes or brains to help out once in a while.

Here are the possible problem causers:

1. I isntalled the FOG client into the system and then rebooted with it installed on the system.

I will have to debunk this one with some further testing if time allows. I cannot believe it was that. Has never, ever affected a system like that.

2. I followed the instructions for making the image from before but left the USB drive in the machine as it booted where I saved the unattend.xml file to. This time I put the unattend and the install.wim into the sysprep folder.

3. When creating these last few imaged on this 990. I used a older unattend file as well as did not install the software to create the answer file. Not sure which of these was the culprit, 1 - 2 - or all 3. But it works now. I followed what you had and nto I have a image looks like.

Thanks for your time in this matter. If you want ot check out FOG the site is fogproject.org. It works quite well and have never been disappointed with it. Honestly it works great.

But thank you again from my beaten brain, tonight will be a celebration. Time to break out the Johnny Walker and coke....hold the coke....

Jim

Main thing is you got it working, happy to hear that