Sysprep

[crimson]

Can you do Sysprep on Windows 7 like on XP?


OK so you do a clean install of W7. Then install all of your software. Now you want to set it up to clear all of the information. That way when you sell it or give it away, the person turns it on is goes through the initial walk-through process setting up the computer. But how on W7?

 

[pparks1]

Yes, sysprep is already installed on a Windows 7 machine. However, you don't want to install any commercial software and then turn around and sell the machine with that software on it. At least I wouldn't think that you would.

To run sysprep you run C:\windows\system32\sysprep.

Sounds like what you want to do is take your box and Image it. Then install anything you want. Then, if you later want to sell it, you want to put that image back on it to get it back to day 1.

You can do that with the built-in Windows "system image" tool. You can find this in the backup program that comes with Windows 7.

 

[crimson]

Kewl. I've never done this before. I'll give it a try. Thanks!

Will sysprep create an image file of my entire hard drive so I can burn it into another hard drive? Like say I have 2 500GB drives that are exactly the same. But one is empty and one has W7 and everything installed. So if I have 30GB of info on my W7 drive, I can transfer everything to an empty drive, and it will be exactly the same right?

 

[logicearth]

sysprep alone will not image the machine. All sysprep does is remove the machine specific configuration and logs. Then on a second machine or partition you use imagex to capture the image.

 

[crimson]

I ran Sysprep on W7, and it cleaned out all the files and shortcuts that were on it. It reset the wallpapers and taskbar and everything. I had like close to 200GB worth of movies, audio, and stuff. Sysprep cleaned it out. So basically, it eradicates everything, and converts W7 to its original state leaving installed software alone.

All of my software remained. All of my applications settings were reset as if I had just installed them. My Objectdock reset to default as if I had just installed it. Skype started up with the configuration menus as if it was just installed. Etc.

 

[logicearth]

Those files were in your user account folder where they not? User accounts are part of machine specific configuration.

 

[crimson]

I deleted all the user account folders when I did my Windows 7 fresh install. When you install W7, they force you to create a default user. You can simply go to "Local Users and Groups" to activate the Administrator. Then logon as administrator, and go to "Local Users and Groups" to delete the user you created. That way everytime you boot to Windows, you're always in as Administratorl. I did this with XP as well. I never use users. It's pointless.

But yes, all of those movies and files were stored in the Administrator's user folder.

 

[crimson]

In the sysprep folder, there are 2 things:
sysprep.exe file
and
sysprep.exe.mui (in the english folder).

What does it mean?

 

[logicearth]

Multilingual User Interface - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Windows Vista further advances MUI technology with support for single, language-neutral, language-independent binary files supporting multiple language skins, with the language-specific resources contained in separate binaries.