User Profile - Customize During Installation

I appreciate your work with Sysprep and Audit Mode. I'll be doing a clean new install and changing the motherboard and CPU in another while reusing the drives.

As a note, I have changed the graphics card a few times and no reactivation was needed. Others may have different experience though.

cvcorv8 said:

I have set everything up through sysprep command but that does not help

Please see my response to you in your earlier thread:

Kari said:

cvcorv8 said:

I have set everything up through sysprep command but that does not help

If you follow the instructions told in that tutorial I mentioned in my first post to the letter, it sets a default home page and favorites for Internet Explorer for all future user accounts which will be created. Users can then later change these as they wish.

The instructions in the tutorial are 100% correct and valid. If you want to do this on an existing Windows installation you need to remember what I told earlier, also in my first post:

Kari said:

Notice that default user profile customization with Sysprep can only be done when no other user accounts exist than the Windows built-in administrator. Because of this limitation the customization should be done when installing, prior to creating any user accounts; if done later you need first reboot to Audit Mode and when there, remove all existing user accounts before using the Sysprep command.

If my tutorial is difficult to read and / or understand, you can find official Microsoft instructions in this article: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/973289/en-us

The same official Microsoft support article in Dutch here: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/973289/nl-nl

EDIT: On an existing Windows setup, you can reboot to Audit Mode by giving this command in Command Prompt or the Run dialog (WIN + R):

Code:

%windir%\system32\sysprep\sysprep.exe /audit /reboot

RangerZ said:

Hi Kari

I am trying to make sure I understand the wim file needed for the DefaultProfile.xml file. I have an HP 840 that did not come with CDs. I retrieved the WIM files from the OS, there were 2 on a bigger file. I a stripped out Win 7 Pro basic and another a more robust business version with HP trust center and other stuff. I can put this in a folder called source on my USB drive, but not sure if that is what I need.

I have a Win 7 PRO OEM disk that I assume will have a file, but it's not the file I installed the OS from.

Can you please guide me?

You can use the install.wim file from your OEM disk. Insert the disk in the DVD drive before sysprepping and make your answer file (the script) to point to that file, for example if your DVD drive is drive X:, point to X:\Sources\install.wim.

Kari