Problem with admin account in sysprep

[theozmanbo]

I’m trying to deploy Vista images on our network here – I want it so that when the image is done being applied to a machine, the only account on there is the administrator with a password that was set in the Autounattend.xml file. I really cannot seem to get this working.

 

Since I don’t want any pointless accounts setup in the image (all the accounts will be setup manually after the computer is started), I set the SkipUserOOBE to true. I am under the belief that by doing this, I skip the welcome screen setup windows stuff (that asks to make user account and whatnot) – because I don’t want to setup any user accounts. I just want the administrator account pre-setup there with a password I give.

 

In the oobeSystem phase, I have the AdministratorPassword field in Microsoft-Windows-Shell-Setup_nuetral | User Accounts set to the password I want. I read through some help articles that suggested that simply by doing that, the administrator account is enabled with that password. This doesn’t seem to be working though. I also am being brought to the welcome screen as well… Any ideas? I attached the XML file that I’ve been using. Thank you so much!

 

P.S. – You’ll notice that I have info for a test account in there – I was just testing things. Once I’m in audit mode and I want to package it for the image, can I just do it from the sysprep GUI by chooing OOBE, Generalize, and shutdown? Or do I have to go it from the command prompt and specify the unattend:Autounattend.xml? Thanks again

Autounattend.xml

[anyweb]

the built-in Administrator account is disabled by default but by adding the following command to your AutoUnattend.xml answer file using Windows System Image Manager (Windows SIM) or any text editor we should be able to enable it.

 

<component name="Microsoft-Windows-Shell-Setup" processorArchitecture="x86" publicKeyToken="31bf3856ad364e35" language="neutral" versionScope="nonSxS" xmlns:wcm="http://schemas.microsoft.com/WMIConfig/2002/State" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"> 
<AutoLogon> 
<Password> 
<Value>windows-noob</Value> 
<PlainText> true</PlainText> 
</Password> 
<Username> Administrator</Username> 
<Enabled> true</Enabled> 
<LogonCount> 5</LogonCount> 
</AutoLogon> 
<UserAccounts> 
<AdministratorPassword> 
<Value>windows-noob</Value> 
<PlainText> true</PlainText> 
</AdministratorPassword> 
</UserAccounts> 
</component>

[theozmanbo]

Why didn't you indicate what configuration pass that belongs to? But anyway, I already have that included in my xml file. Once I get into the audit system and make changes, I command prompt and do

 

sysprep /oobe /generalize /quiet /unattend:e:\Autounattend.xml

 

Still no go with the admin account being created!

 

the built-in Administrator account is disabled by default but by adding the following command to your AutoUnattend.xml answer file using Windows System Image Manager (Windows SIM) or any text editor we should be able to enable it.

 

<component name="Microsoft-Windows-Shell-Setup" processorArchitecture="x86" publicKeyToken="31bf3856ad364e35" language="neutral" versionScope="nonSxS" xmlns:wcm="http://schemas.microsoft.com/WMIConfig/2002/State" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"> 
<AutoLogon> 
<Password> 
<Value>windows-noob</Value> 
<PlainText> true</PlainText> 
</Password> 
<Username> Administrator</Username> 
<Enabled> true</Enabled> 
<LogonCount> 5</LogonCount> 
</AutoLogon> 
<UserAccounts> 
<AdministratorPassword> 
<Value>windows-noob</Value> 
<PlainText> true</PlainText> 
</AdministratorPassword> 
</UserAccounts> 
</component>

[anyweb]

try it in <settings pass="specialize">

 

cheers

anyweb

[theozmanbo]

try it in <settings pass="specialize">

 

cheers

anyweb

 

Okay I will try that.

 

Once I get it in audit mode, what exactly should I do to get it to go into the normal mode after that? I know I have to select OOBE & generalize, but there is shutdown, restart, and quit. Do I need to shutdown the computer? Because it seems that even when I shutdown the computer the sysprep GUI still comes up when I reload it. Should I use quit instead?

[anyweb]

have you captured the image yet or are you planning on capturing it after you've succeeded in sysprepping it ?

 

please review this detailed post on Sysprepping Windows Vista

 

what you probably want is sysprep /oobe /shutdown

[theozmanbo]

have you captured the image yet or are you planning on capturing it after you've succeeded in sysprepping it ?

 

please review this detailed post on Sysprepping Windows Vista

 

what you probably want is sysprep /oobe /shutdown

 

Hmm well I need the /generalize in there too don't i?

 

I've tested the imaging and know it works. Right now I'm just trying to make sure the sysprep is working fine. So far it isn't though. For some reason it seems that once I get the system into the initial audit mode, make changes, and then do sysprep /oobe /generalize /shutdown, it doesn't perform any of the steps for the OOBE pass. Something I tried was making a seperate OOBE.xml file with just the stuff I want to automate the OOBE phase. Then I instead do sysprep /oobe /generalize /shutdown /unattend:OOBE.xml and that works. The admin account still doesn't seem to be created though. Still trying over here.

[theozmanbo]

Hmm well I need the /generalize in there too don't i?

 

I've tested the imaging and know it works. Right now I'm just trying to make sure the sysprep is working fine. So far it isn't though. For some reason it seems that once I get the system into the initial audit mode, make changes, and then do sysprep /oobe /generalize /shutdown, it doesn't perform any of the steps for the OOBE pass. Something I tried was making a seperate OOBE.xml file with just the stuff I want to automate the OOBE phase. Then I instead do sysprep /oobe /generalize /shutdown /unattend:OOBE.xml and that works. The admin account still doesn't seem to be created though. Still trying over here.

 

 

Okay, I think I've determined that you NEED to indicate a user account besides the admin account. I set the AutoLogon in SPECIALIZE to admin with the proper password and set the admin password in OOBE. This will successfully login to the admin account at startup, but it still prompts to enter a user account at setup. I suppose that means that Windows forces you to create an account besides the Admin account. I just decided to keep the admin account disabled and create my own default admin account anyway. Much easier this way around.

 

But I'd still like to figure out why I have to use a separate XML file for the OOBE stuff and manually specify it instead of having everything included in the Autounattend.xml file.

[anyweb]

are you using windows SIM to create the xml file or are you doing it another way ?

[theozmanbo]

are you using windows SIM to create the xml file or are you doing it another way ?

 

I'm using SIM yes