Installing W2k over a network.

[SuperKen!]

I have heard about this, but dont really know what/if the advantages of doing this over a regular install.

Could somebody please tell me what is good/bad about doing it over a network, and what I would need to install it over a network.

P.S. My comps are all networked, so you dont have describe about the wiring and NIC crap.

Thanks.

 

[TBP]

for example, if you need to install Win 2000 on 2000 computers

 

[MulLa]

Yes and if you provide an answer file to it too. Everything will be done automatically without you even moving the mouse or touching the keyboard during installation! Pretty amazing when I first saw it done ^^

 

[igiveup]

What Mulla is describing is called RIS (Remote Installation Services). It is part of win 2k server, not professional and it is a seriously powerful tool. Advantages to a regular network install (not RIS) in a home LAN situation (am assuming here) are really not that great other than to say you have done it. The reason why a network install with RIS is great is you walk through a wizard and choose what you want have installed and it automatically makes an answer file for you. If you work in a large corporation you can make the answer file, start the install and it will broadcast the install to all the computers you have selected. When you come back from your coffee break it should be about halfway done and you can just let it do its thing. Imagine trying to install on 2000 computers one at a time! Anyways, not a huge benefit for you unless you have 2 or more computers and MS Win 2k Server.

LUCK!!

 

[bigshooter]

Plus with RIS you can install other programs like office or whatever at the same time, plus it will generate computer names based on whatever naming scheme you want to implement. Last december I RIS'd about 100 comps. It is a hell of a lot easier than installing seperately, but the bad thing was 20 of them were on a 10megabit link, and even on the 100mb network the other 80 ate up a lot of bandwidth, but we did get 20 of them done at a time which was cool. Now if they would have listened to my "expert" (translated-whoa I have my MCSE I must know what I am doing ) opinion and started their gigabit upgrade AND gone gigabit to the workstations, it would have flown. Probably could have done all 80 at once if we had enough servers.

 

[SuperKen!]

Oh ok, thanks for the answers.

What Igiveup pretty much would categorize where im coming from "in a home LAN situation (am assuming here) are really not that great other than to say you have done it. "
Basically I have no need for it.

Thanks for the replies tho.

 

[Robor]

Would it be easier to use RIS or a Ghost image?

Rob

 

[igiveup]

Didn't think of that. Ghost for this situation here. Still have to do some work like setting up IP's and all, but should be good to go.

 

[overmars]

Ghosting works. Here are alternatives that I like to use.

Drive Image

IC3

 

[Shadow07]

RIS is used to install a new installation of Windows 2000. You can also create a "cloned" computer of all of the apps you want on it. There are two main problems:

1. RIS is hard to setup and maintian.
2. The PXE support is very limited. If you do not have a NIC that supports PXE 2.0 or the PC99 standard, you will have to create a PXE Boot Disk. This boot disk is not customizable and will only work with about 25 NIC's.

If you want to distribute new installs, I would recommend using Ghost or Drive Image Pro. I would recommend DIP over Ghost anyday for the performance. You can create a Network Boot Disk that will load the NIC drivers, the network protocol (TCP/IP, NetBEUI, IPX/SPX), and copy the image over to the new machine.

If you want more info on how to create a Network Boot Disk, goto http://www.bootdisk.com. That site has a wealth of information on how to create virtually any boot disk.

Also, for anyone else, PM me if you want a copy of Microsoft's Network GOLD disk. This disk is da Sh!t. You can put multiple NIC drivers on this disk, load the driver for the specific NIC and logon and run your imaging program. Otherwise, you will have to create multiple disks for every type of NIC you have on your network.