What does everyone use for imaging?

malcybood

Hi,

I got this article through email which opened my eyes as we are currently implementing Universal Imaging Utility, just got a few problems with it taking zenworks policies which we are working on.

http://www.computerweekly.com/Articles/2007/04/19/223342/it-departments-spend-too-much-on-maintenance-says-analyst.htm

I've played a little bit with UIU and it appears to be a great tool. It enables you to image any hardware spec with one single image. Full details here http://www.uiu4you.com/uiu_description.html

We are switching from Ghost which requires a new image for every different machine, we have 15 different desktop/laptops which is alot of man days when an image needs to be revised. With UIU we will have one image for any desktop and one for any laptop and the new image setup is all menu driven. It can also be integrated to reimage machines remotely through ZEN/Console One on remote sites with a server, pretty cool stuff!

Just wondering what everyone else uses and if anyone else has ever used UIU?

MAC_Addy

I work for a school district, which consists of 2000 computers.

They're all dell, many different models. We're using Norton Ghost and it works fine!

malcybood

jamie.english wrote:

I work for a school district, which consists of 2000 computers.

They're all dell, many different models. We're using Norton Ghost and it works fine!

Hi Jamie,

Do you need a different image for every different machine model?

and how many different models?

KGhaleon

Norton ghost, as usual.

KG

sprkymrk

Hi Malc,

We use Symantec Ghost Corporate Edition 8.2.

By using sysprep properly and a good driver database you can use the same image for several models, provided the drive controller is not vastly different. Options like "OemPnPDriversPath" and "InstallFilesPath", "UpdateHAL" etc. A nice overview is here:
http://www.vernalex.com/guides/sysprep/index.shtml

Additionally, the Corporate Edition allows you to do user moves, backups, Auto Installs, Inventory, Reports, and you can push images w/o boot disks.

I've never used UIU, so I can't comment there...

malcybood

sprkymrk wrote:

Hi Malc,

We use Symantec Ghost Corporate Edition 8.2.

By using sysprep properly and a good driver database you can use the same image for several models, provided the drive controller is not vastly different. Options like "OemPnPDriversPath" and "InstallFilesPath", "UpdateHAL" etc. A nice overview is here:
http://www.vernalex.com/guides/sysprep/index.shtml

Additionally, the Corporate Edition allows you to do user moves, backups, Auto Installs, Inventory, Reports, and you can push images w/o boot disks.

I've never used UIU, so I can't comment there...

Hey,

Thanks for the reply.

The method you are using sounds good and the same type of thing, but more manual administration to keep a driver db up to date, more admin and more documentation? I may be wrong though as that has been known to happen believe it or not!!! :P

Does the method you use require much admin overhead to keep the driver database up to date? This UIU thing has all the driver support "out the box" and you customize it to work how you want it to after that (we had consultants in to help set it up).

What is the $$$ situation for Ghost and how many users is your environment? Do you buy licences per seat or some sort of corporate license?

We did look at Ghost but it was knocked back I think because we don't have dedicated people to create images, and the time spent tweaking them constantly was becoming a burden on us. Once a new core build application is incorporated onto our build we currently re-do every build, but that may be down to a training issue as we were never shown how to do what you're referring to. Plus we're still using Ghost 7.5 which is another reason to change!........Now we only have 2 builds to tweak, which will hopefully improve consistency throughout the company.

(Obviously live machines just have the new app packaged & deployed via ZEN).....

I mean we have made the investment now so there's no turning back....the license was about £9,000 (not sure what that is in $$) for 1600 machines and you just download the install from the website. that also includes the first years maintenance which gives you driver updates

I was just curious to see if anyone used anything other than Ghost

Cheers
Malc

Kasor

Norton Ghost is one of the best that I ever used.

sprkymrk

malcybood wrote:

The method you are using sounds good and the same type of thing, but more manual administration to keep a driver db up to date, more admin and more documentation? I may be wrong though as that has been known to happen believe it or not!!! :P

No, you're right. It takes some time, especially up front, but after that it's no big deal.

malcybood wrote:

Does the method you use require much admin overhead to keep the driver database up to date? This UIU thing has all the driver support "out the box" and you customize it to work how you want it to after that (we had consultants in to help set it up).

Not too bad since we use all Dell's, and ususally only have about 3 different desktop models in use at any given time. Laptops are another story. Too many makes and models. We're trying to get a handle on that.

malcybood wrote:

What is the $$$ situation for Ghost and how many users is your environment? Do you buy licences per seat or some sort of corporate license?

The software is licensed per seat. I don't have the cost sheet in front of me right now though.

malcybood wrote:

I mean we have made the investment now so there's no turning back....the license was about £9,000 (not sure what that is in $$) for 1600 machines and you just download the install from the website. that also includes the first years maintenance which gives you driver updates

Good luck and let us know how you like it. It kind of sounds like paying someone else to gather and package the drivers for you. I heard the driver database is something like 600MB. Is that about right?

malcybood

sprkymrk wrote:

Not too bad since we use all Dell's, and ususally only have about 3 different desktop models in use at any given time. Laptops are another story. Too many makes and models. We're trying to get a handle on that.

This is our problem.....we took over a company that had about 15 different types of laptop that they just installed any old version of bog standard windows xp/2000/nt whatever it came with, no policies - yowsa! we narrowed it down to 2 machines the IBM R40 and R51 and had to create images for each of these to bring them to company standard image. They also had about 15 diferent desktops same deal with the os....was messy! Add that to our lifeline of Dells that we've been ordering for last 3 years, GX260, GX270, GX280, SX270, GX620, GX745, Latitude D600, D610, D620, x300, x400 and probably more, all with their own image that's alot of man days creating images!

sprkymrk wrote:

Good luck and let us know how you like it. It kind of sounds like paying someone else to gather and package the drivers for you. I heard the driver database is something like 600MB. Is that about right?

The 9000 is for licensing and works out at about £5.60 per license which I'm not sure if that's expensive but that includes the whole lot, software and support.

Yeh the driver db is about 500 - 600mb can't remember exactly but yeh. It is incorporated as part of the image which they have been about 1.8GB in size. This is approximately the size of EACH ghost image we had which is 40GB - 50GB of disk space that could be used elsewhere! We'll have reduced storage required by 10 times!

The way it works is it puts the base os onto the machine, from the local server. When the machine reboots after sysprep it installs the core build apps such as office. It takes about an hour and requires no input from the user and no post build checklist. Once it's imaged it's ready to use.

Remote sites without a server, we would still need to visit with a bootable DVD with the image/apps on it. It boots into a linux kernel and does it's stuff in the same way though.

Hopefully we'll have the poilcies issue sorted in the next few weeks so I'll maybe post back and let you know what it is like to work with in the field as these things can look like the best thing since sliced bread in a lab or demo environment, but I'm sure it will be good.

Malc

MAC_Addy

malcybood wrote:

jamie.english wrote:

I work for a school district, which consists of 2000 computers.

They're all dell, many different models. We're using Norton Ghost and it works fine!

Hi Jamie,

Do you need a different image for every different machine model?

and how many different models?

We have over 5 - 10 different models. Yeh, we use different images for each one. Which is quite handy because if you have a section of people in sales, you don't want production to have the same programs.

Just like here, we have a lab for 5 year olds... you don't want 10 year olds using the same programs. It helps with administration more than anything.

sthomas

I use RIS and Norton Ghost.

malcybood

The main reason I posted this was more from the sys admin of the imaging. I know Ghost is great when deploying the image, but the bit before that is the painstaking part and can be a real pain in the ass depending on the complexity of the image. If you've never actually created an image before and added policies in etc maybe not get the post the way I mean it.

Thanks for all the input though

jamie.english wrote:

malcybood wrote:

jamie.english wrote:

I work for a school district, which consists of 2000 computers.

They're all dell, many different models. We're using Norton Ghost and it works fine!

Hi Jamie,

Do you need a different image for every different machine model?

and how many different models?

We have over 5 - 10 different models. Yeh, we use different images for each one. Which is quite handy because if you have a section of people in sales, you don't want production to have the same programs.

Just like here, we have a lab for 5 year olds... you don't want 10 year olds using the same programs. It helps with administration more than anything.

The majority of our applications are enterprise apps and web based i.e. JDE, forecasting systems, crystal reports etc and we control user access through user accounts/groups/LDAP

We don't really install fat client applications except office as standard and stuff like ms project, teamplan, autocad etc

Different industry, different needs I guess

JdotQ

We use Microsoft RIS

Only about 4 different images;

Desktop Single Proc (Dell GX260, GX240, GX60)
Desktop Multi Proc (Dell GX520, GX280, GX270, Prec530, Prec650)
Laptop Single Proc (IBM T43, T42, T41, T30, T22, T21, T20, X41)
Laptop Multi Proc (IBM X60, T60)

And we control applications through Group Policy, makes it a little more manageable than incorporating certain software inside each image for separate departments

D-boy

Hi Malcybood,

How is it going with UIU?? Was it worth the money?


I have been testing it for a while now! I downloaded the UIU trial software and have been testing on many different hardware, Dell's, HP, IBM laptops and desktops all different models!

http://techexams.net/forums/viewtopic.php?t=38549

From what I have seen during testing, it will save the company i work for money and man hours!!!

would be good to hear some feedback from someone that has put this into production!

Thanks,
D-boy

loxleynew

I'm gonna give this UIU a shot and see what it can do.

As of right now we just use sysprep + ghost. Seems to work fine as we only have two types of desktops and 2 types of laptops.

D-boy

It includes sysprep, but you still need image software to capture the image. I think UIU is only worth while if you have a large user base and alot of different hardware types/models to support.

But saying that, you might still be able to save a few man hours maintaining your images.

One reason I want to put this in production is my company does not have time to maintain a driver database and multiple images. Also UIU would help us be more flexible over what hardware we support. Since with UIU we could pretty much support any desktop laptop model and future models without updating the image. Plus we take on new companys month after month and they have different hardware too, but with UIU it dont matter what they have

D-boy

malcybood

D-boy wrote:

Hi Malcybood,

How is it going with UIU?? Was it worth the money?


I have been testing it for a while now! I downloaded the UIU trial software and have been testing on many different hardware, Dell's, HP, IBM laptops and desktops all different models!

http://techexams.net/forums/viewtopic.php?t=38549

From what I have seen during testing, it will save the company i work for money and man hours!!!

would be good to hear some feedback from someone that has put this into production!

Thanks,
D-boy

Hi D-Boy,

It took a while to get working but it was worth it.

We now have 2 standard corporate builds "Laptop" and "Desktop" for well over 20 different hardware specs (Dell and HP laptop/desktops) across an 1800 user base.

UIU performs a complete automated install of the XP sysprep'd image including desktop policies etc, reboots then runs a scripted install of each individual core build application such as ZENworks agent, Macafee vscan, EPO, Groupwise etc (anything you want on the core build basically) and it reboots in-between every application install (if required) so for example when the Checkpoint secure client VPN software is installed, we don't get issues with a duplicated virtual adapter MAC address across the whole PC estate as it is installed as if an engineer rolled up and done it as part of a post build checklist - except as an automated process.

The fact that it can be run from a PXE network boot on a linux partition on the client PC and integrated with Console One (or Active Directory I think) enables us to re-image machines remotely (if required) if they are in a regional office with a local file server (latest image kept on all remote office LAN servers).

It has saved us so much man time it is unbvelieveable compared to Ghost, where every time Dell discontinued a Latitude D600, D610, D620, D630 etc etc we averaged around 5 man days per build to recreate / amend and test the ghost image due to the amount of applications our business uses. Lots of compatibility testing required!

Now we simply update either the "Laptop" or "desktop" build with drivers, service packs plugins etc and distribute to remote servers for engineers to use after testing. You can also customise by location so the network settings i.e. windows domain / novell tree are specific to the location the machine is at.

So you firstly get prompted as part of the setup wether you a laptop or a desktop image, the it prompts which office it is in i.e. new york, kansas, san fran etc etc. These credentials can abviously be changed after the machine is built, but it saves post build tasks if it already has the correct Windows domain or Novell tree credentials set in the Windows / Novell client.

You also need to have a CD or DVD copy of the image too for your field engineers visiting ADSL sites for example. LAN is OK but the images are between 1 - 3GB so you don't want that being transferred over the WAN.

I don't know the exact ins and outs of how the technicalities work, but what you say is correct is ther is a big driver database maintained by UIU and you pick what you want to deploy from it etc. I work in the infrastructure team who administers the builds/UIU and know the high level stuff, but I'm more concentrated on LAN/WAN support.

That said, if you have any specific questions about it let me know and I can speak to my colleagues who implemented it and tweak the images and will try to help you out no probs

I can't recommend it highly enough if you have the budget. I think they charge for it "per seat" if my memory serves me correctly but not sure what the figure was.

Cheers
Malc

D-boy

Thanks for your quick response!

We shouldn't have too much trouble setting up UIU as we are going to be using Altiris to push out the images. UIU will be on the image, so it's just a matter of getting Altiris to PXE the PC and **** the image. We are running windows 2003 server and some XP, Vista clients.
Altiris will also be used to do other time wasting tasks, like installing software, asset management, etc.

As a desktop engineer I am just wasting so much time! I cant even tell you how many times i have had to run windows updates before deploying a pc because our images are so out of date!!! updating at least 25+ images everytime something changes or when MS puts out new updates!!!

I will keep you posted, once we have got UIU licensed and up and running with Altiris!

D-boy

nevolved

Norton Ghost

D-boy

nevolved wrote:

Norton Ghost

What version do you use? don't you still have to maintain a driver database? Also when you get new hardware don't you have to create a new image? or download drivers for that model? Can you create one image that will work on multiple hardware?

So your saying Ghost can do everything UIU can do???

We have not commited to anything yet, we are testing ghost, UIU and Altiris to see what will really work for us and save us time and money in the long run. We will be using Altiris as we already have it licensed for another year and also want to use the PC managment side of it (Push out software and asset managment)

So all I am really looking for is, a hardware independent imaging solution that is easy to implement and maintain!

What does everyone else use???

D-boy

the_Grinch

Both school districts I worked for used Ghost. One was setup so that we could image over the network with multicast. It was awesome because I would do labs at about 30 computers at a time. Usually did two labs a day so I would be done imaging all the labs within a week. But the other district we used cds/dvds and have an image for each machine type. All Dells (except for the Macs, but we had imaging software for them), but different models Big pain, this UIU could help them out a lot!

aordal

I use Ghost 8.0. It's older, but it works I can multicast as many machines as I want. Get about 300 MB/s on a 1Gbps LAN. Takes ~15 mins.

malcybood

D-boy wrote:

We will be using Altiris as we already have it licensed for another year and also want to use the PC managment side of it (Push out software and asset managment)

So all I am really looking for is, a hardware independent imaging solution that is easy to implement and maintain!

D-boy

We use Novell ZENworks, Patchlinks and Zen Asset Management for software pushes, auditing & hardware asset mgmt. We have all the functionality as part of our licensing with Novell so makes sense to use it.

UIU is spot on from the imaging point of view so let us know how you get on with it and if you decide to deploy it.

Cheers

aordal

D-boy wrote:

nevolved wrote:

Norton Ghost

What version do you use? don't you still have to maintain a driver database? Also when you get new hardware don't you have to create a new image? or download drivers for that model? Can you create one image that will work on multiple hardware?

So your saying Ghost can do everything UIU can do???

We have not commited to anything yet, we are testing ghost, UIU and Altiris to see what will really work for us and save us time and money in the long run. We will be using Altiris as we already have it licensed for another year and also want to use the PC managment side of it (Push out software and asset managment)

So all I am really looking for is, a hardware independent imaging solution that is easy to implement and maintain!

What does everyone else use???

D-boy

I've been thinking of setting up OS Deployment using my SCCM 2007 site. The process is driver independant. The only downside is it has to go over LAN. Some people prefer to ghost off a USB/Firewire drive and it's very fast. But OSD through sccm is PXE and no need to ever create an image after you set it up the first time. Just add driver packages.

Hope you have deep pockets if you want to use this. But it will do what you want... and so... so much more.

D-boy

aordal wrote:

I use Ghost 8.0. It's older, but it works I can multicast as many machines as I want. Get about 300 MB/s on a 1Gbps LAN. Takes ~15 mins.

But don't the PC's or laptops your imaging at the same time have to be of the same type? So if I am multicasting with Ghost I type in how many clients and select the image file and all cients will get the same image?

We are using ghost currently over the network and takes about 30 minutes, but then again we are not using 1Gbps on the Lan. We also have over 25 images

malcybood

aordal wrote:

I use Ghost 8.0. It's older, but it works I can multicast as many machines as I want. Get about 300 MB/s on a 1Gbps LAN. Takes ~15 mins.

Multicasting wasn't the issue we had..........

The issue comes when you image a machine where the build was last updated 2 years and is one bazillion microsoft patches out of date to the standard core build revision level.

UIU takes the pain out of having a massive tick list of post build tasks / software installs and upgrades to do after the machine is imaged.

15 minutes to copy the image, but how long do you spend after bringing the machine up to spec?

D-boy

the_Grinch wrote:

All Dells (except for the Macs, but we had imaging software for them), but different models Big pain, this UIU could help them out a lot!

This is my problem but on a BIG scale! many different hardware types.....

D-boy

malcybood wrote:

aordal wrote:

I use Ghost 8.0. It's older, but it works I can multicast as many machines as I want. Get about 300 MB/s on a 1Gbps LAN. Takes ~15 mins.

Multicasting wasn't the issue we had..........

The issue comes when you image a machine that was last updated 2 years and is one bazillion microsoft patches out of date to the standard core build revision level.

UIU takes the pain out of having a massive tick list of post build tasks / software installs and upgrades to do after the machine is imaged.

15 minutes to copy the image, but how long do you spend after bringing the machine up to spec?

That's what I am talking about

We use ghost multicasting for some desktop laptops so that = about 30mins to image a machine
a setup checklist that takes 30-45mins to go through to bring the pc upto spec before it even get's deployed!

Also some of our desktops can only boot to a Image Ultra IBM CD, which is 100+ windows updates out of date, which no one know how to update the build using the image ultra software!!! (We are so short staff we dont have time to waste, maintaining images, all the time etc)

And then another 10mins for someone to check the engineers work before it goes out to the floor after they have done all that and config'd it for the user! So about over an hour if everything goes to plan! But with New builds to do every when we have new starters or need to rebuild a users PC and the working hours just waste away!!!

I guess you need to understand what we have to do now to see how much time we waste and why we need a solution ASAP!!!