View all devices recorded by WDS


View the list of devices pending approval


View the list of devices already approved


View the list of devices rejected


To approve a computer (whether it is pending or not)


If the machine has already been approved you can replace /Add-Device with /Set-Device and execute the same command.

IMPORTANT
To avoid boot loops in a fully automated environment, set PXE policy to known-clients require F12 and always continue to boot for unknown-clients.
Then for PXE response, set to response to all clients (known and unknown) and check require administrator approval to unknown computers.
Use the above /add-device method (instead of /approve-autoadddevices) when the box appears in the pending list. This will approve the box for installation
but doesn't add the server to approved list. After the server is fully installed you can make the box unknown again by rejecting the server with /reject-autoadddevices and then deleting the reject list (also don't forget to remove the server from AD by running: net computer \\<name of server> /del
The reason for this is that WDS has the limitation of not letting you delete a single server from the approved list (you can only delete the whole list). With this
limitation, the only way you can make a single server "unknown" to make it eligible for AP again (without messing up the state of other installations in progress)
is to never add the server to approved list (so avoid using /approve-autoadddevices).

To approve a pending computer using /Approve-AutoAddDevices


All possible options for approval:

    * To change the name, specify /MachineName:<name>
    * To change the organizational unit (OU) where the account will be created, specify /OU:<name of OU>.
    * To change the user account for the domain join, specify /User:<name> where the name is domain\user or user@domain.
    * To enable the user to join this computer to the domain only once, specify /JoinRights:JoinOnly.
    * To enable the user to join this computer to the domain at any time, specify /JoinRights:Full.
    * To join this computer to the domain, specify /JoinDomain:Yes.
    * To direct the computer to install from a different Windows Deployment Services server, specify /ReferralServer:<server name>.
    * To change the network boot program used, specify /BootProgram:<path>.
    * To change the unattend file used for the Microsoft Windows Preinstallation Environment (Windows PE) phase of unattended setup, specify /WDSClientUnattend:<path>.
    * To change the boot image used, specify /BootImagePath:<path>.
   
Approval for Linux, where pxelinux.com is download from syslinux



Choose the server's default unattend file:


To prestage a client computer to use an unattend file other than the default for the Windows PE phase of unattended setup

WDSUTIL /Set-Device /Device:<name> /WDSClientUnattend:<path>       (where the path is relative to the unattend file you want from the RemoteInstall folder.)

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To change the message displayed to pending computers



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to delete known hosts:


to get a list:



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To prestage a client computer to use a boot image other than the default

WDSUTIL /Set-Device /Device:<name> /BootImagePath:<path>           (where <path> is the relative path to the boot image you want from the RemoteInstall folder.)




#### RUN THESE ON THE SERVER FOR THE AP INITIAL SETUP #####

configure the pxe boot policy so known clients require the user to press f12 and unknown clients always continue to pxe boot (using the wds mmc). Then run:

WDSUTIL /Set-Server /pxepromptpolicy /new:noprompt
WDSUTIL /Set-Server /pxepromptpolicy /known:optout


wdsutil /set-server /bootprogram:boot\x86\abortpxe.com /architecture:x86

WDS Image Capturing

To make a capture, one needs to execute sysprep on the target system first.

Windows 2008


Windows 2008r2


window 2003

boot menu selection timeout

When you have multiple valid boot images enabled the boot image specified by the "/bootimaepath:" flag is selected by default example:


You can lower the countdown time of the boot menu for faster selection:



Look at the boot options:

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Injecting 32bit NIC driver into win2008x86 boot.wim

You will need to install Microsoft Windows AIK. After installation execute Windows PE Tools Command Prompt from start menu.

run the following commands from the command prompt:

switch to c:\program files\windows aik\tools\x86
then run:



Get the index number of the boot image then run (where 2 here is the index of the boot image in this case)