Deploying client systems with WDS from Windows Server 2008

WDS (Windows Deployment Servic), the Windows Deployment service, is Microsoft's latest image deployment tool, which replaces the previous Remote Installation Services (RIS), primarily for Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008 deployment (and, of course, WDS also supports deployments of Windows XP and Windows Server 2003, without making adjustments). This is a more efficient and convenient image deployment tool, and with WDS we can quickly deploy client systems over the network. This article takes the Windows Server 2008 platform as an example to demonstrate how to quickly deploy a client system using WDS.

1, the working principle of WDS Brief

Before you take a hands-on demo, it's important to talk about how WDS works. WDS works very simply by deploying a WDS server and its clients on a LAN, and it begins to work. First, the client obtains the IP configuration information through the DHCP server during the boot process. The WDS client then finds the WDS server by broadcast or DHCP. The client then connects to the WDS server and initiates a specific boot image, which is WinPE (Windows preinstallation Environmen). Finally, the client can begin installing the operating system image on the WDS server.

2, the installation of WDS

The WDS component is released with Windows Server 20,081 and requires 3 additional components. These three additional components are DNS (used to locate the domain controller DC), Active Directory (ad,2003 version or version 2008, for authentication), DHCP (for clients to obtain IP addresses and the IP address of the WDS server). Also, it is important to note that the installation of the WDS server must be an ad member. We can install all 4 components (AD, DNS, DHCP, WDS) on a single server, and of course you can also deploy to separate servers.

The installation of WDS is started below. With the ad Administrator log on to the DC, open Service Manager (Server Manager) and activate the role (Roles) entry for the role's addition. Click Add Roles to start the Add Role Wizard and display the page before the start (before you begin). Click Next in the list of components that are displayed, drag down to locate and select the Windows deployment Servers item. Next, click Next three times to receive the default settings for each page (Overview of wds,select role services,confirm installation selections). Finally click Install to install the component, and then click Close when the installation is complete. It is important to note that after the WDS installation is complete, the server does not need to reboot. (Figure 1)

Figure 1 Installation of WDS

3, the configuration of WDS

Click start → administrative tools → Windows deplyment Services to open the WDS configuration console. Expand "Server" to see the current server, but there is a yellow exclamation mark next to the server name because the WDS server is not configured. Right-click on the server name and select "Configure Server" for WDS configuration. The configuration requirements for WDS are listed in the Welcome interface. Click Next, and under the Remote installation Folder Location page, select the drive where the image is stored and click Next. Because of the need for a certain amount of space, the drive that stores the image is applied to the image store. The subsequent Display page determines whether DHCP is installed on the WDS server, and if you want to install WDS and DHCP on the same server, the DHCP option 60 page pops up requiring you to configure DHCP so that you can select the port on which the server listens. If you have a dedicated DHCP server in your environment, this step will be ignored.

Click Next to enter the PXE Server Initial setting page, which is used for page Setup to expect the WDS server to respond to Preboot Execution environment (PXE) client requests, and the implementation method under the corresponding settings. There are 4 options in this page, and there is a need to elaborate.

Option 1 If you do not respond to any client computers, this option turns off the WDS response.

Option 2. Responds only to known client computers. With this option, WDS responds to the pre-logon client in AD and completes the pre-logon in active Directory Users and Computers, which is similar to the RIS process.

Option 3 responds to all (known and unknown) client computers. Check this option to enable WDS to respond to all PXE requests. In addition, if this option is checked, item 4th will also be in the optional state. If you check item 4th at the same time as the 3rd item, you will improve security.

Option 4. For unknown customers, notify the Administrator and respond after approval. This option allows the pre-logon machine to receive responses from the WDS server, but for unknown clients, the PXE boot screen is not exited until the administrator approves it in the WDS snap-in. (Figure 2)

Figure 2 The configuration of WDS

Add that if you want to approve an unknown client, you can do this: open the WDS snap-in, expand

Servers, choose Pending Devices. In the results panel, you will see a list of pending requests. Right-click the pending request and select Approve, ReJect, or approve and Name. The first two options are simple; the third option approves the name of the computer object that will be created in active Directory Users and computers. Select the appropriate option and click Finish. On the Configuration Complete page, uncheck the add images to the Windows deploy-

ment Server now check box (because there is no image to add) and click Finish.