Windows 7 - Profile Question.

[Jayce]

Okay, just to refresh, two computers here, both with Windows 7... one working... one not... Let's name them A and B, A = working, B = beeyotch.

Computer A:

-Default Profile-
Status = Hidden
Security - Everyone = Full Control
Advanced - Owner - Current Owner = Everyone
Replace owner on subcontainers and objects = Yes

Computer B:

-Default Profile-
Status = Hidden
Security - Everyone = Full Control
Advanced - Owner - Current Owner = Everyone
Replace owner on subcontainers and objects = Yes

What I did on both Computer A and Computer B:

Set up local administrator profile exactly the way I want the default to be. Created a local user with administrator rights. Restarted the computer. Logged in as that user. Showed hidden files and folders. I then renamed "Default" to "Default.old" and copied Administrator and pasted it, showing up as Administrator - Copy. I renamed Administrator to "Default". Then I set it to hidden - but only that folder. The files/folders inside I did not adjust hidden properties to. Then I granted full control to the folder to "everyone" and changed the effective owner, replacing ownership on files/folders inside with "everyone."

Then I created several more local users, all of them being local administrators of the computer. I logged into several of them to test. Each time, I pulled desktop icons, but nothing that I truly needed. The effectiveness of the default profile is just not working like it did before. Both computers were done identically, yet I cannot trace why I'm having inconsistent results like this.

 

[Jayce]

I decided maybe it's time I bury the hatchet with Microsoft and just... ya know... forget about everything that happened in the past and give them another shot.

So, I decided to try sysprep... again... since some people were kind enough to post very detailed how-to guides, which are substantially more helpful than Microsoft's "documentation" on the matter.

I installed AIK and booted up the Windows System Image Manager. Then, after more digging through guides, found out how I could apply the component to the "specialize" switch to enable my ability to use the CopyProfile switch. By default it didn't show up, but after I enabled the component, I saw it available. So, I selected "True" for the option and saved the file as unattend.xml, as instructed. From what I read, as long as all I need is to adjust the default profile, this is all I have to do.

Then, I put that file (unattend.xml) in C/Windows/System32/Sysprep (as instructed) and ran Sysprep. I did this twice. I ran sysprep.exe (the gui tool) and I also ran a command the one guide had listed to run from command prompt. Mind you, both of these scenarios were done on different computers, so I know that when the 1st step failed, it didn't cause the 2nd step to fail since it was different altogether.

As expected, the system goes through its little "processing" thing and reboots. Put the confetti away, though, this aint no celebration yet.

Upon booting I get:

Windows could not finish configuring the system. To attempt to resume configuration, restart the computer.

Each time I restart, this is what I get. I got this in both scenarios.

I'm biting through my lip with insane patience here, and even still it's very difficult not to throw this computer out the window.

What can I possibly do? I don't even know where to begin troubleshooting. I've followed the guide about 8 times and it failed each time.

 

[KSoD]

Honestly i dont have a clue anymore. There is nothing more i can honestly say that is going to be of any use. I have already told you my feelings about the method you are trying to use. All i can say is contact Microsoft. See if there is anything they can do to help with the support of this. Cause even as knowledgeable as i am, i have no clue anymore. I doubt anybody else will be of help. We are not all working as IT people that are trying to do what you are and there is not going to be a whole lot of people that can offer much more support than what i have tried to offer.

Microsoft is going to be your only hope.

 

[Jayce]

I have already told you my feelings about the method you are trying to use. All i can say is contact Microsoft.

Just an FYI on the matter, according to many sources, there are 3 ways to set default profiles in Windows 7, two of which are not supported by Microsoft. The Sysprep way that I just tried (again) is the way that Microsoft officially supports. So at this point, there's really no excuse for it failing. If the other ways failed and Microsoft said "told ya so" then I full well deserve it. But when I'm trying the official method and it's still backfiring... it just adds to the confusion.

Microsoft is going to be your only hope.

Oh no... I quit. I'm going back to retail.

Thanks for your help bro. I appreciate you throwing back ideas to me. Just sucks nothing worked so far.

 

[KSoD]

Well as i have said before, i know of the Sysprep tool. I have not used it enough to know the inner workings of it to use it the way you need. This is something that maybe they can assist you on? I just dont know enough of the tool to be of use. Maybe there is something that they can do to help? Maybe there is a update to the SysPrep tool or the SysAdmin tools that are not openly available? I mean there are some things out there that are not openly available. There are some SysAdmin tools for Win7 already. So maybe a call to them will be of use?

Hey dont joke about going back to retail...i have and already it stinks. Getting ready for black friday is no treat...

 

[Jayce]

Hey dont joke about going back to retail...i have and already it stinks. Getting ready for black friday is no treat...

Haha, oh I know. I was just kidding about how nice it'd be to avoid Microsoft headaches. It's just the last 3 times I called Microsoft, I kept getting passed off to more and more people. You know, higher tiers of the "tech scale." Then, I'd get disconnected. Each time.

When you boil it all down, it just gets very hard to accept these things not working. I've spent a lot of time at home on my spare machine trying to get this work, calling this district, calling that district, calling Microsoft, browsing hundreds of pages in google, and I still can't get it to work. And ultimately, who's it hurt? Not me. It doesn't hurt me at all. But in the end, it hurts the students. Systems being on a shelf just don't really help ya out when it comes to putting them forth with educational purposes. That's what makes me have zero patience in this issue.

If Windows 7 is as easy as they say, a simple thing like this just shouldn't be that hard.

 

[KSoD]

Search TechNET and MSDN. Stop using Google. I know that everyone loves it and blah. But it doesnt spider M$ Pages. TechNET and MSDN might have some information that you have not seen in your seaches cause you use Google.

 

[Jayce]

Search TechNET and MSDN. Stop using Google. I know that everyone loves it and blah. But it doesnt spider M$ Pages. TechNET and MSDN might have some information that you have not seen in your seaches cause you use Google.

Didn't search MSDN, but I was on TechNET. TechNET is actually where I got the guide suggesting that there's 3 ways to do it, only 1 supported, so that was the only way they were going along with in the guide.

EDIT - Awesome.

http://blog.brianleejackson.com/sysprep-a-windows-7-machine-start-to-finish

Now go to “My Computer” and you are going to rename the Default folder to Default.bak (The CopyProfile setting in Sysprep on Windows7 does not seem to work yet).

Yet they officially support this method? Wow...

 

[JeffO]

I've seen this problem with temporary profiles even with XP. It was a freak occurence, trust me. I've seen it three times in the past decade, so the first time was probably NT4, then W2K, then XP. Very confusing when it happens, but you just have to log off the junk profile, log on with admin rights, delete the junk profile, and try again.

As for Romaing profiles, my company is a mixed domain. Mostly we use local. both are a pain, but it different ways. My area uses local. I don't have strong opinions, but i believe that, IF setup right, roaming would be the way to go. But given the politics in a lot of companies, and the structure of their IT department(s), it may be impossible to get the powers to agree on one set way of doing things. if there's no agree ments, then it'll be a mess when someone from one area logs onto a computer in a different area and the roaming profile does more than just load a profile - it can rip stuff off your machine that you do want, and add stuff that you don't want, because that's what the user's department has roaming set up like.
Make certain you don't allow much data to be stored locally or it'll take a long time to drag a roaming profile through the wires.
Stick with local until you get everyone on the same page.
My company is currently in the painful process of getting this done - and it could be more than a year before we get anywhere. At least we've started talking about it.

 

[Jayce]

Thanks for the input, Jeff. I have since been reading more about roaming profiles to understand how they work and what limitations/advantages they have over local profiles. I talked to the network administrator and it seems as if roaming profiles are something that we may move to in the future, but it would almost definitely require a larger storage server (one of the huge cons of roaming profiles), which won't happen tomorrow/next week.

I cannot believe I'm about to say this, but we're going to Vista. Windows 7, as much as I like that OS, it just isn't ready. The very method MS supports for default local profiles with Win 7 just doesn't work. I stopped working on it after reading about more people who had issues who followed the guide precisely. When I did the same method on Vista, it worked. Of course I had a couple hurdles to jump through, because it turns out there's two versions of the Vista AIK program and I had the wrong one. But anyway, default profiles worked with sysprep in Vista. Didn't carry the background image, but it brought the icons, settings, printers, etc. So we're in good shape for Vista.

Hopefully by the time we consider roaming profiles more, Windows 7 might be mature enough to do a mass upgrade. It's a solid OS, but I think a tremendous amount of testing has to be done yet.