Jeff Harris

Per the guide; you'll use the console to generate the MSI to install the client that will have information regarding your account in it. You can connect to the client at the remote site to do this. If the client can't connect to the SmartDeploy Console host on your main network, it will then look to the internet to reach our Cloud Broker service which will connect it with your host, in which you'll see the connectio type; Cloud. The client service will re-check connectivity periodically and attempt to connect via the local network.

You could have a VPN established to the remote site so that the endpoint could reach the SmartDeploy host, however it's not recommended to do it this way. 

If the SmartDeploy Client Agent is unable to reach the SmartDeploy Console Host on the local network, it will use the Cloud Broker service to reach the SmartDeploy Console host. Clients in this configuration will list “Cloud” in the Connection Type column in the Computer Management workspace. If it's not appearing in the Console, contact support to make sure the feature is enabled for your account, and that you're on the latest version. 

I apologize for the delay, this documentation is being finalized and will be available soon.

There is not at this time. 

At this time, SmartDeploy will always target Disk 0 for imaging. If the Reference VM had an additional drive, then it will look to Disk 1 for the second drive. 

Do make sure that you have the latest version of the Platform Pack for the 600 G1

Anside from that, we would want to see a log set to get some more information. The C:\Platform\Dism.txt specifically, would provide details on the specific driver that’s not being injected correctly. It could mean an update to the Pack is needed, or something else. 

If you can reboot that device into the SmartDeploy environment and click Collect Logs; save the zip file that’s created and email it to Support@smartdeploy.com and we’ll go from there.

Almost all of the problems with v1809 that were reported were resolved with v2.0.3025, but it's possible that it's something else. I'd reach out to support with the media.log to chase down what's causing the problem. 

Per the usual suspects; make sure the SDESetup.exe file you downloaded isn't blocked, and that A/V is disabled when you run the media wizard.

Make sure that you're on SmartDeploy v2.0.3025. We discovered a change in 1809 that was breaking the media creation process, and just recently released this version to counter that. 

You can indeed use a Task to set the product key as part of the deployment. 

In the Answer File wizard, add first boot tasks of:

cscript.exe "c:\wilndows\system32\slmgr.vbs /ipk xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx-xxxxx"
cscript.exe "c:\windows\system32\slmgr.vbs /ato”

For reference; 
/ipk is install product key
/ato is activate

It seems that every release of a creators comes with hew bumps in sysprep, depending on what was installed or done on the Windows installation. In-place upgrades is the most common cause, but often anti-virus or other security software can cause problems too. Also, you don't want to bother with uninstalling any of the Start Menu apps, as it can cause problems in sysprep given the way that Windows handles re-provisioning them. Instead, you can customize the start menu to hide them. 

Parts of Windows breaking following sysprep is the sort of thing we've seen when a Reference VM has had in-place upgrades done, especially if it's gone through more than one. Might that be the case here? If you, you'll want to install Windows directly from the v1803 ISO.

This sort of thing can be very difficult to troubleshoot, and it's often less work to build a new VM. 

This sounds like a bad capture. Make sure there are no pending updates or A/V software on the Ref VM, re-capture the image, saving to a new wim file. Then try creating the Answer File again. 

Hi Nagaraj,

If you are not planning to do any user data migration, or attempt to use the computer name from the existing Windows installation, and will be allowing SmartDeploy to wipe the hard drive, then you do not need to worry about BitLocker being enabled on the target device. If you want to do any of the things I just mentioned, you'll want to decrypt the drive before starting with SmartDeploy.

Jay, 

We leave SoftPaq out of the Platform Packs as it will attempt to re-install the drivers that are already installed, since it uses software markers and not PnP versions.

Additionally, we don't update the Platform Packs on any specific schedule. Certain updates, releases, and security bulletins will prompt us to update Platform Packs ourselves, but typically we process updates as they are requested. If you notice that a Platform Pack needs newer drivers, please fill out our form to request an update at https://support.smartdeploy.com/new

You'll first step through the Media Wizard selecting the Answer File, Platform Packs, and other settings before it creates the boot image and writes it to your first USB disk. When complete, the Wizard  will prompt you to write the same boot image to an additional USB disk. 

The login issue should be resolved for all users now. 

Ok. I mean there must be some strange things in play here, and while you may be able to track them down eventually, I agree that a new VM is the shorter, less effort route to go. 

If you're able to delete the lck file and boot the VM, then you should be able to do a warm capture. But deleting those files is normally something you don't want to do, as it may interfere with VMwares processes. You may consider just re-making the VMs in lieu of troubleshooting this for too long. 

Please try performing a "warm capture," by capturing an image with the virtual machine running, and saving the image to a network location.

This process is detailed in appendix 1 of our user guide:https://www.smartdeploy.com/wp-content/uploads/SmartDeployUsersGuide_V2.pdf

Do you have snapshots on the virtual machines on the original VM host?

Before you throw yourself on the rocks too much troubleshooting, spin up a new virtual machine and install windows, restart the VM and then shutdown and capture another image. This will help determine if it's the VMs you moved or if there's an issue with SmartDeploy your new setup. 

Yes you can. On the Network Identification page of the Answer File wizard; you have the opportunity to specify a domain and OU. You'll need to specify the distinguished name for the OU which you can view by enabling Advanced Features in AD Users and Computers (In the View menu) and then viewing the properties of the OU, and looking up the distinguished name under the Attribute Editor tab. 

The expected behavior is that the local accounts are re-created. Open a ticket with Support and include your C:\Windows\Temp\Loadstate.log file from the target system to get help with what's going on. 

Are the student accounts domain accounts?

I would venture a guess that this may be related to the specific target. Are you able to deploy the image using the same media to other systems?
When you created the media; did you include the platform pack for this device?