Windows Server includes a role that installs Windows over the network. This avoids sneaker administration and saves installation sticks / DVDs.

(Image: Albert Hulm)

The times when a silver disk, be it CD or DVD, was the common installation medium for Windows installations are long gone – today it is mostly USB storage media that the admin plugs from computer to computer. A task that really annoys at the latest when you need to quickly install a delivery of fresh PCs for an entire department or quickly set up notebooks for all new home office employees. An alternative is to install over the network via PXE boot – once set up, the Windows Deployment Services (WDS) of Windows Server save a lot of work.

A machine with Windows Server is required – in Server 2000 is used for this article, but this feature has not changed for years. The server can usually do other work as well, for example as a WSUS server distributing updates to clients. Only rarely will a machine be busy delivering installations around the clock and thus be fully utilized. The machine should definitely have a gigabit connection to the local network; it is better to have several network cards as a so-called NIC team or one 10 – GBit card. After all, the server should deliver Windows packages of several gigabytes in size quickly, sometimes to several computers at the same time.

Who really has many clients (maybe even hundreds) have to install in parallel, but don’t have to worry about the network card becoming the bottleneck. The Windows provisioning services can also deliver the data via multicast over the network and thus install almost any number of computers in parallel without adding up the amount of data sent. Since such a multicast environment also requires adjustments to the network, it is not part of this article. In this article, the WDS server is set up so that it can deliver the first Windows images.

Access to all contents of heise + exclusive tests , Advice & background: independent, critically sound c’t, iX, Technology Review, Mac & i, Make, c’t read photography directly in the browser register once – read on all devices – can be canceled monthly first month free, thereafter monthly 9, 95 € Weekly newsletter with personal reading recommendations from the editor-in-chief Start FREE month Start your FREE month now heise + already subscribed?

Sign in and read Register now and read the article immediately More information about heise +