ImageX is Microsoft’s image creation and application tool included with Windows Vista. It is also capable of creating images of Windows XP machines. Images can be applied from a large flash drive, or over the network using WinPE.
SysPrep
First, prepare your system for disk cloning using SysPrep.exe (located at c:\Windows\System32\Sysprep on all installations of Vista). Vista’s SysPrep has the following options:
- Out-of-Box-Experience: Normal SysPrep – resets system to setup state, will boot to setup wizard on next boot
- Audit Mode: Similar to XP SysPrep “Factory Mode”, configures computer to boot directly to an Administrator log-in on next boot, allowing you to “edit” the image after restore without going through the final stages of Windows Setup.
- Generalize: Resets Vista’s driver configuration and performs full device detection after image restore.
- If you have not removed the computer from any domain prior to executing SysPrep, SysPrep will do this automatically.
SysPrep executes in GUI mode by default. You must provide command-line arguments to use an unattended setup file (use /? for assistance). Microsoft recommends that you use Windows System Image Manager, part of the Windows Automated Installation Kit, to create unattended setup files for use with Vista.
Note: To create ImageX image files for Windows XP, simply run XP SysPrep as you normally would. ImageX simply replaces any other disk cloning software in such a case.
Image Creation
Once SysPrep completes, boot off of your flash drive and connect to a network drive to store the image (using net use). Next, you’ll need to locate and switch to your flash drive, as you’ll need to run ImageX from there (this is usually the E: drive in single partition scenarios).
Next, use ImageX.exe to create the Windows Image file (WIM):
imagex /capture c: x:\YourImage.wim “Descriptive text can go here”Where c: is the source drive for the image, and x: is the network drive. The description is optional. Also, you can optionally specify the type of compression used for the initial capture operation, as follows:/compress [maximum | fast | none]
Image Application
Images are easily applied after booting from your WinPE flash drive. First, prepare the system drive for Windows. Next, connect to the network using net use if necessary. Finally, the basic command is:
imagex /apply x:\image.wim 1 c:
Where 1 indicates the image within the WIM file to apply (1 in most cases), and where c: is the system volume on the destination computer.