How to install Dell T3500 RAID Drivers via unattend.xml?

Question

I work for a medium sized company and, due to the recent XP phaseout, we're rolling out Windows 7 on newer machines throughout the company. Unfortunately, we've had problems doing so as the computers contain RAID cards that require an additional driver.

I was pulled in to help, but have very little experience with sysprep and unattend.xml. Our current method (we've not yet gotten it working) is to persist all drivers on the machines using <PersistAllDeviceInstalls>true</PersistAllDeviceInstalls>

While I'm waiting for more info on that, I've begun working on another unattend.xml:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<unattend xmlns="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:unattend">
    <settings pass="windowsPE">
        <component name="Microsoft-Windows-Setup" processorArchitecture="amd64" publicKeyToken="31bf3856ad364e35" language="neutral" versionScope="nonSxS" xmlns:wcm="http://schemas.microsoft.com/WMIConfig/2002/State" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance">
            <Diagnostics>
                <OptIn>false</OptIn>
            </Diagnostics>
            <DynamicUpdate>
                <Enable>false</Enable>
                <WillShowUI>OnError</WillShowUI>
            </DynamicUpdate>
            <EnableFirewall>true</EnableFirewall>
            <UserData>
                <AcceptEula>true</AcceptEula>
                <!-- <FullName></FullName>
                <Organization></Organization> -->
            </UserData>
        </component>
        <component name="Microsoft-Windows-PnpCustomizationsWinPE" processorArchitecture="amd64" publicKeyToken="31bf3856ad364e35" language="neutral" versionScope="nonSxS" xmlns:wcm="http://schemas.microsoft.com/WMIConfig/2002/State" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance">
            <DriverPaths>
                <PathAndCredentials wcm:action="add" wcm:keyValue="1">
                    <Path>%configsetroot%\drivers</Path>
                </PathAndCredentials>
            </DriverPaths>
        </component>
    </settings>
</unattend>

From what I've seen, this copies everything in %configsetroot%\drivers to C:\Windows\ConfigSetRoot\.

Assuming I have the following directories set up:

C:\WINDOWS\system32\sysprep>tree /f
Folder PATH listing
Volume serial number is 0006EFC4 64F5:C0E6
C:.
│   unattend.xml
│
└───drivers
        lsi_sas.inf
        lsi_sas.sys
        R193683.txt
        svlhx64.cat

And I run, for example sysprep.exe /oobe /generalize /unattend:unattend.xml

Will this unattend file work? If so, how can I make the driver install automatically? Should I perhaps run a SynchronousCommand? If I should do that, how can I install a driver from those files via a CMD command?

Answer 1

So although this is not exactly the answer to you question, but I have been using Dell's Image Assist for quite some time now, and it really saves me a whole of time and headache on image maintenance.

To explain it in the fewest words as possible, Dell basically built an easy to use GUI for the Windows Automated Installation Toolkit. You would simply create a "base" image with all your Windows settings and applications (no drivers), sysprep it, and capture it using Image Assist (imagex is driving this process in the background.) Then you would deploy it with Dell published platform specific CABs (which contains specific drivers for that model).

Under this framework, you only have to create one base image with all your customizations, and pair it with model specific CAB when deploying. Under the hood, during deployment, when the tool looks for the CAB file, it's basically using DISM commands to inject drivers into the WIM. The result would be your base image + model specific drivers already installed.

Here is a TechNet article on DISM.

The driver servicing commands can be used on an offline image to add and remove drivers based on the INF file, and on a running operating system (online) to enumerate drivers. Microsoft® Windows® Installer or other driver package types (such as .exe files) are not supported.

I hope this helps; I wish all manufacturers would publish driver CABs for their models.