Hardware independent deployment

Hardware independent deployment

It’s difficult for administrators managing multiple computers with different vendor makes and models to maintain various disk images for each hardware configurations. A new machine might require a new set of drivers, while an old machine might require updated drivers. OS Deployer eliminates the need to maintain multiple images for each type of hardware. With Hardware Independent Deployment in OS Deployer, you can deploy a single base image to multiple computers, irrespective of hardware and automatically add the required drivers for each hardware.

Hardware Independent Deployment resolves many problems when it comes to imaging and deploying an operating system (OS). The OS alone can’t identify specific devices and will require drivers for carrying out necessary system functionalities. For example, for a system to function it requires a unique set of device drivers like hard disk drivers, network drivers, USB drivers, device drivers etc., If you are manually deploying an image with a set of drivers, there is a possibility that the drivers might not match the machine's hardware configuration, leading to system errors. Hardware Independent Deployment helps you overcome this problem by automatically adding the compatible drivers to the machine where the image is deployed.

Here’s how Hardware Independent Deployment works

1. The target computer is booted into the network environment using WinPE media.
2. The selected OS image is now deployed on the target computer. Before booting the OS, the OS deployer components in the WinPE environment will automatically add the required drivers to the deployed image.
3. After the OS boots, OS Deployer will automatically install these drivers on the target computer.