Deployment Solution

We need to add WinPE 5.1 to our existing Deployment Server 6.9 SP6 environment because of new Dell 8.1 driver requirements. We are currently using both the legacy 2.1 and WinPE 4.0 images. Can this be done? We have not yet moved to Ghost Solution Suite.

Hello Greg.

I don't know answer to your question, but I'm curious, if you really need PE4 - system drivers are installed on production system, so there shouldun't be any extra requirements, but as I might guest, the problem is for integrating drivers to WinPe...

Could you please specify more info about those requirements? what models are cousing problem? what drivers are problematic? maybe we will be able to find some workround

We are attempting to image new Dell Optiplex 5040 and 7040 systems. Our deployment server is currently at 6.9 Build 648 with WinPE 4.0. After booting into WinPE these new systems are in a continual restart of the DHCP service, indicating missing drivers. 

Dell provides drivers for these models for Windows 7 x86 and x64, 8.1 x64 and Windows 10 x64 and I have added the 7 and 8.1 drivers to the WinPE images.

I have been in contact with Dell but do not have a solution at this time.

Hi Greg,

   Thanks for the information, can you please specifiy the network card and also the device id of it. So that i can check for the drivers.

Hi Greg,

The good news is you don't need to upgrade to WinPE5 to get driver support. The 5040/7040 both have WinPE4 NIC drivers available to add into your WinPE4 environment,

http://www.symantec.com/connect/downloads/intel-i217i218i219-drivers-winpe4-x86

Kind Regards,
Ian./

Have you looked into attaining drivers for the NVM Express Controllers? I am running into the same issue and I believe the problem is not the version of WinPE, but rather that the pxe environment doesn't have the appropriate driver set for the embedded SSD drives, which are connected through an NVM Express controller. I am going to see if I can find 32bit drivers for the controller, but another avenue to look at is slipstreaming the hotfixes provided by Microsoft here:

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/2990941

Hi hyperzulu -Gregs issue is DHCP (and therefore NIC driver related). I can say that in our environment we have the 7040 deployed through WinPE4 without supplimental storage drivers. I'll keep an eye out thouse for the NVM Express controller on the new models we're getting in next week -that link you posted just might come in handy!

Greg -do you need anymore help on this issue?

Thank you all for weighing in on this. For some reason I have not been getting email notifications on this thread until this morning so I thought it had died.

I was finally able to get the Win 8.0 32-bit drivers for the new Optiplex systems from Intel. Intel included the new driver set in the "IntelProset 20.4.1" configurations. (The NDIS63 folder contains the Win 8.0 drivers.)

This driver set enabled me to get WinPE 4.0 working with the 8.0 configuration. There was no problem with the PXE boot process but the drivers were not available for the Win 8.0-based WinPE 4.0 to connect to the network. We are back and working now after adding the driver to the WinPE 4.0 image. 

We are in the process of getting GSS licenses so I hope we can get that upgraded soon.

Thanks, Ian, for providing the Symantec link for the drivers. Since I hadn't gotten the posting notice I went down the Intel path.

This issue is resolved for me.

Same setup (and problem) here.

I was able to find the Intel NIC driver and that worked fine, but the Samsung NVMe SSD drive is not recognized at all in WinPE 4.0

I opened a ticket with Dell, but have not heard anything back, but I can't find a WinPE 4.0 32-bit NVM driver anywere!

I'll checkout the MS hotfix referenced above by hyperzulu... sounds like it may be more involved than just finding a compatible driver!

The hotfix was for a different issue. I was not seeing a C drive when I was in my WinPE environment. The hotfix is for the Samsung nvexpress drivers that dell is using in their new SSD implementation. It says it supports Windows 7 SP1, so PE 3.1 will take it. Note that you would also need to stream it into your image.