Most device drivers are provided on the Windows XP Professional and Windows Server 2003 operating system CDs. However, some devices require special device drivers, which you must obtain from the hardware vendor. Some devices that require special drivers include:
Plug and Play devices for which there are no device drivers on the operating system CD. Sound cards and video adapters on portable computers are common examples.
Mass storage controllers, particularly small computer system interface (SCSI) controllers and redundant array of independent disks (RAID) controllers.
Hardware abstraction layers (HALs) created by a third party.
Legacy (non-Plug and Play) devices for which there are no device drivers on the operating system CD.
When you obtain device drivers from a third party, make sure that Microsoft has digitally signed the device drivers. Signing ensures that the device driver has undergone a certain level of testing, and that the device driver cannot be altered or overwritten by another program's installation process. Device driver files can include: system (.sys) files, dynamic-link library (.dll) files, information (.inf) files, and text setup (Txtsetup.oem and Txtsetup.sif) files.
In addition to making sure that you have the appropriate
device drivers for your hardware,
you need to make sure that the device drivers are available to Setup during the
unattended installation process. If they are not, Setup might stop running and
the unattended installation might fail. To make sure device drivers are
available to Setup, you need to save the device drivers in a distribution share
so they are copied to the destination computer during an unattended
installation, or you need to save the device drivers on the destination
computer's hard disk before you initiate the installation.
For a worksheet to help you record information about
supplemental device drivers, see "Unattended
Installation Worksheet" (ACIUI_1.doc) on the Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Deployment Kit companion CD (or see "Unattended Installation Worksheet" on the Web at https://www.microsoft.com/reskit). For
more information about device-driver signing and how Windows selects device
drivers, see "Using Signed Drivers" in Microsoft Windows Corporate
Deployment Tools User's Guide (Deploy.chm). Deploy.chm is included in
the Deploy.cab file
in the Support folder on the Windows Server 2003 operating system CD.
|