Sysprep/Generalize Problem

I have 2 Lenovo Thinkpads with differing hardware. When I create an W7 install wim on the reference system with Sysprep/Generalize/Capture, that wim installs fine on the reference laptop (L460). When I use the same wim to install on the other Laptop (T530), I get an Abend 7e during boot. I was under the impression that generalize is supposed allow for installing on different hardware. Could it be that some driver bits from the L460 are still in the generalized wim that is causing the abend and how could I go about finding out what's wrong?

 

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On The L460 I install a wim with all Windows Updates excluding latest rollups and non-integratable offline updates.The only drivers included are the Intel Rapid Storage Technology Driver and the Intel(R) USB3.0 eXtebsible Host controller Driver which get added during WinNTSetup since there are no USB2.0 ports on the L460 and nothing will be recognized if a USB port is needed.

I then Boot with Ctrl+sShift+F3, Add latest SSU, rollups and non-integratable updates, rebooting when necessary. In the end, I select OOBE/Generalize/shutdown from the sysprep GUI

My laptop is multiboot and from W10 LTSB, I do the capture.

When I install the captured wim on the T530 with WinNTSetup, I use the USB and Rapid Storage Technology Drivers for the T530. The BSOD occurs about 60% into the device processing stage during boot, but continues fine when installing on the L460.

I'm still trying different scenarios and suggestions to pinpoint what might be the cause.

 

Looks like the USB drivers cause the BSOD 7e. If I exclude them, the installation is okay. The T530 has USB3 and USB2, so I was able to do the install via USB2. The USB3 drivers should work too, so I still need to find what is causing the conflict. BTW, after installing, I ran the USB3 setup installer and the system crashed with BSOD 7e. This time there's a dump.

 

I did not want to waste more time trying to find the conflict with the Lenovo T530 Intel USB drivers and my captured install wim, so I trashed those drivers and opted for the ones in the USB 3/XHCI driver stack for Windows 7/Vista thread and that worked flawlessly with the same wim. Kudos to all those involved for making this option available.

Edit: I also found what was causing the conflict. Even though Generalize did what it was supposed to, the captured wim still had the oem2-5 inf files from the L460 usb3 drivers included in the Windows\inf directory. I deleted those with Dism from the wim and the T530 USB drivers installed without the BSOD too.

 

I just ran into another interesting situation with my captured Win7 wim that has the latest Rollup integrated in it. After doing a clean install, be it 32-bit or 64-bit, I always get the rollup offered again by WU. Most of the time, the system eventually realizes that it is already installed and WU finally says Windows is up to date. This did not happen on my T530 even after days of reboots and checking for updates, so I looked further and found a registry key that controls this strange WU behavior. It contained 2 entries:

Code:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Component Based Servicing\ApplicabilityEvaluationCache\Package_for_RollupFix~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~~7601.24563.1.4]
"ApplicabilityState"=dword:00000070
"CurrentState"=dword:00000065

I checked that entry on my other Win7 system where WU was no longer offering the rollup and there, the CurrentState was set to 70, so I changed that value (you need nsudo for this) from 65 to 70 on the T530 and after asking WU to search for updates again, bingo - Windows is up to date.

The question remains why the fresh install, ends up with this flag set to 65. My Sysprep system is not connected and it could be that the rollup install on the Sysprep system does not set this flag correctly unless it has a network connection to communicate with MSoft. Just speculation though - I need to check that. Maybe someone else knows how this flag gets set.

 

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None of the packages are flagged with that.

 

I found these entries, but as usual, don't understand it.

Code:

2021-01-07 12:56:12, Info                  CBS    Appl: Partial install Status testing, package: Package_131_for_KB4592471~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~~6.1.1.4, partially installed (true/false), 0
2021-01-07 12:56:12, Info                  CBS    Appl: Partial install Status testing, package: Package_for_KB4592471_RTM~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~~6.1.1.4, partially installed (true/false), 0
2021-01-07 12:56:12, Info                  CBS    Appl: Partial install Status testing, package: Package_131_for_KB4592471~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~~6.1.1.4, partially installed (true/false), 0
2021-01-07 12:56:12, Info                  CBS    Appl: Partial install Status testing, package: Package_for_KB4592471_RTM~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~~6.1.1.4, partially installed (true/false), 0
2021-01-07 12:56:13, Info                  CBS    Appl: Partial install Status testing, package: Package_for_KB4592471_SP1~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~~6.1.1.4, partially installed (true/false), 1
2021-01-07 12:56:13, Info                  CBS    Appl: Partial install Status testing, package: Package_for_RollupFix~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~~7601.24563.1.4, partially installed (true/false), 1

I installed the KB .cab online with dism on the Sysprep system and there was no indication that the install had a problem, so I don't know why it's complaining now. It doesn't like the SP1 package.

 

Only the SP1/Rollup is flagged 1. I searched on "partially installed (true/false)" and then selected all the rollup entries that were checked for partial install. If you look at Package_131 it's flagged 0 and not 1. SP1/Rollup are the only enties flagged 1 in the whole CBS log and all other partial install tests show 0 and I assume 0 is false (not partially installed) right?. DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /ScanHealth comes up clean.

Spoiler

Code:

=================================
Checking System Update Readiness.
Binary Version 6.1.7601.24499
2021-01-07 19:01

Checking Windows Servicing Packages

Checking Package Manifests and Catalogs

Checking Package Watchlist

Checking Component Watchlist

Checking Packages

Checking Component Store

Summary:
Seconds executed: 110
 No errors detected

 

These are all the entries that I found where partial testing was done.