Bare-Metal Deployment Hyper-V host with VMM 2012R2 Part3 – Prepare OS deployment

• Bare-Metal Deployment Hyper-V host with VMM 2012R2 Part1 – Introduction
• Bare-Metal Deployment Hyper-V host with VMM 2012R2 Part2 – Prepare Networking
• Bare-Metal Deployment Hyper-V host with VMM 2012R2 Part3 – Prepare OS deployment
• Bare-Metal Deployment of Hyper-V host with VMM 2012R2 Part4 – Hyper-V host provisioning

Now that network configuration is done in VMM fabric, it’s time to prepare the OS deployment. As other OS deployment, a PXE server must be installed and a baseline image should be created. To finish, a Physical Computer Profile will be set to automate the network configuration and some other settings (product key, password etc.).

Add a PXE server to Virtual Machine Manager

To deploy WInPE and VHDX file through the network, a WDS (Windows Deployment Services) server is needed. WDS is a Windows Server role:

Once it is installed, make the first configuration and start the service. Once WDS is installed and prepared you can come back to VMM Fabric. Right click on PXE Servers as below and select Add PXE Server.

Specify the WDS server name and a user account with enough privilege on WDS. When you click on “Add”, you will see the deployment of some image as WinPE. This WinPE is a special version for VMM. When the setting is done successfully, the PXE server appears in VMM as below.

Create a VHDX Syspreped

A VHDX syspreped is necessary for Bare-Metal deployment. This file contains the operating system with some specific settings that you have configured. On my side, I have added the Failover Cluster feature, the OS has been updated with the last patches and I have created a c:\temp folder. To finish I have disabled the firewall for all profiles. This last will be reactivated after that host servers have joined the domain with GPO.

So to prepare an Operating System as I want, I create a Virtual Machine that I called _Baseline – Core – W2012R2 – DTC. I make all change that I want. And when I have finished I shut down the VM. I shutdown the VM because before launch a sysprep, I create a clone of that VM. In this way I have a pre-Sysprep VM in my store (to update my baseline VHDX or to recover quickly if I make a mistake).

Do not add MPIO feature or do not enable Hyper-V role (ok it can be hard on VM :p) in your image preparation. These features will be automatically added by VMM.

Once cloning is done I re-launch the VM to sysprep the Operating System. Below screenshot presents settings to sysprep the VM:

Once the VM is syspreped, I copy the VHDX in VMM library and I delete the Virtual Machine.

Create a Physical Computer profile

Now, it’s time to create a Physical Computer Profile. As other profile in VMM, the Physical Computer Profile is a sort of template for host servers. It can be used to deploy Hyper-V hosts or Scale-Out File servers. So open your Library and right click on Physical Computer Profile and select Create Physical Computer Profile:

In VHD file, select the previous VHDX syspreped created in the previous chapter. On hardware configuration you can configure the network settings that will be applied on the Hyper-V host during provisioning. On my old Dell 1950 I have only two physical NIC so I Add two physical NIC. Next I had 4 virtual NIC while Management NIC is mandatory.

My Management NIC is configured as a virtual network adapter connected to one of physical NIC. I configure the classification as Host Management and it is connected to my Fabrikam vSwitch. To finish with this vNIC, I set to obtain a static IP in IP Pool of VM Network (Yes I know called a VM Network “VM Network” is a bad idea, I realize too late).

Next, each Physical NIC is configured to be connected to Fabrikam vSwitch with the uplink port profile Host teaming. Because my Dell 1950 is a very old server, it does not support CDN so I not set CDN.

Now I present you a Virtual NIC configuration. I show you one vNIC because others is the same thing, just parameters that change. So on each vNIC I configure the connection with Fabrikam vSwitch and I set the related classification.

Then I set the IP configuration related to vNIC needs. In the below example, the vNIC belong VM Management Network and a static IP will be attributed from the related IP Pool.

Next, some settings are available to configure the disk where will be deployed VHDX (Operating System or not).

On Driver filter, you can specify a drivers tags to install this last. In fact when you add drivers in VMM library you can tag them.

To finish, some OS configuration can be set as below:

At this point, all configurations on VMM is finished. The next step is the provisioning of Hyper-V host.