Ghost deployment and XP license

[Guest]

I am currently trying to make helpdesk support faster. I got many laptops
(different brands and hardware configs). Some of the laptops sometimes needs
reload and the OS is XP with standard applications such as Office 2003 pro,
Cisco VPN client, etc.

I am thinking of using Ghost and NEWSID from sysinternal, and a software I
found on the internet to change the serial no of Windows XP (when the OS is
blasted back to a laptop). I did this in the past and with very much effort I
was successful, but within a very specific requirements.

But now I am faced with 2 problems:
1. How do I change the serial number of Office 2003 so that it can be
authenticated by Microsoft as genuine (each laptop is purchased with office
2003).
2. Is there any better way to deploy the image (OS with standard apps)
without playing around with NEWSID and changing serial no of XP?
Thank you.

 

[Og]

I am currently trying to make helpdesk support faster. I got many laptops
(different brands and hardware configs). Some of the laptops sometimes
needs
reload and the OS is XP with standard applications such as Office 2003
pro,
Cisco VPN client, etc.

I am thinking of using Ghost and NEWSID from sysinternal, and a software I
found on the internet to change the serial no of Windows XP (when the OS
is
blasted back to a laptop). I did this in the past and with very much
effort I
was successful, but within a very specific requirements.

But now I am faced with 2 problems:
1. How do I change the serial number of Office 2003 so that it can be
authenticated by Microsoft as genuine (each laptop is purchased with
office
2003).
2. Is there any better way to deploy the image (OS with standard apps)
without playing around with NEWSID and changing serial no of XP?
Thank you.

You might consider posting your Deployment question where the Deployment
gurus hang out:
microsoft.public.deployment.desktop
microsoft.public.windowsxp.setup_deployment
Steve

 

[Kerry Brown]

Look at sysprep.

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;302577