Office XP 2003 Deployment over the network

[juruk]

I am trying to upgrade around 40 computers from Office 2000 to XP Office 2003 over the network and I need any guidance like step by step document or similar. I know that there is something on the Microsoft site but is kind of wage since this is something new for me. If anyone can share any tip how I can make this process less painful I’ll really appreciate.
Thanks,
Juruk.

 

[Khoeth]

If you wanted to, you could use a CD burning utility to make an ISO of the office XP 2003 CD onto your computer's harddrive, install Daemon tools (

http://www.daemon-tools.cc/dtcc/portal/portal.php

) onto every computer on the network, have the virtual DVD drive that Daemon tools made shared over the network, then mount the ISO into the virtual DVD drives of each computer from your personal computer, and install office XP 2003 onto each computer at the same time. Though you still have to install daemon tools on every computer, it installs much faster then Office XP 2003 does. The added bonus of this is that you will never have to leave your personal computer to make network wide software installations again.

Khoeth Mora
patton525@hotmail.com

feel free to Contact me at patton525@hotmail.com

 

[unclehammy]

Create an installation point on your server (or a machine you want to use a "server" if in a workgroup).

To create the installation point...

-create a chared folder on the server Shared Permissions -> Everyone, Full NTFS Permissions ->Everyone Read/Execute (this is the simplest, you may want to change this depending on your situation)
-insert the disk
-click RUN type "cd drive:\setup /a" which starts an administrative install
-choose you shared folder location in the location box
-choose all the settings for installation

Now, you have you shared installation point you have two choices to do the installation

1. Go around to all the machines, navigate to the shared folder, and start the install via the setup program
2. If you are in an AD Domain, either assign it to the required computers, or publish it to the required computers/users depending on how mandatory the installation is.

Hope this helps,
Hammy

 

[juruk]

Hammy
You solution sounds interesting since yes it is a domain environment but if you can please explain more what exactly needs to be done. Do you refer that somehow i can use group policy to force the installation to a particular PC's? I'll appreciate if you can elaborate little bit more or refer me to some web site/links.
Thanks,
Juruk

Khoeth,
Thank you for you tip however i don’t want to go to each machine and load the utility individually since i have 40+ Pc's.
Thanks anyway.

 

[unclehammy]

Yes, it is done via GPO. Assigning a piece of software is mandatory, it will be installed the first time the computer is restarted, before the logon on prompt (if assigned to a PC) or after logon (if assigned to a user). Pulishing a piece of software makes it available to the users it is published to either via a link on the desktop or the Add Remove Programs applet.

Anyways, here's an overview...

http://www.microsoft.com/resources/...dowsserv/2003/standard/proddocs/en-us/ade.asp

Specifically for office...

http://www.microsoft.com/resources/documentation/office/2003/all/reskit/en-us/depc04.mspx

There is an option in the GPO dialog for software installation to indicate that the software you are dploying is an upgrade, and to indicate what package you are upgrading, though I am not certain if the latter part will refer to a previously GPO deployed software package to specify as the upgraded package.

In all honesty, it isn't that difficult. As always, I'd run it in a test environemt if you can, make sure it behaves as desired, then deploy it in production.

Oh yeah, and I was mistaken about one thing. You wouldn't want to create an installation point as I indicated if you go the GPO route. You want to follow the MS directions which are to install the Office package using the ADD part of Add/Remove Programs on the server.

Anyways, there's plenty of info other than this out there to help you out.

 

[juruk]

Thanks a lot again.
Yes i would run some tests on my test machines and then deployed on the prodution network. I need to work on this arround march 21st so once i have any info or problems i will post them on thisthread. In the mean time will read the MS tip.
Once more many thanks,
Juruk