The best route please...

Hi and thanx for reading this post...

In September we, a small primary school in the uk are having our network
maintained by professionals at long last but what I would like to do is set
up the software as good as I can before they start to save time and money. We
have windows 2003 running our server and xp pro on 30 machines around our
site. At the moment we have lots of problems as our previous set up and
maintenance contractors left 3 months ago and I feel a complete reinstall and
setup is required so if this is the case would it be possible to do the
following...

First I would like to remove all software from our machines not the
operating systems as these have been kept up to date by myself and get them
defragged and cleaned so each is in a nice virgin state, then

I need to put allot of software on each of the machines can I set up one
with all we need throughout the school and then do a ghost copy on to a
portable hard drive to copy on to the remaining machines including the
server??

We can't ask the new contractors yet as they have not been allocated to us
yet!

Would this be the best way, please your advice would be appreciated

Kind regards Marshall

"Conbloodyfused" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:BB5896AC-E9B6-4C14-889B-(E-Mail Removed)...
> Hi and thanx for reading this post...
>
> In September we, a small primary school in the uk are having our network
> maintained by professionals at long last but what I would like to do is
set
> up the software as good as I can before they start to save time and money.
We
> have windows 2003 running our server and xp pro on 30 machines around our
> site. At the moment we have lots of problems as our previous set up and
> maintenance contractors left 3 months ago and I feel a complete reinstall
and
> setup is required so if this is the case would it be possible to do the
> following...

Don't try to solve problems you don't have yet and can't even identify.
Simply "feeling" that a reinstall is required is a long way from "knowing" a
reinstall is required and "knowing" the exact problem and the exact cause of
the problem.

Wait for the "professionals" to finish their work. Then you will have a
clean environment to work with. You might be surprised how many problems
might "go away" when they are done that you would be vainly trying to solve
on your own beforehand.

> I need to put alot of software on each of the machines can I set up one
> with all we need throughout the school and then do a ghost copy on to a
> portable hard drive to copy on to the remaining machines including the
> server??

Ghost is fine if you remember to use GhostWalker to alter the SID everytime
a machine is created from that image,...simply altering the machinename
isn't enough. You have to:

1. build the machine from the Image
2. change the machine's name
3. use Ghostwalker to change the machines SID
4. add the machine to the network.

--
Phillip Windell [MCP, MVP, CCNA]
www.wandtv.com
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