MDT 2012 Customize "Running: Lite Touch Installation"

Customizing the MDT Progress bar.

There's various things you can do to the Litetouch progress bar. Today let's talk about the generic text that's displayed during deployments

"Running: Lite Touch Installation"

That doesn't look too pretty now does it.

Well a new added feature in MDT is that you can change it via the "_SMSTSPackageName" variable on customsettings!

This variable is unavailable in MDT2011 but in MDT2012 it is now parsed by ZTIGather.

Sample Customsettings.ini

[Settings]

Priority=Default

[Default]

_SMSTSOrgName=IT SUPPORT YORK INC.

_SMSTSPackageName=Consult %_SMSTSOrgName% for your deployments.

Oh yes, you can use another variable within another variable- awesome!

MDT 2012 is out

MDT 2012 is offically released.

You can head over here and download - TechNet Download

MDT 2012 Change Log

• Comprehensive tools and guidance to efficiently manage large-scale deployments of Windows 7 and Microsoft Office 365.


• An enhanced user-Driven Installation (UDI) deployment method that utilizes System Center Configuration Manager 2012. UDI lets end users initiate and customize an OS deployment on their PCs—via an easy-to-use wizard.


• Ease Lite Touch installation through integration with Microsoft Diagnostics and Recovery Toolkit (DaRT).


• This release provides support for deploying Windows 8 Consumer Preview in a lab environment.

MDT 2012 Beta 1 is out!

Here are some of the new features and changes!
(Taken from the official release documentation)

MDT 2012 Beta 1provides new capabilities, such as:

• Support for Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager 2012 Beta 2, including the new application model and user device affinity (UDA).
• Improved Lite Touch partitioning, supporting the preferred partition layouts described in the Windows Automated Installation Kit.
• Support in Lite Touch for deploying 64-bit Windows® to computers that support Unified Extended Firmware Interface (UEFI) (without requiring compatibility support for legacy BIOS).
• New Lite Touch “Deploy to VHD” task sequence templates that support deploying a Windows 7 or Windows Server® 2008 R2 image into a virtual hard disk (VHD) file that can then be used for booting the OS (“boot from VHD”).
• Added support for deploying Windows ThinPC and Windows POSReady 7.
• Improved Lite Touch wizard lookandfeel.
• Continued support for System Center Configuration Manager 2007 SP2 and all operating systems supported by MDT 2010.
• Many bug fixes and other small improvements.

 Download MDT 2012 BETA 1 Here