📎 AI Summary:
The thread discusses concerns about deploying Windows 7 and Office 2007 across a large organization of desktops and laptops previously managed with Windows XP and Ghost imaging. The original poster seeks clarity on how to efficiently image and activate Windows 7, mentioning confusion over licensing methods like MAK and KMS. Responses suggest exploring the Windows Automated Installation Kit and ImageX, with a note that activation may be more complex compared to the previous XP setup. Overall, the sentiment indicates a need to understand new deployment and activation processes for Windows 7 in a corporate environment.
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Fazza

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Joined
Sep 22, 2009
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4
Thread Author #1
Hi!

Currently we have over 250 desktops and around 75 laptops, all running Windows XP with Office 2003 on them.

We're looking in to going over to Windows 7 with Office 2007.

We use Symantec Ghost to image our computers (we have a Select Agreement with Microsoft) and with XP it's nice and simple. One CD of XP Pro with one product key/code which we can then imaged across to all desktops and laptops of the same type.

Is it just as easy to do this with Windows 7? The reason I ask is I was reading somewhere about MAK's and that's when it started to get a bit confusing so I thought I would post on this forum and see if I can get some clear and simple answers from people who know about Windows 7!

Many thanks in advance.

:)
 

Solution
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Ghost

Take a look at the Automated Installation Kit for Windows 7. Now Microsoft wants you to use ImageX to make images instead of third party utilities. I don't think it will be so easy to deploy Windows 7 computers without entering activation codes.
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Fazza

New Member
Joined
Sep 22, 2009
Messages
4
Thread Author #2
Thanks for the reply!

You say that it's easy in a corporate environment but dont say what the process is. With XP we have a Select Agreement where we get one code and never have to activate it as it's the corporate edition of XP so we can image it across 200+ PCs' for example without any issues.

With Windows 7 I keep seeing the acronyms KMS and MAK but don't seem to be able to find a simple explanation of what they are and how we actually go about installing a fresh install of Windows 7 and then image the software build on to our computers?

:confused:
 

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penguin386

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Joined
Oct 4, 2009
Messages
28
#3
Ghost

Take a look at the Automated Installation Kit for Windows 7. Now Microsoft wants you to use ImageX to make images instead of third party utilities. I don't think it will be so easy to deploy Windows 7 computers without entering activation codes.
 

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