Depending on the form factor of the server that you purchase (e.g. Blade server), you might end up in a situation where you don’t have a DVD drive available to carry out a tactical one off install of the operating system.
On the other hand you might actually have a DVD drive and want to carry out a tactical install from USB as it is somewhat quicker that DVD.
You first need to ensure that the use of USB devices is enabled (available) and not set to hidden in the BIOS. Next you need to make sure that the USB device is high enough in the boot order so that you end up booting off the USB device.
Once the prep work is complete the next step is to partition and format the USB drive. You can follow these steps below:
From the Command Prompt type DISKPART
LIST DISK
SELECT DISK 1 (this assumes that your USB drive is listed as disk 1)
CLEAN
CREATE PRIMARY PARTITION
SELECT PARTITION 1
ACTIVE
FORMAT FS=FAT32 QUICK
ASSIGN
EXIT
Finally all you need to do is copy the contents of the Windows 2008 R2 DVD to the USB drive. You can follow this step below:
XCOPY E:\*.* /S /E /F F:\ (this assumes that your DVD drive is E:\ and that your USB drive is F:\)
Now there is nothing stopping you overwriting the default INSTALL.WIM file on the USB drive with your own corporate INSTALL.WIM image if you want to take it to the next step.
Patrick Lownds