Prior to installing Windows Deployment Services,
we need to have an Active Directory server,
unless we choose the standalone option.
We also need a DNS server,
which is going to be included in our Active Directory domain controller.
So I'm going to create a domain and forest and then join the
Windows Deployment server to the domain.
Make sure you have a static IP address set on your domain controller
and install the Active Directory Domain Services,
click Add Features, click Next, Next, and Install.
After the installation is complete,
we'll go ahead and promote this computer to be a domain controller.
Installation is complete.
I can click Promote this server to be a domain controller here,
or I can click Close and then click the triangle and do it from this section.
Now a new wizard will come up.
I'm going to choose to Add a new forest,
and I'm going to call this PS.int, and click Next.
I'll choose the default Forest and Domain functional level,
which are the highest that they go, and I'll put in a password for recovery,
and click Next, and continue clicking Next,
choosing all the defaults, until we get to Install.
Once installation is complete, the server will automatically restart.
And we can see that it was successful,
and it's automatically going to sign me out and restart.
I'm now logged into the Windows Deployment Services server,
and I'm going to go to Settings, and join the domain that I just created.
I'll go to System, and I'll go down to About,
and on the right‑hand side, I'll click on Advanced system settings,
and Computer Name, and Change.
I'll leave the computer name the same,
but I'm going to join it to the PS.int domain.
I'm prompted for the administrator username and password,
and I'm now welcomed to the domain.
So I'll go ahead and restart.
After restarting the newly created domain controller.
I can go to Tools and take a look at one of the other prerequisites,
and that's going to be DNS, or domain name services,
and by default, when you install an Active Directory domain controller,
it installs DNS with it.
I just want to make sure that it created it okay and everything looks good.
It should have a couple of lookup zones that are
forward and none that are reverse.
You can create reverse ones if you'd like,
but just for these purposes, it's not necessary.
The first domain that you see here, the _msdcs,
that is for the forest and the domain,
and it replicates any other domain controllers we may create in the future.
Then we have the zone, and the zone itself also gets replicated,
but it just contains all the different records of the different clients,
other servers,
and other things that may have an IP address that get registered with DNS.
And we see something such as Start of Authority,
Name Server, as well as A records.
Start of Authority means that this particular server can make
changes to this zone because it is authorized.
The Name Server means that this is the name server itself that you're
going to look to for any type of name resolution.
Here's the name resolution itself, ps‑dc1, and ps‑wdc.
The resolution is the name to the IP address,
whereas a reverse lookup zone is the IP address to the name.
Now I'm going to minimize this and install one more
role and that is the DHCP server role,
and that's also required to give our client computers as
they boot up into the PXE environment an IP address so they
can connect into our WDS server.
So I'm going to choose DHCP, click Add Features, click Next, Next, and Install.
Once it's installed,
I'll go ahead and create a server pool with various
different options that we'll use for the scope,
and then those computers will be able to get IP addresses when they boot up.
I can go ahead and close and now configure DHCP.
A wizard pops up, click Next.
I'm going to choose to authorize the server to be able to hand out IP addresses,
and click Close.
Now I'm going to go to Tools,
DHCP to open up the DHCP Manager, and I'll create what's called a scope.
A scope is a range of IP addresses in a pool that will be handed out to
our clients as they connect, and it also includes server options in
order to hand out things like the DNS server,
the gateway out to the internet, etc. So I'm going to right‑click and
choose to create a new scope, and the scope wizard pops up.
I'll just call it WDS Scope, and now we need to put in a range, and
it should be a range that's not currently being used by any static IP
addresses. And the length is correct.
My subnet mask is the 24‑bit, but you can double‑check that yours is correct.
I don't need to add any exclusions because there are no IP
addresses in that scope that are using static IPs.
Usually, I like to change the Lease Duration to one day so
computers aren't hanging on to them for too long,
click Next, and I do want to configure the scope options
now. Now I want to put in the router, which will take the
servers out to the internet,
click Add, and it automatically found my domain name,
which is great, and it also found my domain controller's IP address, so
I don't have to do anything there, just click Next.
We don't use WINS servers anymore, so I'll just click Next, and
I'll want to activate that scope and click Finish. IP addresses
will now be handed out to any computers that connect in through
the pre‑execution environment.
All of our prerequisites have been created and installed and configured, and now we can install the Windows Deployment Services.