How can I enable users to set the Administrator password during a Remote Installation Services installation?

John Savill

January 7, 2001

1 Min Read
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A. When you use the Microsoft Remote Installation Services (RIS), by default the Administrator password is set to null (blank) during the installation. You can, however, let the user set a password during the final GUI portion of installation. Perform the following steps:

  1. On the RIS server, open the .sif file of the installation you want to modify. By default, this file is in the RemoteInstallSetup\[language]Images\[folder name]I386Templates folder with a name of Ristndrd.sif.

  2. Go to the [GuiUnattended] section of the .sif file, and find the following line:

    AdminPassword = * 
    
    
  3. Change this line to read as follows:

    AdminPassword = "" 
    
    
  4. Save the change.

During installation, the system will prompt the user to type an Administrator password. You should test this change to ensure that it works correctly.

As a side note, instead of "" you could type a password (e.g., AdminPassword = "fred"), which sets the Administrator password to the password you specify and doesn't prompt the user. However, this password travels as clear text, so I don't recommend this approach.

The Windows 2000 Resource Kit describes another option (although not well!). You can use a Custom Installation Wizard (CIW) and let the user type in a password. However, this approach is quite complex.

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