Discussion Forums/PDQ Deploy/Knowledge Base
Deploying Microsoft Office 2010 Professional
Shawn Anderson
posted this on August 02, 2010 13:50
Step 1: Extract administrative files from Office installations disk
Locate the setup.exe for Office and run the following:
setup.exe /admin
This will extract the Microsoft Office Professional 2010 files that you will need to modify to perform silent installations as well as providing license key information. The Office Customization Tool will start automatically.
Make your modifications at this time. One area of importance is the Licensing and User Interface section, which allows you to auto accept the Microsoft Office EULA as well as set the interface level for the installation. This is also the page where you will enter your product key (if you don't use volume licensing). It's not as clear cut as I'd like it to be, but it's intuitive enough.
For silent deployments select None in the Display Level (see image).
Make any additional changes or configurations and select File > Save. This will create your .MSP file. I suggest saving this file in the same directory as your setup.exe.
To deploy Office 2010, open PDQ Deploy and browse to setup.exe in the Installer File to Deploy field. Be sure to select "Include Entire Directory". In the parameters field enter the following:
/adminfile admin_file
Comments
I've followed this instructions step by step, but now have the problem, that in the Deployment Console, the job never ends. The installation itself is running fine, but the status remains on "installing".
Whats wrong here - how can I debug?
Thanks
Hi Kurt, There could be a couple of reasons for this issue, including using a retail copy of Office vs. volume version, or installing slightly different products. I'd like to get a copy of your .msp file that you created. I'll open a separate support ticket so that we can resolve this issue. Thanks for commenting.
~Shawn
I'm having the exact same problem as Kurt at the moment.
I haven't found a solution yet.
Filip, Kurt discovered that by turning off his completion notice it worked. Will you open your admin file and see what you have the completion notice set to. It's in the same section as running the installation silent, etc. Please let us know if it works. If you still have issues we will open a support ticket and see what we can find.
Thanks,
Shawn Anderson
Also, if you want to have the installation auto-activate so the users don't get the activation dialog on first use, do the following:
In OCT, under Modify Setup Properties, click the Add button. In the name Field, put in the following:
AUTO_ACTIVATE
In the Value field, put in the following:
1
Hit OK and you are done. This will auto-activate in the background with no user interaction required. The only downside to this is every time you run an install it will use up another MAK, so if you push out a new install over an old one, it will not reuse the key.
Hope this helps. PDQ Deploy rocks! Just bought the pro version and am using it heavily the past week. I own a Managed IT Service shop and this tool is saving me tons of time with my clients. =)
Is anyone having a problem with pushing it to windows 7? The install seems to hang. I can see that the files copy to the local win 7 machine but thats it. I also see the service running but it isnt doing anything
Matthew, I've pushed to Windows 7, Vista, and XP. If you'd like I'd be happy to look at your MSP file (assuming that you created a custom MSP). Please send it to support@adminarsenal.com and I'll see if it hangs in our lab.
After we create the .msp, where should this be placed? Same folder as the setup.exe?
I am not sure if the .msp is getting read since I have it set to not restart after finishing installing, but once the setup is done, the user says the computer restarts.
Dan, I usually keep my msp next to setup.exe (same level). I've had spotty success when keeping it in \admin.
Will you please export your office installer (in PDQ Deploy) and send it to support@adminarsenal.com. We'll take a look and see if something stands out.
Shawn-
Thanks for the reply. I have it in the same level as the setup.exe. It isnt place in the \admin.
I have tired to send the .msp but i keep getting a bounce back that it doesnt like the file type. I have tried to zip it aswell.
Please try and attach it here. I can remove it from the forum after I download it.
Also, did you say that you don't have an admin directory? If so, then we need to find out where your office cd came from. If there is no \admin directory then the admin tool likely will not work.
Thanks, Dan. We have your office_x32.msp file. We will check it out and get back to you. I have removed the file attachment from this forum.
I know this is going to sound like a completely unintelligent question, but why does the MSP file need to be moved from the updates folder? Will the deployment not work? I'm just learning to play around with the OCT and did a successful customization- including automatic activation and removal of a couple of unwanted programs. I've only tested it on a couple of machines so far (navigating to the share on the server and starting the install), but they've come out exactly as I had wanted. It was my understanding from reading the Microsoft documentation that the installer would process whatever was in the updates folder. Does PDQ interfere with, or prevent that? Thanks so much for any and all help.
Microsoft's documentation indicates that the MSP can reside in the \admin, \updates, or root folder. I've seen instances in \admin where the msp didn't take, but my most consistent behavior is in root. The \updates is also fine, especially when you will be applying service packs or patches.
PDQ Deploy runs the application as though you were doing so manually from a command line, it simply passes (albeit in the background) the setup.exe /adminfile <file> parameter as specified. There shouldn't be any changes to the intended MS installation.
Hello Support Team,
Mind if I ask if there's a way to auto activate MS Office 2010 just thru OCT? Tried Jeff's produre (AUTO_ACTIVATE, set value to 1) but its still prompting me to activate the account right after the installation.
Much appreciated.
Jay, Office 2010 has joined the ranks of Win7 and Server 2008 in requiring volume license customers to activate using the Microsoft KMS (Key Management Services). This is an application that you install on a server or workstation on your network and your Office applications hit it to activate. The KMS keeps a tally of your license entitlement from Microsoft.
Here is a link with more information.
http://www.microsoft.com/licensing/existing-customers/product-activ...
The days of the volume license that has already been activated ended with Office 2007 and Vista. :(
Im trying out PDQ for the first time... I have the installation working, the only thing I cant figure out (I am very green at scripting) is how to prevent a reboot at the end. I tested it out on a 7 box where the user had a prior version of office and left it open. I wanted to see what it was capable of during the deployment to determine user interference. Do you know how I would suppress the reboot at the end of the install or at least something to say, "hey, can you restart me in order to use office"?
nevermind. Following these instructions worked! No reboot now.
http://support.adminarsenal.com/entries/20623341-install-never-comp...
hmm. Nevermind again. Worked on test 1 and not test 2. Any ideas on supressing the reboot?
Hi Jen,
You need to open your Office Customization tool. Go to "Modify Setup properties" and click Add.
Enter the name SETUP_REBOOT and the value Never.
custom-settings.png
This should do the trick.
Newbie to PDQ, just wanted to say thanks to all who posted here. This thread plus PDQ helped me deploy Office 2010. While everything worked great, I got the following error when I opened one of the applications, in this case MS Word. After clicking OK, the software works just fine, but thought I would post it here.
Hi Shawn, there is a screen shot of the error attached to my original post. We are moving from office 2007 to 2010. The error came up on a clean install (no previous version of Office) and on an install where Office 2007 was currently installed. But like I mentioned before, both installs worked just fine, the error comes up on first launching one of the Office applications, but not on subsequent launches.
Adrian, sorry about not seeing the earlier image. I was reading the post from my cell phone and I guess the images don't show up there. I did a little searching and it seems that this is a somewhat common error that happens when a word template becomes corrupt. Here are some links that might shed some more light on this.
http://michal.jakou.be/2011/02/08/ms-word-2010-startup-issue/
http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/ar/officesetupdeploy/thr...
The first link is from Michal Jakoube, who incidentally has been using our products for many years. Other online topics discuss corrupted Add-ins and to disable them by starting Word in safe mode (run > winword /safe and disabling the Add-ins.
It seems like this is a one-time issue, right? Some of posts I read were experiencing this every time they opened Word.