Automate the Out of Box Experience and create a local user in Windows 11 Pro Audit Mode

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Use the link at the end of the description to download a copy of the sysprep script used in this demo.
Edit the script to use your language/region, for example if you are in the United States you would use en-US instead of en-GB
For a full list of region codes, use this link -:
docs.microsoft.com/en-us/open...
You should also set the time zone for where you are.
If you are in the United States, you might enter
Pacific Standard Time instead of GMT Standard Time
For a full list of time zones, see this link.
docs.microsoft.com/en-us/wind...
You should also replace the username and password for the local account you want to use.
In this example script, I used a user called Admin and set the password to Password123
You can also set the password for the local Administrator account although the administrator account is disabled by default.
Get the sysprep script here:
UK users - drive.google.com/file/d/1DaeY...
US users - drive.google.com/file/d/1-Mlg...

[@avertry9529]

Why net user add, when your unattend script will do it for you? And looking at it's already to go.
If you want to automate it instead of running sysprep, just put the unattend.xml in C:\Windows\Panther and it will bypass your oobe and make your admin account.

[@ClickNextDemos]

Hey, thanks for the tip. Just tried that out and it worked great. I didn't know you could do that - will definitely use that in the future.

[@tienflame]

I think I am missing some crucial information, I am trying to build a script that can automate this on a brand new device. My goal is to create generic local admin, create password, from there install some basic softwares such as slack, chrome and a new antivirus. For windows PC. What is the best way you think I can achieve this? I think in the beginning I can access command prompt with shift + f10 and from there go into powershell to launch my script.

[@avertry9529]

@@tienflame Sorry i don't really know, I just used rufus to setup a usb drive installer, and looked at the scripts they used, then googled what I didn't know. From there it's trial and error.

[@tee_2da_hee]

Hey@@avertry9529 , it sounds like what you did is what im trying to go for. You were able to script out, bypass oobe, and create an admin account with a password? How were you able to do it?

[@Martin-ot7xj]

Hi there, it was very Informative and practical tutorial video. Thnx

[@jmedoestech]

Hi, Great informative vid. Did you build you reference image in a virtual environment? If so how did you then capture/convert to an .ISO image? Thank you in advance 👍

[@ClickNextDemos]

I normally create my reference images in a Virtual Machine (Hyper-V in Windows 10 or Windows 11 in my case).
To capture the image, I boot the VM with WinPE boot media (ISO) and use the DISM tool to capture the C:\ partition to a wim file and save it to a network shared folder.
learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-hardware/manufacture/desktop/winpe-create-usb-bootable-drive?view=windows-11
Wim file images can then be deployed to other machines either manually using the DISM tool, importing the image to an MDT imaging server or you could just save the image as install.wim and copy this to a Windows installation media on USB and overwrite the \sources\install.wim with your own custom install.wim - then boot from the media and install Windows as normal. When you get to the OS selection screen, you would see your custom image instead of the default Windows 10 Home, Windows 10 Professional etc
On a physical PC you could use USB media (Either a WinPE bootable USB or a Windows Installer on USB media) to boot and save the wim file
If you don't want to go to the trouble of creating your own WinPE media, you could actually use a Windows 10 or Windows 11 install disc. You would boot from that and when you get to the first screeen, just press SHIFT and F10 and this will give you a command prompt. You could then use the DISM tool to capture the C:\ partition
You can create Windows 10 or Windows 11 Install bootable USB Media using the Media Creation Tool
www.microsoft.com/en-gb/software-download/windows10
www.microsoft.com/en-gb/software-download/windows11
There is also a 3rd party tool called Rufus which allows you to take an exsting Windows ISO file and create bootable USB media from it - rufus.ie/en/
If you also want to use a sysprep unattend script to automate the Out of Box Experience during Windows setup, you could copy you sysprep script to the Windows Install USB, then when you have created your custom windows image, run sysprep and point it to your script. Once you have run the script and shutdown, you should then boot up and capture the image.

[@koosvaneijck]

Is this also possible whit local user and no password?