AOMEI Image Deploy - The simplest image deployment software and network cloning software

AOMEI Image Deploy User Manual

AOMEI Image Deploy Overview

Sometimes we need to deploy/restore Windows image files to multiple computers or clone system
disk to multiple computers in a same LAN to install system on a batch of computers quickly.
Originally, if there are 30 computers, we only can use bootable CD/USB to deploy/restore
computers one by one. That would add much extra work because of computers’ different hardware
configurations. For example, some computers do not have CD-ROM drive, which will take a lot of
time to install OS. Under this circumstance, AOMEI Image Deploy can help you solve the
problem easily. AOMEI Image Deploy is an image deployment software and network clone
software. It supports you deploy (restore or clone) system image or system disk image to multiple
computers through network in a LAN, which can solve the installation and configuration system
problem of a batch of computers.

Supported operation systems

Microsoft Windows XP (all editions, 32-bit and 64-bit)

Microsoft Windows Vista (all editions, 32-bit and 64-bit)
Microsoft Windows 7 (all editions, 32-bit and 64-bit)
Microsoft Windows 8/8.1 (all editions, 32-bit and 64-bit)
Microsoft Windows Server 2003 and 2003 R2 (all editions, 32-bit and 64-bit)
Microsoft Windows Server 2008 and 2008 R2 (all editions, 32-bit and 64-bit)
Microsoft Windows Home Server (WHS) 2011 and Windows Small Business Server (SBS) 2011
Microsoft Windows Server 2012 and 2012 R2(all editions)
Microsoft Windows Server 2016 (all editions)

Use of AOMEI Image Deploy

Preparation of client computers:

1. Check the cable connection between server and client computers, ensure that they are in the
same network segment in a LAN.
2. Verify that the client computer connected to the LAN and the network card of client
computer supports network boot (PXE boot). Note: almost all computers support the option
of network boot, you can get into client computer’s BIOS to set up.
3. Get into all client computers’ BIOS to open PXE function, set up the first boot as network
boot.
4. Verify that the disk sequence number for installing system in client computers are same (for
example, install systems to disk 0), to avoid the data loss caused by installing system to other

AOMEI Image Deploy - Easily deploy image to multiple computers and clone multiple computers over network
 AOMEI Image Deploy - The simplest image deployment software and network cloning software

hard drive (you’d better move out other disks and only keep the disk for installing system).

Preparation of server-side computer:

1. Before using AOMEI Image Deploy, you need to have a system image file or system disk
image file. You can install AOMEI Backupper and use it to backup your system or your
system disk to gain the image file (the backup system should be the system which you want
to deploy to multiple client computers).
2. The system image file made by AOMEI Backupper should be put into a network shared
folder or NAS, and the network shared folder or NAS should be on the same network
segment with the client computers’ network segment.
3. Install and launch AOMEI Image Deploy. Attention: the server-side computer could be a
common PC, or a server machine.
4. If your server computer is previous version of Windows 7, the program will prompt you to
download and install Windows AIK/ADK so that you can create Windows PE. If you do not
want to download AIK/ADK, we suggest you use Windows 7 or higher version as the
server-side computer to install AOMEI Image Deploy.

AOMEI Image Deploy operation steps

Step 1
1．Use “Create Windows PE automatically” or “Create AOMEI bootable Windows PE ISO
manually” to create Windows PE ISO file which has AOMEI Image Deploy program included.

Note:
 Select “Create Windows PE automatically” and then click “Next”, the program will
automatically create Windows PE ISO file in the installation directory of this program.
 Select “Create Windows PE automatically” and then click “Make WinPE”, it will bring the
interface where you can manually create Windows PE ISO. You can click “Add Drivers” to add
device drivers into the Windows PE ISO if need be. Then finish creating Windows PE ISO step
by step. When it is done, back to the main interface, and click “Browse” to select the ISO file
created.

2．Check “Enable DHCP” if needed

Note: To make AOMEI Image Deploy work normally, there has to be and one only DHCP server
within LAN, because many DHCP servers will lead to AOMEI Image Deploy client IP address
distribution messed up. “Enable DHCP” is the built-in DHCP server setting function. If no DHCP
server in your LAN, you can use this “Enable DHCP” function.

Step 2
Entering the second wizard page, AOMEI Image Deploy program will prompt “The service has
started, waiting for connect…”, then you can walk to the client computers and start them up.

Note:
 Client computers have to wait to boot till the prompt “The service has started, waiting for

AOMEI Image Deploy - Easily deploy image to multiple computers and clone multiple computers over network
 AOMEI Image Deploy - The simplest image deployment software and network cloning software

connect…”. Otherwise, client computers cannot boot successfully.

 To boot client computers: must enter BIOS, set the Network Boot as the first boot device or
directly let the client computers to boot from Network.
 If your BIOS is UEFI mode, you should set “UEFI and Legacy” or “Legacy Only” to boot the
client computers. (If your BIOS does not support UEFI, you can ignore the operation step).

Then wait for all the client computers to boot up successfully, namely all the status of the client
computers in the AOMEI Image Deploy program display list is “Client computers connected”, and
then check the option “I confirm all the client computers which need to be deployed are online.”
and click “Next” to enter restore setting page.

Step 3
The “Select backup image file” option can only select the system image file or disk image file
created by AOMEI Backupper with a filename “.adi” in the Network Shared folder or NAS. Click
“Browse” to open the page to select an image, and click “Add share or NAS device” to add
network share directory or NAS share directory, and select the system image file or disk image
file with a filename “.adi” from there.

Step 4
“Select client computers”: select client computers that need deploying image file from the list.
“Destination disk number”: specify which the disk of the client computer you need to deploy the
image to (the disk number started from 0-256).
“Deployed computers”: specify the number of client computers will be restored or deployed at
the same time, 1 at least, and 33 at most. If you set it as 3, it will restore every 3 computers at a
time and then go for the next 3 computers.

Note:
 Restoring/deploying will delete all partitions on the destination disk, so make sure the
specified disk numbers are the same with the disks that need restoring on the client
computers. Generally, if the client computer has only one disk, then the disk number is “0”.
 The source data are transferred through the network, so it will increase the pressure of
network if the “Deployed computers” are set too high, which will also slow down the
transfer speed and restore/deploy speed. Therefore, you need to set the proper number
based on the hardware devices such as network card and wire. The suggested number is 5.
 If AOMEI Image Deploy Free is installed on Server OS, only a maximum of 20 computers can
be selected; if AOMEI Image Deploy Free is installed on PC OS, an unlimited number of
computers can be selected; if you do need to install AOMEI Image Deploy on Server OS, And
the need to deploy an unlimited number of computers, AOMEI Image Deploy Technician is a
better choice.

Step 5
Select “Setting” to configure restore settings.
“Set computer name”: set the client computer name after restoring/deploying.
“Set IP”: set the IP address and DNS server of the client computer after restoring/deploying.

AOMEI Image Deploy - Easily deploy image to multiple computers and clone multiple computers over network
 AOMEI Image Deploy - The simplest image deployment software and network cloning software

Client computers’ name and IP can be quickly set as your decision.

“Universal Restore”: set whether use “Universal Restore” to proceed restore or not. If the
hardware of client computers, like CPU, motherboard, are not the same as the source computer’s
in the system image file, select “Universal Restore” which supports restoring/deploying image to
a computer with dissimilar hardware and make sure the computer boots fine after recovery.

Note:
 When setting computer name and IP address, try to avoid setting the already used computer
name and IP address with LAN.
 “Set IP” and “Universal Restore” are available only in AOMEI Image Deploy Technician.

Step 6:
Click “Start Deploy” to enter the page to proceed the restore/deployment. You can use “Shut
down PC” or “Restart PC” to set whether to shut down the computer or restart it after restoring
the client computer. You can check deploy/restore progress from here. The deployed client
computers can load system normally.

FAQ & Contact

AOMEI Image Deploy FAQ
1. Why the “Local IP” and the “Server IP” showed in client computer have different network
segment and also the connection status is “None”?

Maybe there are multiple DHCP servers in the LAN. Please just keep one DHCP server and
Disable others.

2. Why you just can restore one disk of the backup image which has several disks?

If the one disk backup image has multiple disks, the software just support to restore the first
one of that disk backup image.

3. Why the disk format of the client computer sometimes is changed from GPT to MBR or from
MBR to GPT after restore?

When you restore the backup image to the client computer, the software will delete all the
data in the destination and then change the disk format of the client computer to be the
same as the disk format of the backup image. For example, if the disk is MBR in the backup
image but the target disk is GPT in the client computer, when the software does the restore,
the disk in the client computer will be changed to MBR. If the disk format is same, the
software will directly continue to create the partition to do the restore. Therefore, the disk
format of the client computer must be same as the one in the backup image. If not, the
software will change it automatically.

AOMEI Image Deploy - Easily deploy image to multiple computers and clone multiple computers over network
 AOMEI Image Deploy - The simplest image deployment software and network cloning software

4. How to ensure that the client computer is bootable after restoring the system image or disk
backup image?

 Please check if the boot mode in BIOS is consistent with the restored disk or system. If
the restored disk is GPT, the boot mode must be EFI/UEFI. If the restored disk is MBR,
the boot mode is legacy.
 Please ensure that the computer name and the IP address you set for the client
computer are not used by another computer in the same LAN. If they are used by
another computer and this computer is on, when you boot the client computer you will
get the error message that the computer name and the IP address conflict with another
computer which is in the same LAN.

5. Why the Windows PE ISO made with the AOMEI Backupper cannot be used by the AOMEI
Image Deploy software to deploy the system?

Because that only the Windows PE made with AOMEI Image Deploy software can
communicate with the AOMEI Image Deploy server. Please use the AOMEI Image Deploy to
do the Windows PE ISO file. In addition, the AOMEI Image Deploy cannot recognize the
Windows PE ISO made with other software.

6. Why the server shows that the client computer information is that “Respond to boot
request” and the client computer is stuck in this page that “PXELINUX 6.03 lwIP Copyright
(c)1994-2014 H.Peter Anvin et al -”all the time?

Usually, you encounter this problem because you use the “Enable DHCP” feature but the IP
address of client computer allocated by the DHCP server is same with (conflicts with) the
one of another computer which is running in the same LAN. We advise you to turn off that
running another computer or change the IP address of that computer. Then please reboot
the client computer to do the operation again.

Technical Support
If you cannot find what you are looking for and need further help, please do not hesitate to send
an email to support@aomeitech.com, or visit www.aomeitech.com.

AOMEI Image Deploy - Easily deploy image to multiple computers and clone multiple computers over network