Issue with Sysprep'd Image - Could not process the unattend file

Hello Everyone,

Let me provide some background information on our environment and my process for imaging currently. We will be moving to SCCM soon so a lot of this will be a moot point but I do have to get some stuff deployed now.

We are currently utilizing Altiris 6.9 SP5, but basically I have it just launching our WinPE Environment and run the needed scripts.

1. I do a Diskpart to whack all partitions and disks, and then I do a scripted install of Windows 7 x64 w/ SP1 to my reference machine

2. I do the Windows Updates, Join it to our domain, install all our needed apps, enable the Local Administrator Account, and log into the machine with the Local Admin account.

3. I then Sysprep it using an unattend file that simply contains the 'Copy Profile' Settings (Sysprep /generalize /oobe /shutdown unattend:file.xml)

4. I then capture the image in the WIM Format. Everything is fine from here.

5. I then go to push out the image with another unattend file that I have used successfully on other machines before but I get a

"Windows could not parse or process the unattend answer file for pass [specialize]. The settings specified in the answer file cannot be applied. The error was detected while processing settings for component [Microsoft-Windows-Shell-Setup].

Now, I have used this answer file just fine before but I am having issues with it on this hardware. I thought it was maybe because of the Unattend file with 'Copy Profile' on it was left on the WIM, so I mounted the WIM, removed that unattend file, and tried pushing the image again........same error.

What is happening??

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