Windows Assessment and Deployment Kit (Windows ADK), formerly Windows Automated Installation Kit (Windows AIK or WAIK), is a collection of tools and technologies produced by

Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company, technology conglomerate headquartered in Redmond, Washington. Founded in 1975, the company became influential in the History of personal computers#The ear ...

designed to help deploy Microsoft Windows operating system images to target computers or to a virtual hard disk image in VHD format. It was first introduced with

Windows Vista Windows Vista is a major release of the Windows NT operating system developed by Microsoft. It was the direct successor to Windows XP, released five years earlier, which was then the longest time span between successive releases of Microsoft W ...

. WAIK is a required component of Microsoft Deployment Toolkit.

History

Windows AIK Version 1.0 was released with

. New or redesigned tools and technologies included Windows System Image Manager (Windows SIM), Sysprep, ImageX, and

Windows Preinstallation Environment Windows Preinstallation Environment (also known as Windows PE and WinPE) is a lightweight version of Windows used for the deployment of PCs, workstations, and servers, or troubleshooting an operating system while it is offline. It is intended t ...

(WinPE) v2.0. Windows AIK Version 1.1 was released with

Windows Vista SP1 Windows Vista is a major release of the Windows NT operating system developed by Microsoft. It was the direct successor to Windows XP, released five years earlier, which was then the longest time span between successive releases of Microsoft W ...

and

Windows Server 2008 Windows Server 2008, codenamed "Longhorn Server" (alternatives: "Windows Vista Server" or "Windows Server Vista"), is the seventh major version of the Windows NT operating system produced by Microsoft to be released under the Windows Server b ...

. A number of new tools were introduced, including PostReflect and VSP1Cln. WinPE 2.1 could be more customized. Supported operating systems include Windows Server 2008, Windows Vista, Windows Server 2003 SP1, Windows Server 2003 SP2 and Windows XP SP2. Windows AIK Version 2.0 was released with

Windows 7 Windows 7 is a major release of the Windows NT operating system developed by Microsoft. It was Software release life cycle#Release to manufacturing (RTM), released to manufacturing on July 22, 2009, and became generally available on October 22, ...

beta. Significantly, a single new tool, DISM, replaced several earlier tools including PEImg and IntlCfg, which were deprecated.

User State Migration Tool The User State Migration Tool (USMT) is a command line utility program developed by Microsoft that allows users comfortable with scripting languages to transfer files and settings between Windows PCs. This task is also performed by Windows Easy Tr ...

(USMT) was added to this version of WAIK. Supported operating systems include Windows Server 2003 R2 SP2, Windows Vista SP1, Windows Server 2008, Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2. Windows AIK version 3.0 is exactly the same as 2.0; the version number has only been updated to correspond with the release of Service Pack 1 for Windows 7. Microsoft has also released a WAIK supplement for Windows 7 SP1. WAIK

readme In software distribution and software development, a README file (computing), file contains information about the other files in a directory (file systems), directory or archive (computing), archive of computer software. A form of Software doc ...

references the WAIK supplement, which optionally adds WinPE v3.1 to a previously installed, compatible WAIK. Sysprep is included with the operating system rather than included in WAIK. AIK was renamed The Windows Assessment and Deployment Kit (ADK) for Windows 8, and includes Windows OEM Preinstallation Kit. ImageX was removed from this version, as DISM supports all its features.

Components

Application compatibility tools

This toolset consists of Compatibility Administrator and Standard User Analyzer.

Configuration Designer

DISM

Deployment Image Servicing and Management (DISM) is a command-line tool that can perform a large number of servicing tasks. It can query, configure, install and uninstall Windows features such as locale settings, language packs, optional components, device drivers,

UWP apps Universal Windows Platform (UWP) apps (formerly named Windows Store apps, Metro-style apps and Modern apps) are applications that can be used across all compatible Microsoft Windows devices. They are primarily purchased and downloaded via the ...

, or Windows updates. DISM can perform these tasks on the live (running) Windows instance, an offline instance in another partition, or a Windows installation image inside a WIM file. Starting with Windows Server 2012, it can repair damaged or corrupt Windows files by downloading a fresh copy from the Internet. DISM has been part of Windows since Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2. Before Windows Server 2012 and Windows 8, DISM had incorporated the majority of ImageX functions but not all; ImageX was still needed to capture the disk image for deployment. However, DISM

deprecated Deprecation is the discouragement of use of something human-made, such as a term, feature, design, or practice. Typically something is deprecated because it is claimed to be inferior compared to other options available. Something may be deprec ...

ImageX in Windows 8. In addition, Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012 expose DISM services in

PowerShell PowerShell is a shell program developed by Microsoft for task automation and configuration management. As is typical for a shell, it provides a command-line interpreter for interactive use and a script interpreter for automation via a langu ...

through 22 cmdlets for object-oriented scripting. This number has reached 62 in Windows 10 and Windows Server 2016.

Imaging and Configuration Designer

Preinstallation environment

WAIK includes

, a lightweight version of Windows that can be booted via

PXE PXE may refer to: Science and technology * Pentium Extreme Edition, a variant of the Pentium D microprocessor * Preboot Execution Environment, booting computers via a network * Pseudoxanthoma elasticum, a genetic disease Other uses * Proof and Exp ...

CD-ROM A CD-ROM (, compact disc read-only memory) is a type of read-only memory consisting of a pre-pressed optical compact disc that contains computer data storage, data computers can read, but not write or erase. Some CDs, called enhanced CDs, hold b ...

USB flash drive A flash drive (also thumb drive, memory stick, and pen drive/pendrive) is a data storage device that includes flash memory with an integrated USB interface. A typical USB drive is removable, rewritable, and smaller than an optical disc, and u ...

external hard disk drive A hard disk drive (HDD), hard disk, hard drive, or fixed disk is an electro-mechanical data storage device that stores and retrieves digital data using magnetic storage with one or more rigid rapidly rotating platters coated with magnet ...

and is used to deploy, troubleshoot or recover Windows environments. It replaces

MS-DOS MS-DOS ( ; acronym for Microsoft Disk Operating System, also known as Microsoft DOS) is an operating system for x86-based personal computers mostly developed by Microsoft. Collectively, MS-DOS, its rebranding as IBM PC DOS, and a few op ...

boot disk A boot disk is a removable digital data storage medium from which a computer can load and run ( boot) an operating system or utility program. The computer must have a built-in program which will load and execute a program from a boot disk meeting ...

s, Emergency Repair Disk,

Recovery Console The Recovery Console is a feature of the Windows 2000, Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 operating systems. It provides the means for administrators to perform a limited range of tasks using a command-line interface. Its primary function is to ...

and Automated System Recovery boot disks. Traditionally used by large corporations and OEMs (to preinstall Windows client operating systems to PCs during manufacturing), WinPE is now available free of charge via WAIK.

User state migration

WAIK for Windows 7 includes

v4.0, a

command-line interface A command-line interface (CLI) is a means of interacting with software via command (computing), commands each formatted as a line of text. Command-line interfaces emerged in the mid-1960s, on computer terminals, as an interactive and more user ...

tool for transferring Windows user settings from one installation to another as part of an operating system upgrade or wipe-and-reload recovery, for example, to clean out a

rootkit A rootkit is a collection of computer software, typically malicious, designed to enable access to a computer or an area of its software that is not otherwise allowed (for example, to an unauthorized user) and often masks its existence or the exist ...

. USMT v4.0 can transfer the settings from Microsoft Windows XP or later to Microsoft Windows Vista and later. Versions of the USMT are included in the Windows ADKs for Windows 10, versions 1511 and 1607.

Volume Activation Management Tool (VAMT)

Windows Assessment Toolkit

Described in Microsoft documents.

Windows Performance Toolkit

Described in Microsoft documents.

Former components

ImageX

ImageX is the command-line tool used to create, edit and deploy Windows disk images in the Windows Imaging Format. Starting with

, Windows Setup uses the WAIK API to install Windows. The first distributed prototype of ImageX was build 6.0.4007.0 (main.030212-2037). It allowed Microsoft OEM partners to experiment with the imaging technology and was developed in parallel with Longhorn alpha prototypes. It was first introduced in Milestone 4 into the Longhorn project, and used in later builds of Longhorn. Build 6.0.5384.4 (Beta 2) added significant advantages over previous versions, like read-only and read/write folder mounting capabilities, splitting to multiple image files (SWM), a WIM filter driver and the latest LZX compression algorithms. It has been used since pre-RC (release candidates) of Windows Vista.

References

External links

* {{Windows commands Windows administration Microsoft software