Stage 2: Configure the RAS Template

Once the agent software is installed, and the Status field on the Check Agent wizard page confirms this, click Next . The VM will now be powered off (wait for the power off operation to finish).  Once the VM is powered off, the template configuration stage begins. The subsequent wizard pages are described below.

Properties

On this page, specify the following options:

• Template name: Choose and type a template name.
• Maximum guest VMs: Specify the maximum number of guest VMs that can be created from this template.
• Number of guest VMs deployed on the wizard completion: The number of guest VMs to deploy once the template is created. Please keep in mind that this will take some time because the VMs will be created one at a time.
• Guest VM name: A prefix to use when naming a new guest VM.
• Clone method: Whether to create linked or full clones. A full clone is a complete copy of a template. As such, it occupies as much space on the physical hard drive as the source template and takes a significant time to create. A linked clone is a copy of a template made from a snapshot that shares virtual disk with the source template, therefore it takes much less space on the physical hard drive and it takes only a couple of minutes to create.

  You should use full clones if your application and OS updates are too slow (full clones take longer to create, but they provide the best possible performance). Otherwise if your updates are fast enough, use linked clones as it takes much less time to create them.

  Note: If the Create a linked clone option is grayed out, it means that the current version or Parallels RAS does not support linked clones with the hypervisor that you are using. At the time of this writing, support for linked clones is available for VMware, Microsoft Hyper-V, KVM, Scale Computing HC3, and Nutanix. Please note that Citrix XenServer support in Parallels RAS includes full clones only. Linked clones support will be added in the near future.

Additional Properties

On the Additional Properties page, specify the following options:

• Keep available buffer: The minimum number of guest VMs to always keep on the VDI host and ready to be used in order to provide the fastest access to end users.
• Delete unused guest VMs after: Specify what to do with unused guest VMs to save resources.

Advanced

On the Advanced page, specify the following:

• Folder: Specify a folder where guest VMs created from this RAS Template will be stored. This option is available if you are using Hyper-V, Hyper-V Failover Cluster, VMware vCenter, Citrix XenServer, KVM, or Nutanix.
• Native Pool: Specify the native pool to add the VMs to. This option is available if you are using VMware ESX and VMware vCenter.

Preparation

Use the Preparation page to select and configure an image preparation tool. First, select whether you want to use RASprep or Sysprep. The advantages of using RASprep and the differences between the two tools are described below.

RASprep is the Parallels RAS tool for preparing Windows in a VM after cloning it from a base image. RASprep performs the following tasks during the initial startup of each new VM:

• Creates a new computer account in Active Directory for each guest VM.
• Gives the guest VM a new name.
• Joins the guest VM to the Active Directory domain.

Compared to Sysprep, RASprep works much faster because it modifies a lower number of configurable parameters and requires less reboots.

Note: Due to API limitations, RASprep cannot be used on Windows Server 2008 machines.

The following table lists the main differences between RASprep and Sysprep:

After selecting the preparation tool, specify the following options:

• Computer name: A name pattern that should be used to assign a computer name. For example, Windows10-RAS-%ID%.
• Owner name: Owner name (optional).
• Organization: Organization name (optional).
• Administrative password: Local Windows administrator password.
• Join domain: A domain name for the VM to join.
• Administrator: Domain account.
• Password: Domain account password.
• Target OU: Full DN of an organizational unit. Click the [...] button to browse Active Directory and select an OU.

License Keys

On the License Keys page, specify the license key information that will be used to activate virtual machines created from this template.

First, select the license key management type that you are using in your organization (KMS or MAK). Parallels recommend to use KMS because MAK has limited activations.

Key Management Service (KMS): If you are using KMS, click the Finish button to save the template configuration information. Virtual machines that will be created from this template will look for KMS in DNS (at the end of the OS mini-setup and domain joining) and will be activated accordingly.

Note: If you are using KMS activation and RASPrep, the source guest VM must be activated using KMS before you create a RAS Template from it. If the guest VM has already been activated using another method (retail key or MAK), you need to convert it to KMS activation. For the information on how to do it, please read the following article from Microsoft: https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff793406.aspx

Multiple Activation Keys (MAK): If you are using MAK, do the following:

1. Click the Add button and type a valid key in the License key field.
2. In the Max. guests field, specify the key limit. The limit should be greater than or equal to the max guests in the template (which you set on the first page of the wizard)
3. Click OK .

Note: Parallels RAS does not keep the old MAK key in guest VMs if it was updated in the Parallels RAS Template properties.

Summary

On the Summary wizard page, review the template summary information. You can click the Back button to correct some of the information if needed.

Select the Launch Parallels RAS Test Template Wizard on completion option to start a wizard allowing you to test the health of the template. The wizard allows you to see upon completion that all post-prep activities complete correctly. This includes checking DHCP settings, DNS registration, correct VLAN, joining the AD domain, correct target OU, etc. The wizard is described in the section that follows this one .

Finally, click Finish to create the template and close the wizard.

If you need to change the template configuration later, select it in the RAS Templates list and click Tasks > Properties . Use the dialog that opens to view and modify the template properties. The dialog consists of tab pages containing the same properties as the wizard pages described above.