User guide

Table Of Contents

 Support for stand-alone deployment to Microsoft Surface Pro and Microsoft Surface Pro 2

tablets.

 Compatibility with backups created by Acronis Backup 11.5.

 Deployment of Linux to UEFI machines (no BIOS <-> UEFI migration).

 The Acronis Universal Deploy feature is now included in all Acronis Snap Deploy 5 licenses.

 The Acronis Universal Deploy feature is now available for Linux.

 New Linux kernel version (3.11.6) in Linux-based bootable media. The new kernel makes for

better hardware support.

1.3 What you can do with Acronis Snap Deploy 5

This section describes typical usage scenarios for Acronis Snap Deploy 5.

1.3.1 Taking an image of the master system

First, you create the desired system configuration and save the image of the system hard disk to a

network folder, detachable media (such as a USB hard drive) or removable media (such as a DVD). An

image, also called a master image, is a file that contains the system in a packaged form.

Scenarios

Scenario 1

Each department in your organization, such as accounting, sales, and technical support, uses a

fixed set of applications for daily work.

You create a library of master images. For example, you create one image for each department.

You then deploy these images to new hardware without having to manually configure the

operating system and applications.

Scenario 2

You might need to deploy the standard configuration, which is included in the image library, to

various hardware.

Acronis Universal Deploy configures Windows or Linux so that the system is able to boot on

dissimilar hardware.

1.3.2 Deployment to specific machines (immediate, manual, and

scheduled deployment)

You can perform deployment to a specific list of machines with known physical addresses (called

MAC addresses). The deployment can run immediately after you set it up, on a schedule, or when

you start it manually.

These ways of deployment are also known as manual deployment and scheduled deployment.

When the deployment is about to start, the software will power on the target machines with

predefined MAC addresses by using the BIOS Wake-on-LAN (WOL) functionality.

Machines in another subnet can be woken up through a component called Wake-on-LAN Proxy,

which is delivered with Acronis Snap Deploy 5. The machines typically boot into the PXE server that is

installed in the same subnet.