Windows Deployment Services contains five main components:
- Windows Deployment
Services Server Components. The Windows Deployment Services
server service (WDSServer) is the main server-side service. It
provides basic functions such as memory management, thread pooling,
and network interface binding to support its subcomponents (known
as providers).
- PXE Server
Components. These components are associated with booting a
client computer from the network. This includes the Pre-Boot
Execution Environment (PXE) server, the PXE providers, and the
Trivial File Transfer Protocol (TFTP) provider.
- Image Store
Components. These components are associated with assisting the
Windows Deployment Services client in locating, selecting, and
installing an operating system image. It is the protocol used for
communication to and from the client and server, unattend
processing, and install image enumeration.
- Windows Deployment
Services Client Component. The Windows Deployment Services
client is an application that runs within Microsoft Windows
Preinstallation Environment (Windows PE), enabling you to select
and install an install image. This application is the Setup.exe
program from Windows Vista with some additional functionality
that is needed for network deployments.