launch.ps1 does not get started automatically (on Server 2025?)

[DaStivi]

apparently launch.ps1 does not get started automatically, is there by any change ah way of figuring out way?
vhdx seeams to be prepared correctly, scripts are on the disk but start-fleetsweep only loops in the completion check with no progress...

on the fleet vms i don't see any progress, not powrshell is running... as soon as i manually start launch.ps1 i'll see the drive gets mapped and its "running" or getting into pause mode ... whatever..

[DaStivi]

i'll found the powershell.exe call in HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersrion\Winlogon\Shell....

but it does not run... when i just run "powershell.exe" as shell it is starting!
when i start the "powershell.exe -noexit c:\users\administrator\launch.ps1" manually it also runs fine

as soon as i enter more then the powershell.exe command, so just adding some parameter it looks like it doesnt start anymore...

[dl2n]

Can you confirm which SKU you are using for the VMs? It should be Datacenter Core; not the full GUI Datacenter.

[DaStivi]

I've used (standard) core sku Server 2025

I did a workaround now, I've converted the launch.ps1 to exe with ps2exe module.... Right away having the launch.exe in the user path also didn't worked.... I then copied the launch.exe to windows\system32 and just had "launch.exe" then in the winlogon-shell regkey and this started to work now!

I might Test what happens when the launch.ps1 is in some different path .. I'll just guess it's some permission issue that the script can't be loaded/accessed?! (Maybe because some security hardenings in Server 2025?!)

[dl2n]

Are you in a position to try the Datacenter Core image? I'm ~worried there may be a wrinkle with Standard Core, which is less accessible for me to check against. Will if I need to.

[comnam90]

@dl2n I've just hit the same issue in my testing. I was initially using a WS2025 Standard Core image, but I've swapped to a WS2025 Datacenter Core Image and having the same issue. VMs boot to a blank screen and don't trigger the launch.ps1 to run. Manually executing powershell C:\users\administrator\launch.ps1 from Task Manager will kick it into gear until the VM is next booted.

[comnam90]

Just changed my gold fleet image to WS2022 Standard Core and it works as expected