Question on Windows 7 Image creation with Altiris 7.1

I have been given the task of creating a new Windows 7 64bit image for our organization. Our initial image was created by another employee who has since left the company. His notes for creating the image creation are somewhat vague.

We are using Altiris 7.1 with the latest service pack as well as DeployExpert for deploying drivers, giving us a hardware independent image. My goal is as follows:

• Windows 7 64bit image with latest all available Windows updates
• A modified default user profile
• A modified unattend.xml file (specifics like regional location & firewall settings configured)
• Once the image is deployed, a custom local administrator account is created (I believe the previous employee had the unattend.xml create the local admin account).

I have been following the steps that are laid out from this URL:

http://sybaspot.com/the-complete-guide-to-preparing-a-windows-7-deployment-image-using-audit-mode-and-sysprep-with-an-unattend-xml-answer-file/

I am interested if I should follow the above steps and go into audit mode right after I have Windows installed on my source PC and then perform all my updates and customizations? If I do this, does this cause any grief with the sysprep process when performing the image task from within Altiris?