Arwidmark Driver Management - talktorrent93’s blog

Hi Ronnie, We use the same method for importing drivers as you describe in this post. However, I wonder why you don t distinguish the architecture in the Driver.

Oct 31, 2014 Q: How can I quickly check what driver versions I have installed for certain hardware on my machine. A: You can easily use the PowerShell Get.

Deployment Research

Johan Arwidmark

Aug

2012

A new chapter in the driver s saga has been written; this time it will teach you how to master drivers in ConfigMgr 2012

Update 2012-09-01: Also see this post:

Migrating unsupported driver packages from ConfigMgr 2007 to supported packages in ConfigMgr 2012

Background story:

Since the release of ConfigMgr 2007 I have recommended taking control of your drivers, using a method known as Total Control as opposed to the default Total Chaos method in ConfigMgr. In the previous guide one of the options described was to create driver packages in ConfigMgr 2007, without even importing the drivers. This method was actually possibly because of a bug in ConfigMgr 2007 I like to call it a feature, but never mind. I really liked that method because it was super-quick and easy to both setup and maintain, not to mention that I didn t have to store the drivers twice on the server and got an easy-to-read folder structure instead of the guid named folders ConfigMgr 2007 generated.

But guess what, in ConfigMgr 2012 Microsoft fixed the bug, which rendered the above method impossible. In ConfigMgr 2012 you really have to import the drivers, whether you like it or not. The change in ConfigMgr 2012 also prevents you from migrating existing driver packages from ConfigMgr 2007 If they were created without importing the drivers. Luckily, if you did follow the previous guide, you already have a perfect driver structure, and in this post you learn how to use the exact same structure for ConfigMgr 2012.

Pros: Having to import the drivers into ConfigMgr 2012 is not all bad, in fact, it comes with benefits First, by importing the drivers into ConfigMgr 2012 they are validated. In ConfigMgr 2007 it was possible to create a driver package with a bad driver, which you didn t learn about until the deployment blew up on you. Also, because of the new content library in ConfigMgr 2012, all duplicate files are removed, thus keeping the driver packages disk usage to a minimum.

Cons: You better have your coffee machine fully loaded - Importing the main driver source will take a good few hours Luckily this is more or less a onetime thing, importing drivers for additional models over time is quite quick.

Driver Options available:

To take control of your drivers you have more or less two options that I have found useful. The first one is using the Apply Driver Packages feature in ConfigMgr, and the second is to programmatically set Categories on the fly and use the Auto Apply Driver features. In this post I have provided instructions for the Apply Driver Packages feature for that is the only feature that works for every deployment scenario that ConfigMgr supports. I plan to add more info on the Auto Apply Drivers feature shortly

Option 1 - How to manage drivers in ConfigMgr 2012 using Apply Driver Packages – Total Control Freak Style

aka as always bloody work style :

Successful driver management in ConfigMgr 2012 using this method involves four main steps:

Finding and download the drivers

Extract the drivers if needed and creating the perfect DriverSources repository

Import the drivers into ConfigMgr 2012, categorize them, and create driver packages

Assign the driver packages to your task sequence

Step 1 - Finding and download the drivers

Depending on vendor, you need to locate their utilities or driver source downloads

Step 2 - Extract the drivers if needed and creating the perfect DriverSources repository

On your site- or file-server, create a folder structure for your driver sources, on our server CM01, I have created the following folder structure:

CM01 SCCM_Sources OSD DriverSources Operating System Vendor Model

Examples:

CM01 SCCM_Sources OSD DriverSources windows 7 x64

CM01 SCCM_Sources OSD DriverSources windows 7 x64 HP

CM01 SCCM_Sources OSD DriverSources windows 7 x64 HP HP EliteBook 8560w

CM01 SCCM_Sources OSD DriverSources windows 7 x64 Lenovo

CM01 SCCM_Sources OSD DriverSources windows 7 x64 Lenovo ThinkPad T420

CM01 SCCM_Sources OSD DriverSources windows 7 x64 Dell

CM01 SCCM_Sources OSD DriverSources windows 7 x64 Dell Latitude E6410

Extract if needed the drivers, and copy them to the correct folder.

Clean-up the drivers – Don t expect the vendors to only have Windows 7 x64 drivers just because the download was named Windows 7 x64 – Often they have DOS, XP, VISTA and Windows 7 x86 versions in the same download. Delete the unwanted drivers; they will only cause issues during both import and actual deployment.

Step 3 - Import the drivers into ConfigMgr 2012, categorize them, and create driver packages

In this example you learn how to import drivers for HP EliteBook 8560w, repeat for additional models. Note that you should use different folder paths for your driver sources and drivers packages.

Using the ConfigMgr Console, in the Software Library workplace, right-click the Drivers node and select Import Drivers.

Use the following settings for the Import New Driver Wizard / Locate Driver page:

Source folder: CM01 SCCM_Sources OSD DriverSources windows 7 x64 HP HP EliteBook 8560w

Specify the option for duplicate drivers: Import the driver and append a new category to the existing categories

Use the following settings for the Import New Driver Wizard / Driver Details page:

Click Categories, and create a new Category named Windows 7 x64 – HP EliteBook 8560w

Use the following settings for the Import New Driver Wizard / Add Driver to Packages page:

Click New Package, and create a new package with the following settings:

Name: Windows 7 x64 – HP EliteBook 8560w

Path: CM01 SCCM_Sources OSD DriverPackages windows 7 x64 HP HP EliteBook 8560w

Complete the Import New Driver Wizard.

Step 4 - Assign the driver packages to your task sequence

After creating the package s, the task sequence needs to be configured to use them. In this example I will add the HP EliteBook 8560w package to a task sequence named Windows 7 Enterprise SP1 x64.

Using the ConfigMgr Console, select Task Sequences, right-click Windows 7 Enterprise SP1 x64 task sequence and select Edit.

In the Post Install group, disable the Auto Apply Drivers action. Disabling is done by selecting the action and, in the Options tab, select the Disable this step check box.

After the disabled Post Install / Auto Apply Drivers action, add a new group name Drivers.

After the Post Install / Drivers group, add a new group named HP.

In the PostInstall / Drivers / HP group, add an Apply Driver Package action with the following settings:

Name: HP EliteBook 8560w

Driver Package: HP EliteBook 8560w

Options tab, add a Query WMI condition: SELECT FROM Win32_ComputerSystem WHERE Model LIKE HP EliteBook 8560w

Repeat step 6 and 7 for additional vendors and models.

/ Johan.

Wanted to post a blog entry with typical WMI backend queries for limiting Task Sequence steps. My intention is to update this as I find more queries that we use.

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Re: MDT 2010 Lite Touch Driver Management By jonconwayuk on 7/3/2010 The real trick for this scenario is to name the driver folders according to the name of the.

Re: The Drivers Saga Continues This time we battle SCCM 2007 By Sebastian on 12/9/2008: Hi Johan Thanks for the tip about having a unique file in each driver.