Unknown computers with SCCM 2012

Is there an easy way to build unknown computers with SCCM? Seems rather annoying if we have to turn them all on, note the mac address and import them especially with a large batch of new computers.
Ticking unknown computer support in PXE obviously has no effect as the machine won't be in a collection to be able to see any advertised task sequences.
Only way I've found so far is to use standalone boot media which is a *huge* pain for an 8GB image let alone a 12GB one. Don't fancy full builds on 70+ computers like that...

Think you also need to point your task sequence advertisement to the "All Unknown Computers" collection.

Though that's in 2007, no idea if 2012 is different.

From the way 2007R2 works, you advertise to the unknown computer collection the task sequences you want, then when PXE booting, you have the various options available - there are some more steps involved, I'll see if I can find the tutorial I followed, should translate to 2012.

Ah yes, just figured this. Similar to what you've both said, there are "x86 and x64 unknown computers" which need adding to a collection of choice (i.e Newbuild Deployments) then moving/adding to relevant collections after build.
Cheers :)

Unknown Computers aren't an issue in 2007 R2, also if you set a variable called OSDComputerName you can specify the machine name at the start of the image so it gets domained with the name you want rather than the auto-generated MININT-blahblahblah name OSD gives out by default :)

Also if your collections are built by query you don't need to manually move machines around, get SCCM to do the legwork for you ;)

I'm aware of the query parts of SCCM collections but haven't had much of a play in this regards. How would you think it'd be best to set that up? Can't for the life of me think how to specify certain machines should go to what collection - how would it know? :)

Currently the initial build process is simple enough: Machine is built via a task sequence and put into an AD OU "Newbuilds". It's given the MININT name but only as I haven't gotten to that yet (still faffing with getting it to join a certain security group first). Then moved into the relevant collection and OU after. Once machines are built and known it's easy.

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Originally Posted by synaesthesia

How would you think it'd be best to set that up? Can't for the life of me think how to specify certain machines should go to what collection - how would it know? :)

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For me its all done by machine name - eg if it is <sitecode>-admin-<ID> then then admin computer collection picks it up and installs all the software that is advertised to it. If its <sitecode>-TL-<ID> then its a teacher laptop and goes into the teacher laptop collection and etc etc.
Obviously the great thing with SCCM is that you can have machines in as many collections as you want so doesn't take a great deal of planning.

I've got a few different ones for mine...

Room-by-room, mainly used for imaging and specific software deployments, based on System > Name
Machine type, used for driver updates and reporting, think that's based on System Enclosure

Also software-based ones done by version of the software installed, again for upgrades that need to be targetted or reported on.

For Unknown Computers this tip from Technet will sort you out...
Ref: SCCM R2 Unknown Computer Support and changing computer name during Task Sequence

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n order to be prompte for the Computer Name for ANY OS task sequence targeting an All Unknown Computers Group

1) Select All Unknown Computer Group and go to Modify Collection Settings
2) Under Collection Variables create a new Variable called "OSDcomputerName" make sure it has no Value
3) Advertise your OSD task Sequence as an OPTIONAL task sequence (in other words it's not mandatory...)
4) Boot to PXE and HIT F12 AGAIN to boot to network (Since its Optional you have to confirm you want to boot to Network)
5) Since its an Optional Advertisment you have to pick what Task sequence you want to run
6) Once the task sequence is selected it prompts you to imput the missing Task Sequence Variables. In this case the Computer Name!

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Hey ,

I hope this would help people who are trying to fully automate deployment of OS via SCCM to unknown computers. The solution I provide is followin:
- Enable unknown computer support
- Set up and configure computer autonaming based on prefix SCCM – OSD Dynamic computer naming (dynamically generate computer name)

I have been using it now and it works fine within the scope of my requirements.

success
R

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Originally Posted by gshaw

I've got a few different ones for mine...

Room-by-room, mainly used for imaging and specific software deployments, based on System > Name
Machine type, used for driver updates and reporting, think that's based on System Enclosure

Also software-based ones done by version of the software installed, again for upgrades that need to be targetted or reported on.

For Unknown Computers this tip from Technet will sort you out...
Ref: SCCM R2 Unknown Computer Support and changing computer name during Task Sequence

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Synaesthesia, or anyone else who's interested, I've developed a system not using SCCM (but making heavy use of scripting) that fully automates new/old computer naming, encryption (which we do with DiskCryptor, which is FOSS), domain joining and the works.

As it's essentially been cobbled together it's a bit involved to explain in a forum post, but if anyone wants to PM me I can arrange for a screen-sharing session to demonstrate it.

Cheers, we're pretty much covered now :) Only bit I want to work on is getting an option during SCCM build to join specific OU's in AD and join relevant domains and collections but I've not really sat down to figure it out (not high priority) We've got a simple script from windows-noob that does computer name (OSDComputerName) so just want to expand to that.