Deployment Server Options - What have you used?

[Gilly2003]

Hi all,

 

Need some advice on deployment server options, in the past I have only used SCCM which I found to lack at times and Altiris which I loved.

 

however I am open to others to try or even free deployment servers if they exist lol

 

Thanks for replies in advance

[3s-gtech]

FOG - free and what we currently use

Clonezilla - also free, not used the network version myself

[themightymrp]

Microsoft WDS with MDT for me

[dhicks]

however I am open to others to try or even free deployment servers if they exist lol

 

We use Serva (free):

 

PXE Server for Windows - Serva

 

It will serve network boot images over PXE, including Windows (we have it deploying Windows 8.1 on all workstations) and Linux (I've had it install Debian, Ubuntu, Fedora and XenServer over the network so far).

[sparkeh]

What does SCCM lack?

[SHimmer45]

MDT & WDS

[Davit2005]

Another vote for MDT & WDS, gone are the days of an image per machine, we just have 2 images, everything else is small enough deployment for AdHoc deployment .

 

I would love to have SCCM for reporting etc, basic deployment of SCCM took me 2 days but the time to set up and learning how to use for reporting etc is not here at the moment.

 

I think there are advantages to having MDT in place first to transition to SCCM ( please enlighten me).

[halbaradkenafin]

We're currently using MDT for OS deployment but transitioning to SCCM as we use that for some packages (GPOs for others) and want to have it all managed centrally. SCCM can be a little slow to deploy things sometimes but it gets the job done and the reporting and logging is very good.