SCCM vs. Drivers. Best Approach?

[Gongalong]

Hi folks,

 

I've done plenty with images and apps in SCCM, but never broached drivers.

 

It looks like it would be helpful to be able to deploy an Intel NIC driver to some of the PCs, just to update it.

 

The driver downloads as a file called PROWIN64.EXE (for 64 bit) and if I expand this it's full of folders with various drivers in said folders.

 

What's the best method of getting this into SCCM? I note there's both Drivers and Driver Packages.

 

I've had a look at the MS documentation, which is heavy on detail, but doesn't really give any guidance on which approach is best.

 

Thanks

[DalekSec]

Depends on the Make of the PC i find, Dell's are nice and easy as they are easy to get the Driver Package for

 

Driver packages are all the drivers for a model of PC eg Dell Optiplex 7010 will include the NIC, Chipset, Flux Capacitor, etc., Where as the drivers section is for single Drivers

 

Personally i make task sequences so they have driver packages,

 

I learnt all my SCCM knowledge via 'Anyweb' on 'Windows Noob' he has some great SCCM guides.

Edited August 11, 2017 by DalekSec

[DalekSec]

Also the driver packages are fairly straight forward to setup once you have the packages, you could always do it my way.. wing it!

 

Works most of the time... well about 73% of the time,

[mukz]

If your not too sure and as DalekSec said about dell, have a look into Dell Command configure for sccm which will do alot of the leg work in terms of drivers for you.

 

There are also some great articles on Scconfgr which automate for other brands too.

[DalekSec]

Here is the link for the Cab files for dell driver packages : Dell Command | Deploy - Driver Packs for Enterprise Client OS Deployment - Enterprise Client - Wiki - Client and Mobile Solutions - Dell Community

 

I'm unsure how other manufacturers do it,

[KibosJ]

I've never really had issues with drivers.

 

Import the drivers and tag/categorise them with the machine model, then add them to a package and tell the task sequence to load drivers from the package.

 

I have multiple models and the task sequence only installs the drivers to the corresponding model, so you don't get any incompatible drivers installed.

[sparkeh]

If the drivers are of the setup.exe variety then you can create a package and run it silently on the client.

 

If is just the bunch of files variety then you can leverage pnputil.exe as per: http://ccmexec.com/2013/10/update-a-device-driver-configuration-manager-2012/

[Fazza]

In my experience using a silent install and either adding to a task sequence or deploying it to computers is the way that always works.