Microsoft Deployment Toolkit (MDT) 2010 Update 1 Beta is available for testing

Microsoft just released the Update 1 beta for MDT 2010. MDT 2010 Update 1 provides new capabilities, such as:

· Support for Microsoft Office 2010.

· A new User-driven Installation (UDI) deployment method (formerly known as “Modena”) for Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager 2007. UDI gives information technology (IT) staff control over the deployment experience while empowering users to interact with and customize their operating system deployment through an easy-to-use wizard.

· Improvements to the Deployment Workbench driver import process, detecting each driver’s true supported platforms.

· Many bug fixes and other small improvements.

Register and download the Update from Microsoft Connect Site

How to manage drivers for your HP machines

If you ever been working with OS deployment, you know that one of the biggest hassle is to download drivers and keep your driver “repository” up-to-date. Since some companies now need to download drivers for both Windows XP, Windows Vista and soon Windows 7 for both x86 and x64 architectures it gets even harder and more time consuming. The good new is that HP has a nice small tool that help you a lot. Below you can se some print screens of the tools.

1. First you need to do some basic configuration. Here you can specify how/where you want the downloaded files. You also specify in what language and for what OS type/architecture.
   
2. Then you select what type of machine and for what OS
   
3. Click the “Find Available Softpaqs” icon on the left top of the application and it will now show you a list of all types of Softpaqs that are available
   
4. Select the Softpaqs you want to download (there is quick selections if you click on the “Select Softpaq” drop-down-icon")
   
5. Select “Download and unpack” (this is very useful if you need to import the drivers in some other tool that require the standard drivers instead of an exe file”), then click the “Download” icon to start the download
    
6. The files will now be downloaded to your computer and also be unpacked. During the download you have Progress information in the lower left of the application. If you open the file explorer you will see the files and folders.
   

Download HP SoftPaq Download Manager from HP

If you have any other tool(s) that helps you manage drivers for other computer brands, send the info to me by adding a comment to this post

Update to Microsoft Deployment is available

This week Microsoft released the first update to Microsoft Deployment (the replacement for Business Desktop Deployment 2007). At the same time, they decided to change the name to Microsoft Deployment Toolkit 2008 (MDT). The update includes both fixes and new features:

• Support for Vista Service Pack 1
• Full support for Windows Server 2008
• Additional Actions including Configure DHCP, Authorize DHCP, Configure DNS, and Configure ADDS during server deployment 
• New scripts that will automate the installation of Mass Storage Drivers for Windows XP and Windows 2003 Systems
• Ability to use a WSUS server for the Windows Update script
• Improved performance for the PXE Filter for System Center Configuration Manager unknown computer support
• Improved documentation including a new Quick Start Guide for System Center Configuration Manager and a guide for implementing the Management Pack for System Center Operations Manager

PS! From what I can see, the new automatic installation of mass storage drivers for XP and Windows Server 2003 is only during the unattended installation (when you create the master image). I was really hoping they would add this function so you don’t need to rebuild the master image every time you get a new storage controller:-(

Download Microsoft Deployment Toolkit 2008