MDT 2008 and Device Drivers (Help Please)...

[zeusabj]

Hey guys,

I'm totaly hung up on this issue and I'm really hoping somsone here can help. I am using the MDT 2008 to standardize OS deployment for my company. Our goal is to have a single DVD that can be used to load Windows XP SP3 (Applications, Drivers and all) onto a new PC or be used to refurbish existing models deployed in the field as they come in for maintenance/repair. I have been able to use the Media Deplyment point to successfully create and test several ISO's. So far they install our company applications without any issue, its the DRIVERS that are killing me! I got all the drivers for every model we have extracted and imported into the Out-Of-Box drivers, but for some reason they don't install when I run the ISO. I can launch device manager after Windows is installed, choose the option to update drivers, browse to the DVD, find the appropriate driver and it installs perfectly, but I was under the impression the MDT would install this automatically (if you had them proplery set up in Out-Of-Box Drivers). What am I doing wrong here? Any ideas?

I've searched the forum and have not found an answer to this, maybe I was not uing the right search terms. Can anyone help?

[mmarable]

Are you getting any device drivers installed? I tried a quick MDT build using XP-SP2 and it worked for the most part. ZTIDrivers.wsf inventories the PCI IDs of the hardware it finds on the box and the compares that to the driver store in MDT. When it finds a match it copies it to the C:\Drivers (hidden) and updates the DevicePath in the Registry. PNP does the rest.

What could trip it up is if the "Inject Drivers" task is disabled in the Task Sequence, or the drivers you have do not match up with the hardware (ie Vista drivers for XP machine).

Do you have any drivers installing successfully?

Do you have a hidden "Drivers" folder off the root of your C: drive?

If so, what is in it?

Are the paths found in C:\Drivers listed in the DevicePath key in HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion?

[zeusabj]

Are you getting any device drivers installed? I tried a quick MDT build using XP-SP2 and it worked for the most part. ZTIDrivers.wsf inventories the PCI IDs of the hardware it finds on the box and the compares that to the driver store in MDT. When it finds a match it copies it to the C:\Drivers (hidden) and updates the DevicePath in the Registry. PNP does the rest.

What could trip it up is if the "Inject Drivers" task is disabled in the Task Sequence, or the drivers you have do not match up with the hardware (ie Vista drivers for XP machine).

Do you have any drivers installing successfully?

Do you have a hidden "Drivers" folder off the root of your C: drive?

If so, what is in it?

Are the paths found in C:\Drivers listed in the DevicePath key in HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion?

Okay you offered some interesting tips. I'm still really new to all of this and you made me aware of quite a few things. Yes, the hidden drivers folder is there, and it seems some of the drivers *did* install while some did not. Mainly mass Storage controllers, NIC and video drivers. When I look in that folder it appears to have copied over five driver files and those appear to have installed properly. Is there some other step I should take here? I guess I'm just assuming the LiteTouch ISO is properly detecting my hardware and installing the appropriate driver. Is there some way to "tell it" what to do? Maybe create a task sequence for each model? If so how do I tell it where to find the drivers?

I know I'm asking a lot of questions here, but I've read a lot of the documentation and none of it seems to cover my specific requirements (running the entire thing from a single DVD). Surely I can't be the only person trying to do this. Are there any sort of step-by-step guides or how to's out there with screenshots that can help me?

Edited March 23, 2009 by zeusabj

[mmarable]

You could very well use a specific set of tasks within you sequence for each model. You would put in logic that uses WMI to determine the model of the hardware and then run particular tasks based on that. A bit complicated, but doable.

I would focus on the hardware that does not have the drivers installed correctly for. It could be that the hardware does not have a PNP driver but requires an installation of the software.

The process is working, it's just not finding matching drivers for the hardware that it is skipping.

[zeusabj]

You could very well use a specific set of tasks within you sequence for each model. You would put in logic that uses WMI to determine the model of the hardware and then run particular tasks based on that. A bit complicated, but doable.

I would focus on the hardware that does not have the drivers installed correctly for. It could be that the hardware does not have a PNP driver but requires an installation of the software.

The process is working, it's just not finding matching drivers for the hardware that it is skipping.

Sorry I have not responded had a number of work and family related items that came up ad just slammed me. Thanks for your help MMarable. I guess I'm just going to have to sit down and figure it out through trial and error. never done any scripting like that beofre. Sure wish there was some sort of tutorial that could help me. Oh well. If anyone finds any good MDT-related guides that describe my problem and detail some solutions, please post them!