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1. A Drivers Saga: The Control Freak
Meets the Dynamic Developer
Johan Arwidmark
Chief Technical Architect, Knowledge Factory

2. NOW!
Q&A
The Tools
Driver Babble

3. General Driver Challenges
• Challenges
– Multiple packaging methods
– Driver Applications
– New versions may drop support for old devices
– Badly-formed drivers (INFs)
– Two-tier drivers (bus drivers)
• There is hope
– OEMs starting to pick up…

4. demo
Finding drivers

5. General Driver Challenges
• Challenges:
– A constantly changing list of “supported”
hardware
– Rapidly-changing PC hardware
– “Configuration of the day” vendors
– Chipsets
– Intel vs. AMD
• Infrastructure Optimization, standardization
– Maybe even less frequent purchases

6. General Driver Solutions
What approach to take
• “Chaos” • “Control freak”
– Throw them all in, let the system – Explicitly configure what drivers
and/or Windows figure it out should be used for each model
– Simplifies administration, repository – Addresses supportability concerns,
management compatibility issues

7. Windows Drivers
• Boot Image Drivers
– Primarily Nic & Storage
– Windows PE 4.0 uses Windows 8 drivers
• Operating System Drivers
– All drivers

8. Drivers in MDT 2012 (Lite
Touch)
• Deployment Share holds driver repository
– Import
– Folders
– Selection profiles
– Inject Drivers
• Designed to be dynamic
– Rules-based process to help filter

9. demo
MDT 2012 Lite Touch
Driver Management

10. ConfigMgr 2012 Drivers
• Driver catalog
• Auto apply drivers
– Drivers are matched by PnP ID
• Apply driver package
– Only the specified package is used
– Only choice for XP/2003 mass storage
drivers

11. demo
ConfigMgr 2012 SP1
drivers

12. Drivers Tips & Tricks
• Unsigned versus signed drivers
• Understanding driver ranking
• Troubleshooting Driver Infs
• Scratchspace
• Drivers as Applications
– BlueTooth, QLB, Mobile Broadband, Biometric
• Hybrid Scenarios

13. demo
Drivers tips and tricks

14. Resources –
Trainings, Videos, books
deploymentartist.com