Deployment Solution

I'm not even sure this is a 'fixable' problem. When I used to work with HP's, at least part of the hardware information would populate when you booted (to DOS or WinPE) for imaging. This allowed you to do machine specific imaging and drivers. I've noticed with Dells however that this doesn't happen. When you boot to DOS or WinPE none of that information gets populated in the Console and forces me to use generic jobs taking more steps manually to get the machine imaged and drivers populated correctly.

Does anyone know of a way to get Dell machines to provide this info when booting to DOS or WinPE?

just in case I was unclear in what fields/properties I was referring to...

when you boot a new PC into WinPE or DOS and it connects to the Deployment Server and waits for the next instruction (or the Initial Deployment job), some types of computers (HP I know for sure) will populate part of the Hardware section of the 'Computer Properties'. This would usually give you the Manufacturer, Model and or Product Name at the very least. Unfortunately, with Dell computers, this doesn't seem to be the case - which means instead of a single conditioned job, i'd have to create a job for every model under the initial deployment. This defeats the purpose of being easy to maintain really.

Again, i'm not sure if there is actually a solution, or a plug in, etc or if this is just the way Dell does things.

Any help is greatly appreciated!

Dell seems to populate fine for me. I use the fields you are talking about all of the time, especially for my HII image as I inject the drivers and HAL based on the machine hardware information. I don't use WinPE, but I do use both Linux and FreeDOS. Not sure if you upgraded DS and maybe didn't recreate your PXE boot images? I've seen that be a problem where you use an older version of the AClient/DAgent in the Automation Boot and it doesn't fully update due to client/agent version inconsistencies.

we have recreated the PXE boot images...though we're still using 1.6 (i've tried creating 2.1, but it always seems to hang - i have another open thread on that issue!).

I know there used to be some Dell console plug ins and/or tools...but all i'm seeing now is the Dell Client Manager for NS and some Deployment Server for Dell Server and Thin Clients. Not sure if one of those might have an client pack I might be able to install.

what you're doing is exactly what i'm trying to do (and it works wonderfully for machines that already exist in the console). however, brand new machines out of the box don't populate that info unfortunately.

Using 1.6 may be the issue (not positive as I don't use WinPE here). I use Linux for 99% of my builds, with only a couple straglers that won't work with Linux, so I use FreeDOS for those. Each of these started out not in the DS console with an initial deployment job, just like you are referring to. Have you tried using Linux at all? Just curious if the lack of hardware population is related to the version of the agent/client that the automation os is using.

I understand where you're coming from...but the fact that the same process worked for HP makes me think that it's something specifically with Dell hardware. I'm going to install the Dell pack for Servers and see if something in there makes it click. I swear there used to be a Dell add on specifically for clients, but I can only seem to find one for Servers/Thin Clients now.

I don't use any "add-ons" and our shop is 100% Dell.

interesting...and you're not using the Dell based Deployment Server? this is so strange...

all the odd problems we've had, i'm half tempted to rebuild this thing.

We are all Dell here too and I'm not seeing this happen either.

Correct, I am not using any Dell based Deployment Server software. I am at DS 6.9 SP1 MP1. It was working at the earlier versions as well.

Have either of you used the newer Optiplex 960's? That's what i'm seeing it on right now...

We currently do not use the 960's. Our current models are the Optiplex 755, Latitude E6400, Precision T7400, Precision M4400 and Latitude E4200. All of these models as well as the older models report in fine.

I'm at the same version of DS as bhawver. I don't have any 960's either but I've never had any computers not show any hardware information in any version of DS.

The strange thing is, this has been happening since the Optiplex 755 model came out. We just figured they changed something...but maybe something has 'broken' in our Console.

Just to make sure we're totally on the same page...

Hardware information is completely populated on a fully imaged machine. When it's in production and in use, it's totally fine and can be reimaged fine.

The problem arises when we get a new one out of the box...brand new and try to boot to DOS or WinPE. It will not display hardware info for some reason when connected to the Console. If I put a generic image on it, get the AClient on it, etc...then it will report the correct information and I can image it with a conditionalized job. That's very tedious obviously.... Again, this is only an issue on brand new PCs...not existing ones.

Maybe set up a test environment with a fresh install of DS and PXE and see if you still have the problem.

well, there is an updated bios from A01 to A03...i'm going to try doing that, then booting to DS and see if it's any different. We also have some of the Dell Studio Hybrid thin clients...and they didnt even put the PXE option in the original BIOS - it had to be updated. So....i guess anything is possible, right? :-)

If not, i'll probably do what you suggested as I have time. Otherwise, I just may make multiple options at the 'Initial Deployment' stage for the time being. Not the greatest solution, but may get me by until I can figure out the root of the issue.

As of right now, I think that the issue is with the Deployment Server itself. None of the patches or fixes have resolved the issue, and we also have issues with adding drivers, etc.   As there is a SP2 released, I may end up rebuilding this server.  My only worry is that the issue is in the database, not that we are pulling data from it or anything, just makes it all the more tedious.

I would do a test environment first and rule out the DS before just rebuilding it.  If you set up a test DS with a separate SQL database (test environment, which can be virtualized if you don't have the hardware), if you still have issues, then it's not with the DS or your database.