The Problem

The hardware inventory file generated by the Auto Apply Drivers step is over 100k, which is the size limit for the MatchDriversSP process SCCM runs to provide the right drivers.  The process then fails.

The Solution

Create individual driver packages for each model and have a WMI query to apply those drivers as needed.

Some Background

For years, our SCCM 2007 installation has been solid, auto apply device drivers worked like a charm. We’d simply import the drivers in to SCCM, add needed ones to the boot media, and away it went.

On a few hardware platforms, we’d have to specify a driver package for the RAID controller, but for the most part it was fairly hands-off.

Well, over the last few months, with the release of newer hardware, we’ve noticed the auto apply device drivers step in our task sequences was not working properly. I did some checking and found several other people had similar issues. Our workaround was to create specific driver packages for specific server models and query WMI to apply them. This works fine, too, but is an added step. I also found a post on TechNet where others were also having this problem on completely different hardware. Shortly after asking in that thread if a fix was discovered, someone posted a link to a different TechNet thread HERE, scroll down to the bottom and read the post by Isaac Gamboa.

He explains when the Auto Apply Drivers step is ran, it creates a hardware inventory file that is processed by MatchDriversSP. The problem is the file size limit is 100k, and SCCM will not run that process if the file is larger. I’m assuming the newer hardware has many more devices in the inventory file, thus exceeding the 100k size.

In SCCM 2012, the file size limit is bumped to 1MB, so that buys us time. Although it’s unclear how much the file will actually grow to, 1MB should suffice…at least for now :)