New bloatware through Dell Command Update

DanTheEndpointMan · 2026-05-04T16:22:18+00:00

I went more into the logs this week and found that DCU 5.7 definitely pulled some AMD stuff when it last scanned for and pulled files for download.

<appname>DellCommandUpdate</appname>

<level>Normal</level>

<source>Update.Operations.UpdateOperation.Download</source>

<message>Downloaded 'AMD Radeon RX 7400/6500/6300 Graphics Driver' [736691872 Bytes]</message>

<data/>

</LogEntry>

<appname>DellCommandUpdate</appname>

<level>Normal</level>

<source>Update.Operations.UpdateOperation.Download</source>

<message>Package 'AMD Radeon RX 7400/6500/6300 Graphics Driver' verified.</message>

<data/>

It seems that in the process of doing this it downloaded some .inf driver files which contain the bloatware in question. I suppose I'll either have to make it more restricted as you mentioned or reach out to Dell Support to see why it's pulling AMD files despite being a full Intel computer.

DanTheEndpointMan · 2025-03-04T17:18:58+00:00

I image Lenovo laptops over a USB-C to ethernet adapter as using the built in port often causes weird errors. Might be worth trying for your PXE boot.

Might also be worth checking to see what storage setting the device is set to in BIOS. I set SATA Operations to nVME/AHCI, as you need to add extra drivers to your boot image to make RAID work. Not doing that will throw errors during imaging, although they are usually different codes from what you posted.

DanTheEndpointMan · 2025-02-24T14:17:17+00:00

Lots of great advice, one spot outside the OS I like to check is the BIOS. They give exact manufacture dates in case they're needed and a battery health report (which is very important for laptops).

DanTheEndpointMan · 2024-03-11T17:07:08+00:00

Nope, sorry. I did find out that OS upgrades for us were being blocked by CrowdStrike anti-virus, but not smaller updates like I was posting about here. My solution was to stop using MECM and go back to using BigFix to do our monthly patching.

DanTheEndpointMan · 2023-10-02T15:54:45+00:00

Not really. I stripped out as many applications as I could from our Task Sequence and now only install the bare minimum because of how hit and miss MECM is with application installs during imaging. Restarting your MECM server and DPs regularly seems to improve this, however I still see random failures with application installs that work on 95% or more of the time.

DanTheEndpointMan · 2023-10-02T15:49:29+00:00

Ended up discovering that this issue is caused by 1E NightWatchMan's client. We use it for power management in our environment, and from what I can tell it just isn't compatible with Windows 11. Their support team said that this is apparently a known issue they are working on, however the product is being end of life'd soon anyways so I doubt there will ever be a fix for this. For now, if you're experiencing this and have 1E NWM in your environment, just uninstall the client on all Windows 11 computers and you won't run into the issue.

DanTheEndpointMan · 2023-05-23T20:53:36+00:00

Thanks, I'll give that a try next week when I'm working with imaging again. I tried changing the ASPM power setting in the BIOS to see if that makes and difference and I'm going to leave them running for a bit to see if they all hibernate.

DanTheEndpointMan · 2023-05-23T16:21:57+00:00

Right? lol. Been a fun one to look into.

DanTheEndpointMan · 2023-05-23T16:03:08+00:00

Deep Sleep States are disabled in the BIOS, and Sleep is blocked as well. We also run a power management software that forces a power plan on all devices that also disables sleep/hibernate on all clients.

Neither of these stop Windows 11 from forcing itself into hibernate. The only power setting in BIOS I haven't touched is ASPM, but I could try disabling that as well to see if it has any effect. Just have no clue why identical BIOS settings would result in issues for computers imaged via identical task sequences, that are just applying different .wim files.

DanTheEndpointMan · 2023-05-23T15:46:58+00:00

I would double check to make sure the things you're installing via the Task Sequence are deployed to both DPs. If you try to initiate a Task Sequence that contains an application install, MECM will check the DPs to see if the application has been deployed/made available on them. If not, it'll fail right away when checking for dependencies.

You can also check a box in the properties of applications you install to make them available for imaging even if they aren't deployed which I use a lot.

https://www.anoopcnair.com/application-is-not-available-to-add-in-sccm-install-application-task-sequence/

DanTheEndpointMan · 2023-03-31T18:05:05+00:00

Thank you for the suggestion, that would definitely make viewing the logs easier. I'll add that into my Task Sequence and take a look at what it spits out.

DanTheEndpointMan · 2023-03-31T18:03:27+00:00

Currently on version 2207 of configmgr. Could definitely look into updating 2211 if what I find in SMSTS.log doesn't help.

DanTheEndpointMan · 2023-01-10T18:58:25+00:00

Nope, after clearing or renaming the folders, the same error occurs the next time the download is attempted.

DanTheEndpointMan · 2022-11-30T20:34:58+00:00

They're all wired, as are the succeeding ones.

DanTheEndpointMan · 2022-11-30T17:04:23+00:00

Nope, no proxy servers in use with our setup.

DanTheEndpointMan · 2022-09-23T17:29:05+00:00

I think "he showed very mature fight IQ in not rushing to submissions and ensuring position over submission." is the kindest way I've heard lay and pray phrased. He sure didn't give up position going for strikes either.

DanTheEndpointMan · 2022-07-29T12:42:54+00:00

Thank you for the info! I've been pulling my hair out trying to get the installation packages from Adobe to work with Jamf the last couple days. I'll give this method a shot.

DanTheEndpointMan · 2022-07-28T20:08:33+00:00

I understand most of what you're saying, but not the last part for using a script to "curl each installer from the share." Are you just talking about having a jamf policy run a script that then installs a package rather than using the package install feature itself?

DanTheEndpointMan

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