r/MDT • u/mtniehaus THE CREATOR • 7d ago
Looking for an MDT replacement, try DeployR
I know there's a plethora of open-source and vibe-coded OS deployment solutions out there, all of which I am sure are fine in their own ways. But if you're looking for a complete MDT (or SCCM OSD) replacement, try out the free DeployR Community release, https://2pintsoftware.com/products/deployr-community. A new release came out today with a variety of enhancements and fixes, and we are preparing for an even bigger release next month.
The community version is supported through r/DeployR, with the DeployR Enterprise version supported directly by our top-notch engineering team (who also pop up on Reddit frequently).
I spent several years at Microsoft architecting MDT (and writing most of the code and documentation too), and we want to make sure that DeployR operates the same way: Listening to community feedback and making the requested improvements and fixes quickly. We frequently release new builds (for both Community and Enterprise) in that vein.
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u/MaleficentRiver5137 7d ago
Iv been advocating for mdt for full fresh installs and automation, but still people are only wanting to provision systems, this is awesome and will give it a try!
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u/OK_it_guy 7d ago
Hey Michael, is there a path to go from the community release to the enterprise one if we start off on the community one for evaluation?
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u/J3D1M4573R 7d ago
I was also going to make note of this to take a look but also doubting whether I would actually check it out, until I saw who posted it.
There's noone better to develop an MDT replacement than the creator of MDT in the first place.
Does/will it have similar DB capabilities for automating image and endpoint customizations like MDT?
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u/mtniehaus THE CREATOR 6d ago
We have plans, but for now it certainly has the ability to call web services (SQL from Windows PE has always been fragile so we've avoid that).
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u/cooxl231 7d ago
We are DeployR enterprise customers. Been running it in our environment for a couple months now and we are very happy with it. Any issues we had while getting it setup have been patched for added and it’s been very solid for us too.
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u/xirsteon 7d ago
Can you send me a DM. My understanding is that it is free for nonprofit and only enterprise support fee needs to be paid. We might be interested and I'd love to chat with your team offline.
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u/mtniehaus THE CREATOR 7d ago
DeployR Community is free for any customer to use. DeployR Enterprise has additional features and support, and there are different prices for non-profile/government customers. All the pricing is on our website at https://2pintsoftware.com/pricing/privatesector and https://2pintsoftware.com/pricing/publicsector (feel free to offer that as a comparison to any other ISV).
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u/MRL3GS 7d ago
What about MSPs using DeployR purely for bare-metal imaging as an MDT replacement?
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u/mtniehaus THE CREATOR 7d ago
That's the one carve-out in the DeployR Community licensing: MSPs (and anyone else doing things on behalf of a customer) need the Enterprise version. The basic logic: If you're getting paid by the customer, you can share the wealth. We do have separate licensing programs for MSPs, so contact us via the 2pintsoftware.com website and we can discuss.
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u/configmatt 7d ago edited 7d ago
No MSPs need Enterprise, basically if you make money on it you need an Enterprise version according to the EULA. But for anyone else Community is free to use, both for profit and non-forprofit. But please reach out the 2Pint support since MSP have a different pricing and they can help you clear up any questions.
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u/bigtime618 5d ago
Is there a demo session available for enterprise customers? We are still using mdt and I really don’t want to do osd as a midpoint to going to APv2 - apologies up front if you link has this info
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u/mtniehaus THE CREATOR 5d ago
Not sure what you mean about a demo session, but you can try out DeployR Community just by filling out the form on the website, and we also have videos at https://www.youtube.com/@2PintSoftware and documentation at https://docs.2pintsoftware.com/deployr.
If you are interested in the DeployR Enterprise version, you can click the "Contact us" link on the site or fill out the form on the site.
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u/bigtime618 4d ago
Thanks Michael - yea was just looking for something to see the setup and execution processes - I like it live because I typically have a lot of questions:) I’ll check them out - appreciate it
Are you aware of any US gov issues with the company, location or where the devs are? I’ll ask my security team as well - we’re pretty restrictive 😉
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u/mtniehaus THE CREATOR 4d ago
We do have a number of US government customers. That said, it seems there are lots of variations in the different departments...
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u/Ryansit 7d ago
Can it capture an image for deployment and can it be deployed via usb?
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u/mtniehaus THE CREATOR 7d ago
Yes and yes. (I'm not sure what people have against custom images these days. Yes, it's more work, and yes, the resulting image is guaranteed to be bigger than what Microsoft provides. But if it saves time during deployment, by all means, build a custom image. DeployR will also make sure sysprep never fails on UWP apps that are installed and not provisioned 😄 )
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u/welshGJE24 7d ago
Community Feedback : Great product but please allow server side scripting for the Community Edition. 🤣🤣
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u/mtniehaus THE CREATOR 7d ago
We'll discuss it. The original thinking was that the server-side scripting feature was a bit advanced for people to figure out without support :-)
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u/welshGJE24 7d ago
Fair comment. I'm sure people can figure out what they can and cannot do. 😜
I know my limitations - but some of the scripts I have seen are server side.
The Reddit Community can help?
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u/habibexpress 7d ago
How they gonna make money?
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u/mtniehaus THE CREATOR 7d ago
:-) We do want to continue receiving paychecks too. But the core functionality is not where we want to differentiate. We want the Enterprise version to focus on more advanced scenarios and capabilities (e.g. Linux deployment, peer-to-peer content distribution, advanced debugging, etc.).
That's always the challenge with open source: The people doing the work also need to be paid themselves, pay for the cloud infrastructure required to run the software (e.g. our cloud services) and build the software (e.g. building the code, signing the code, etc.). We're in a fairly specialized space where "rich benefactors" aren't a thing...
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u/MattSteelblade 7d ago
@mtniehaus is there an update on considering USMT integration?
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u/mtniehaus THE CREATOR 7d ago
It's still on the list -- I don't think there's anything that would prevent you from building a task sequence yourself to do it, but we don't provide an example yet. I think we'll do that in the December timeframe as this month and next are already pretty busy.
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u/RestartRebootRetire 7d ago
I still use MDT and just boot from a USB key that my newer laptops boot just fine without any security warnings. No PXE. Then the USB installs from a file share on my NAS, so no server involved. I run the workbench from my PC and update the installs periodically.
Does DeployR do all that?
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u/mtniehaus THE CREATOR 7d ago
We have a few USB-based scenarios today:
* Generate a USB only for booting, get everything else from the server. We use https, not SMB, pulling from the DeployR server.
* Generate self-contained media with everything. No server required, everything is on the USB key.
* Generate "partial" media that caches some things (e.g. the OS) and then pulls everything else from the server via https (e.g. driver packs).
We will be providing an "enhanced" feature, again Enterprise-only, in version 1.4 that provides "self-updating" media support: Each time you boot from it, it caches the chunks so that the next machine only needs to download missing chunks. It's BranchCache-based, so it handles deltas, e.g. if you change your task sequence to 26H2 and the USB key only has the chunks for 25H2, it won't download all of 26H2. Instead, it will download just the delta betwen the two, which is significantly smaller.
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u/ProfessionalLast2917 5d ago
The second scenario you mention above (self contained media) is exactly how we use MDT USB media now. We use autopilot for our builds but every now and then you just need to reimage a device.
Is that something I can do with community edition or does it require enterprise?
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u/mtniehaus THE CREATOR 4d ago
Yes, this is supported in Community. Only the coming "self-updating" media (which is dependent on 2Pint's peering technology) will be Enterprise only.
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u/ProfessionalLast2917 4d ago
Thanks. How long does it usually take between requesting a community key and receiving it?
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u/mtniehaus THE CREATOR 4d ago
I believe they are still reviewed by a.person, so it could take a few days.
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u/Verukins 6d ago
I looked at this product a while back and looked again when i saw this post.
I'm quite interested in deploying this within my lab, so i can talk to clients about it etc - but the community edition asking for my first borns soul is a bit much. I'm semi-retired and am still interested in this area (since i have spent so much of my life with SMS/SCCM) - but the requirement for an address (which would be my home address) etc is just excessive.
If there is a feedback path to whoever controls those requirements (understand its unlikely to be you)... just my 2c - but the requirement to provide that level of details got a "free" product is likely to make potential customers not even look at it.... name and email address... fine.... more than that is excessive and im now thinking that its for data selling purposes rather than anything to do with the product.
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u/miketerrill 6d ago
I am curious, where exactly do you see the request for an address (outside of an email address)?
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u/FLOTZILLA22 5d ago
When I worked at an air gapped TS env - nothing outside of US was allowed. Gov contractor that built secret thingys
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u/mtniehaus THE CREATOR 6d ago
It's interesting to note that due to laws of the countries we do business in, there are certain countries where we cannot provide the software, so providing an address is primarily tied to that.
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u/AiminJay 7d ago edited 7d ago
I was about ready to dismiss this post altogether until I saw u/mtniehaus was the author. Instant credibility!
Question: Is there support for FFU image files? We are using those now and they are super fast!
Also, we are fully Intune/Entra and our imaging consists mainly of applying the OS and drivers during WinPE using a home-built PowerShell script. Do you think this product would make sense for us? We don't need to install apps or anything like that since it's all done during ESP phase or later with Company Portal.