Today we are happy to share the release of Update 1901 for Technical Preview Branch of System Center Configuration Manager.
This release gives you a new interactive client health dashboard with an overview of client health, scenario health, and common errors for your environment.
Offline and obsolete clients can negative impact client health metrics. This new dashboard makes it easy for you to filter out offline and inactive clients. You can also filter the view by several attributes to see any potential issues by OS and client versions.
Learn more about the client health dashboard
This preview release also includes:
Distribution Point Maintenance Mode - You can now set a distribution point in maintenance mode to temporarily disable communication with the site. In maintenance mode the site doesn't distribute any content and management points don't return the location of this distribution point to the clients. Set this mode when you are patching software or making hardware changes to the distribution point.
New management insight rules for collection best practice - New insights that help simplify management and improve performance by cleaning up and reconfiguring collections are now available.
Specify a custom port for peer wakeup - You can now specify a custom port number for wake-up proxy.
MAC address filtering - You can now filter and search for devices based on their MAC addresses in the devices and device collections nodes.
View recently connected consoles – You will find a new sub-node under the security node which shows the most recently connected consoles. It includes information about which sites the consoles are connected to and their machine names.
Run CMPivot from the central administration site – You can now run CMPivot from the central administration site.
Dedicated monitoring for phased deployments - Phased deployments now have their own dedicated monitoring node, making it easier to identify phased deployments you have created and navigate to the phased deployment monitoring view
Optimized image servicing - When scheduling the application of updates to operating system images containing a single image index, there is a new option to optimize the updated image file by removing any superseded updates.
Improvements to the Run PowerShell Script step of a task sequence - When running a PowerShell script during a task sequence you now have the option to specify a timeout value, alternate credentials, a working directory and success codes.
Import a single index of an Operating System Image - When importing a WIM file to Configuration Manager you are now given the option to import a single image rather than all nested images.
Specify thread priority for feature updates in Windows 10 servicing – You can now adjust the priority with which clients install a feature update through Windows 10 servicing. Set it to normal to use more system resources and update faster. Set it to low to allow users to continue their work on the device while it downloads and updates in the background.
Additions to the product lifecycle dashboard – The product lifecycle dashboard now supports Office versions 2003 through 2013.
Submit Feedback confirmation - When you submit feedback from the Configuration Manager console, you will now receive confirmation that your feedback was successfully sent and a reference number.
Create Configuration Manager Technical Preview Lab in Azure – You can now use an Azure Resource Manager template to build a System Center Configuration Manager Technical Preview lab environment in Microsoft Azure with a basic configuration.
Update 1901 for Technical Preview Branch is available in the Configuration Manager Technical Preview console. For new installations please use the 1810.2 baseline version of Configuration Manager Technical Preview Branch available on TechNet Evaluation Center. Technical Preview Branch releases give you an opportunity to try out new Configuration Manager features in a test environment before they are made generally available.
We would love to hear your thoughts about the latest Technical Preview! Send us Feedback directly from the console. You may also use our feedback channels through the Feedback Hub app for product issues, and our UserVoice page for ideas about new features.
Thanks,
The System Center Configuration Manager team
Configuration Manager Resources:
Documentation for System Center Configuration Manager Technical Previews
Try the System Center Configuration Manager Technical Preview Branch
Documentation for System Center Configuration Manager