Microsoft Intune for SCCM Admins Part 1

Let us learn Microsoft Intune for SCCM Admins Part 1. I’m hoping to give a fair bit about Microsoft Intune for SCCM admins.

I don’t want to make this post very long. Hence planning to divide it into multiple posts. I will cover the basics in the first part of Intune for SCCM admins.

NOTE! – This post is from an SCCM Admin (Windows Device Management) perspective. You might have a different perspective, depending on your job role.

Great Learning

SCCM is great, and it will not die as per Microsoft. But, don’t go away from Intune learning. I would strongly recommend going through Intune learning process.

Patch My PC

What to Learn Intune? Great Resource Around you! (1) LinkedIn Learning Courses for Microsoft Intune, (2) Learning How to Learn SCCM Intune Azure, (3) Learn Intune Beginners Guide MDM MAM MIM, (4) Microsoft Intune for SCCM Admins Part 1

What is Microsoft Intune for SCCM Admins?

Intune can perform most of the functionalities of SCCM. As per Microsoft, Microsoft Intune is built on modern modular cloud components.

This solution decoupled the monolith services from development, deployment, and maintenance perspectives.

Intune is ready-to-use SaaS (Software-As-A-Service) solution for device management from Microsoft

Adaptiva

Microsoft Intune is an Enterprise Mobility Management (EMM) solution from Microsoft. Microsoft Intune helps manage all flavors of devices (Windows, iOS, Android, and macOS).

This solution helps to deliver network settings and other device management settings. 

Microsoft Intune combines Device, Application, Information Protection, Endpoint Protection (antivirus software), Security, and Configuration policy management solution.

Intune Servers & Management?

Microsoft Intune for SCCM Admins
Many Intune Tenants Hosted under one cloud infra within Microsoft Data Center? I don’t know. 1

Microsoft handles intune Servers and management of those servers. Microsoft Intune is a Software As A Service (SaaS) solution from Microsoft. Following are some of the useful points with Intune from some of the organization’s perspectives.

  • There is no Servers requirement to install Intune (Purchase EMS or Microsoft 365 license and start using it) – Managed by Microsoft.
  • Maintenance of Servers is not required to update Intune to the latest version – Managed by Microsoft.
  • Intune Web Console access anytime, anywhere – Managed by Internal IT (Intune Admin)
  • Intune admin won’t be able to check and edit Intune Database, unlike SCCM Database – Managed by Microsoft.
  • Intune Admin doesn’t have an option to go back to the previous Intune version –
  • Perform Intune Server-side troubleshooting – Managed by Microsoft
Intune Version - Microsoft Intune for SCCM Admins
Intune Version 1905 👍 – Microsoft Intune for SCCM Admins 2

Intune Infra Administration

As I mentioned above, Intune server infra is managed by Microsoft as this solution is SaaS. As an SCCM admin, all infra admin tasks are located in the Administration workspace. The logical view of Microsoft Intune for SCCM Admins.

There are very few or no server admin tasks for Intune admins. However, you might still need to install connectors and global policies before starting Intune deployment.

Most of these activities are one-time activities. You can just set up Intune and forget.

You might need to configure the following components from an Infra administration perspective.

Logical View of Intune Administration - Microsoft Intune for SCCM Admins
Logical View of Intune Administration – Microsoft Intune for SCCM Admins 3

Discovery of User, Groups, & Devices

SCCM can discover the resources from the network (Active Directory or Azure Active AD, or Network discovery) and install clients on those devices. For Intune, you don’t have to do this type of configuration.

Intune is tightly integrated with Azure Active Directory, and Intune blade will have all the Device, User, and Group resources available for you to use without doing any discovery configurations.

Users, Devices, and Groups - Microsoft Intune for SCCM Admins
Users, Devices, and Groups – Microsoft Intune for SCCM Admins 4

NOTE! Microsoft Intune Setup steps are explained in HTMD Intune Free Training.

Client Installation & Upgrade

SCCM client installation and enrollment methods are different from Intune enrollment options.

Unlike SCCM, Intune doesn’t have any separate client component. Intune manages Windows devices by built-in MDM client agent component of Windows 10 or Windows 11 Operating System. So, there is no need to Install Intune client on Windows 10 devices.

NOTE! – Intune Supports only Client operating systems. Intune does NOT support Windows Server Operating systems. You won’t be able to manage servers with Intune.

NOTE!Intune Company Portal is an end-user application for Microsoft Intune. This app can be installed as Intune client component on a Windows 10 device.

Two main Intune Enrollment Options are explained in the following blog posts. More details are available in my Intune Learning post. Also, Intune enrollment can be done via Microsoft Autopilot (Windows Autopilot).

MDM Client is part of Windows 10 OS - Microsoft Intune for SCCM Admins
MDM Client is part of Windows 10 OS 5

NOTE 1 – No, there is nothing called Intune Client upgrade for Windows devices. Intune is using Windows 10 MDM component for management. So, the MDM component will get updated with Windows 10 updates.

NOTE 2 – Intune also uses Intune Management Extension agent for Win32 App deployment. The installation & Update of this Intune Management Extension agent is handled automatically in 99% of the scenarios.

Collections & Groups

SCCM collections are used to group the resources which you want to manage. There is no collection concept in Microsoft Intune.

Intune uses Azure AD User & Device groups in the place of collections. So, you can create the following type of groups in Azure AD and deploy applications and policies to those Azure AD groups.

Azure AD Groups Vs SCCM Collections - Microsoft Intune for SCCM Admins
Azure AD Groups Vs. SCCM Collections 6

NOTE! – Many years (I feel like) before even Intune had their own separate Intune Groups, and they removed Intune Groups as part of Azure Intune portal migration from Intune Silverlight portal.

Configuration Items & Compliance Policies

SCCM CI (Configuration Items), Baselines, Compliance Policies, and others are available in Microsoft Intune. The following details would be helpful in Microsoft Intune for the SCCM admin’s context.

In the Intune portal, you can create similar policies (as mentioned above) from Device Compliance, Device Configuration, and Device Security nodes.

SCCM CI & Compliance Policies - Microsoft Intune for SCCM Admin
SCCM CI & Compliance Policies – Microsoft Intune for SCCM Admin 7

NOTE! – I will continue more settings and details in upcoming posts (Microsoft Intune for SCCM Admins Part 2). So, in this post, I covered the SCCM Administration, Assets & Compliance Workspace.

Resources

10 thoughts on “Microsoft Intune for SCCM Admins Part 1”

  1. Hi. Can I use Microsoft Intune for patching with updates Windows servers that are physical servers non-domain joined ?

    Reply
  2. But SCCM does it? Or there is any software develop by Microsoft that does manage physical non-domain joined Windows servers?

    Reply
  3. sorry for replying back. i am still in confusion. I know SCCM requires AD integration. so my question is, can I use SCCM (which is part of an AD domain) to do server patching for physical NON-domain servers (servers that belong to WORKGROUP) ?

    Reply
  4. I like to understand the backend flow (at the server level) what will happen when we enroll devices, add applications, create a policy in Intune Console. This is not about Push notification and how complete MDM flow occurs.

    I want to know activities that occur only at the server level.

    Reply

Leave a Comment

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.