Deprecation of WSUS & Alternatives to SCCM

[steadybird]

Hi All,

We're currently using the desktop publisher to push apps and updates into Intune and it's working quite well for us. On-prem server patching is a rather manual process for us currently even if we're still using extracted PMPC Intune packages of the same software and running it that way.

Budgeting for System Center was not approved.
I considered WSUS with scanning sources enabled such that the rest of the server updates would come from Windows Updates directly, and only PMPC stuff via WSUS... However, my CIO has veto'd that due to WSUS's deprecated status.

For SMB's... What are the alternatives available to us?
Is PMPC considering options for integrations to help fill in that niche that WSUS will leave? That being those SMB's that can't justify forking out for something as overkill as System Center?

Perhaps using a variation of their personal desktop client as a kind of server-side client "agent", that could interact with a local data store/share of some kind. With PMPC Publisher pushing content into that local store for the agents to use on whatever schedule they're configured for, or manually?


Right now I am half considering trying to emulate the overall PMPC process by using PMPC requirement scripts, packages, and deployed scheduled tasks to run them all. But this is a very manual process for me to design this and then ongoing work to manually extract and transfer all the content into the staging area.

I would love if there was a PMPC native solution so that I could continue to use PMPC Publisher as my primary pane of glass to push content to all of my end points be they Intune MDM devices or on-prem servers.

[Andrew Jimenez (Patch My PC)]

Hello,

Unfortunately, I don't have any immediate solutions for you that don't involve WSUS, however, I would recommend reading the article we posted here: https://patchmypc.com/wsus-deprecation-announcement-patch-my-pc-customers about the WSUS deprecation. It seems that some will read way too deeply into deprication announcement, but WSUS is still fully functional and supported and will be for many years. There is further evidence of WSUS' continuing support in its inclusion in Windows Server 2025. Windows Server 2025 will have extended support through 2034, so you can expect WSUS to be supported for at least that long.