Using MDT to re-join computers to a domain after a re-image

Question

Since 2010 we have been using WDS to build, capture and deploy our image across our organisation (A High School) which has worked well enough. While WDS can do all this the build and capture is a little clunky and relies on you to manually installing all
programmes and then mounting the WIM file and inject the drivers so I have moved us onto MDT for the build and capture before importing the finished WIM file into WDS for deployment.
This has worked much better as MDT makes it much quicker to get an image up and going (programme silent installs, testing is much quicker etc) and drive management is as simple as telling MDT to put ALL the drivers you want into the image but I have been
reading that you should link MDT and WDS together.
I followed the instruction and imported the LiteTouchPE wim file into WDS and we are able to PXE boot right into MDT and either make a new image or capture the one we are working on but I am trying to automate the deployment so it is more like what we have
when just using WDS for deployment. Because I want to retain the ability to use MDT to make a new image I cannot customise the customesettings.ini file too much and instead I am relying on MDT task sequences for must of the customisations.
Currently all our systems are pre-staged into WDS (I think it is actually Active Directory at the end of the day but you use wdsutil to pre-stage them) so when we boot into PXE WDS deploys and configures the machines using WDSClientUnattend and ImageUnattend
XML file so that once the deployment is finished it is sitting at the logon screen waiting for the user to login already joined to the domain and our wireless network.
I am having trouble trying to achieve this same result using our WDS + MDT combo with the main sticking point being trying to re-join the computer back to the domain (we re-image machines constantly so re-join back to the domain is a must). I wrote/found
a PowerShell script that does the domain join but because an account already exists (all our machines are pre-staged under their service tag and GUID) it throws an error about their already being an account with that name (the computer still appear to join
the domain and I can logon using my domain account). Because of this error MDT borks the deployment and doesn't finish up and complains about deployment being in progress etc.
Is using WDS to boot the LiteTouchPE and then deploying through MDT the best way or are we better off going back to using MDT to do the build and capture and then using WDS and it's pre-staging to do the deploy? I really like that with MDT I can have a little
more control over driver deployment (recently had a problem where we got a new laptop and injecting the new drivers into the WIM broke the entire image for all our machines except the new one) and software at the time of the re-image (I cannot install the
Lenovo hotkey software in a virtual machine because it does a hardware check and fails to install so either the entire image needs to be made on a Lenovo or the software doesn't get installed).
I am currently making a Windows 8.1.1 x64 Enterprise SOE/MOE/whatever you would like to call it using MDT 2013 with WDS running on Windows Server 2012 R2 x64.

Answer 1

Hello,
It is better to use so-called "thin" images. These contain only the operating system (in a facility and captures vm). Subsequently pilots and soft will be deployed by the bais of MTD. 
For drivers I recommend you to use selection profiles. Moreover it is necessary to put a condition in step "Inject Drivers". Condition Type: Variable called MODEL, variable value Latitude E6430 (change the value to the desired model). It is necessary
to add more step Inject Drivers that type of position. 
Application level, you import the different applications in MDT allowing you to select only the desired wizard when applications. If you want to automate this step you will need to indicate statically in the task sequence to install applications, this will
require the creation of several task sequence.
Best Regards
Well I am well aware the Microsoft recommends a thin image it is simply not practical in a School environment where Students change in and our of subjects and where the combination of subject specific software is nearly infinite the overhead is too great
(maybe if we used something like SCCM where we could deploy applications based on OU or group membership).
All your other points aside my problem/issue/question which appears to have been lost is, how do I rejoin a computer to the domain using MDT?  We re-image laptops constantly and using WDS they rejoin with no problems but using MDT an error is thrown because
the account already exists.  In WDS we have all our machines pre-staged so is there an MDT equivalent that will let me re-image a laptop and have it re-join the domain under the same account without throwing and error.