Uninstall IE9 via SCCM

Internet Explorer 9 is the fastest, most secure iteration of IE yet!  Unfortunately, some companies are not ready to deploy it into production or are in a testing phase.  In environments with System Center Configuration Manager (SCCM) you may have cases where an administrator accidentally rolled out IE 9 via SCCM’s Software Updates.  In this scenario you may need to uninstall IE9 and reinstall at a later time.  But how do you go about removing IE9 from systems?

I have seen various ways to do this with SCCM, and I am a fan of simple solutions.  Microsoft has provided a Microsoft Fix It link within this article:  http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2579295#phrss.  The awesome part is that the link runs an MSI.  MSI installers are a perfect item to package up in SCCM for easy distribution!

Here is the summary of how I set it up for one of my customers:

1. Create a Collection of Workstations with IE9 installed
2. Package the MSI downloaded by clicking “Fix this problem” in the above article
3. Package a script that kills the iexplore.exe process to ensure Internet Explorer is not running when the uninstall is executed
4. Create a Task Sequence that runs through all the packages in logical order
5. Advertise the Task Sequence to the Collection of Systems with IE9 installed

Part 1: Create a Collection of Systems with IE 9 Installed

Here is an example query that will find all Workstation Systems (we don’t want to reboot Servers) with IE 9 installed:

select SMS_R_SYSTEM.ResourceID, SMS_R_SYSTEM.ResourceType, SMS_R_SYSTEM.Name, SMS_R_SYSTEM.SMSUniqueIdentifier, SMS_R_SYSTEM.ResourceDomainORWorkgroup, SMS_R_SYSTEM.Client from SMS_R_System inner join SMS_G_System_SoftwareFile on SMS_G_System_SoftwareFile.ResourceId = SMS_R_System.ResourceId where SMS_G_System_SoftwareFile.FileName = “iexplore.exe” and SMS_G_System_SoftwareFile.FileVersion like “9.%” and SMS_R_System.OperatingSystemNameandVersion like “%NT%Workstation%”

Part 2: Package the MSI

Download the MSI from http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=9787447 and create a package in SCCM containing the MSI file.  Run the following command line for the install:

msiexec.exe /i MicrosoftFixit50778.msi /qn /norestart

Part 3: Package a Script That Kills IE

The script I used can be downloaded here.  Extract the VBS file and package it in SCCM.  Run the following command to execute the script:

cscript.exe killIE.vbs

Part 4: Create a Task Sequence

You will want to put all the above items into a Task Sequence as it’s the simplest way to chain multiple steps together.  The Task Sequence should:

• Stop the Internet Explorer process, iexplore.exe, from running
  

  IE Task Sequence Step 1

• Uninstall IE 9
  

  IE Task Sequence Step 2

• Restart the computer but provide a 60 minute warning so the user has plenty of time to save work before rebooting
  

  IE Task Sequence Step 3

Part 5: Advertise the Task Sequence

How you want to set this up is really up to the administrator.  The wizard is very flexible!  I let the Task Sequence be visible to users, meaning we selected the check box to Show Task Sequence Progress.

And you’re done!  Pat yourself on the back.  I do want to add my disclaimer that you should always test on a couple machines before advertising to a large number of computers.  Better safe than sorry!