Instant obsolete files in Software Inventory. Need help!

[Maestro]

Hello!

 

Win 10 on devices, SCCM version is 1810, SCCM clients on devices are actual version.

 

I've used the SCCM SI to find devices with the certain .EXE files in order to delete these files. Something like "c:\Somestuff\111.exe", "c:\Install\Somestuff\111.exe"

OK, ~40 devices  were found, files (and folders containing them) were deleted and I run the report again. Surprisingly, ~10 devices still showed that these folders and files are exist (let's call them "bad").

 

For quick check I've wrote the SQL query (it's working fine for "bad" and "good" devices) and started experiments.

1. First of all I've checked that the whole Software Inventory "chain" works OK on both Client and Server sides. It does!. No errors in logs, no bad files in sccm_Inbox.

2. Tried to run Full SI instead of Delta (you know, deleting this 00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000002 class and rerun).

3. Tried to re-install SCCM client with complete uninstall and deleting all Windows\CCM folders (and reboot after every action).

4. Tried uninstall SCCM Client, remove device from console (SQL query showed zero results), add device back to SCCM, install the client (and reboot after every action).

5. Step 4 with checking WMI classes (and reboot after every action)...

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Well, after all the efforts the SQL query still shows me these damned, non-existing "c:\Somestuff\111.exe", "c:\Install\Somestuff\111.exe"!!

The only one way I've succeeded was the reinstall of Windows on one of "bad" device.  After that these obsolete files disappeared from DB and all other .exe were listed correct.

 

I'm sure for 101% that the problem is hidden somewhere in Windows. Does anyone have an idea where the information "is stuck" in OS and what can I try to get rid of it without reinstall of Windows?

Thank you for your time and ideas.

 

Sincerely,

Maestro

PS. And moreover! I don't see neither these folders nor files in Resource Explorer! I'm completely stuck here...

Edited July 28, 2020 by Maestro
Added PS

[GarthMJ]

First off SW inventory is NOT reliable, you should be using CI for this. 

Secondly, if your SW inventory runs for more than 4 hours it will NEVER send up update results. Yes is it very common for SW inventory to run for more than 4 hours runtime (not real time).

Third did you review the inventoryagent.log file to see how long it takes for SW? Did it complete? Are you sure? 

 

[Maestro]

Hello, Garth, thank you for your answer!

First of all I want to thank you for many of your articles! They were very useful for me when I was only entering SCCM space!

 

Yes, I know your opinion that SI is mostly useless in SCCM.

But I've very carefully examined the whole chain of logs. On the client side it took near 8K seconds to generate the log and file has been transferred to Server (1 server, 1 MP). On server side file has been received, processed and sent to DB with no errors.

And as I said before, this bug is detected only on several devices. And the bug disappeared (at least on one device) after OS reinstall.

 

[GarthMJ]

If you think it is a bug open a support case and microsoft will fix it.