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Introduction to Wi-Fi Profiles in Configuration Manager

 

Updated: June 26, 2015

Applies To: System Center 2012 Configuration Manager SP2, System Center 2012 R2 Configuration Manager, System Center 2012 R2 Configuration Manager SP1

Note

The information in this topic applies to System Center 2012 R2 Configuration Manager and System Center 2012 R2 Configuration Manager SP1.

Use Wi-Fi profiles in System Center 2012 Configuration Manager to deploy wireless network settings to users in your organization. By deploying these settings, you minimize the end-user effort required to connect to the wireless network.

For example, you installed a new Wi-Fi network named Contoso Wi-Fi. You now want to provision all devices that run the iOS operating system with the settings required to connect to this network. You can create a Wi-Fi profile containing the settings necessary to connect to the Contoso Wi-Fi wireless network. Then, you can deploy this profile to all users that have devices that run iOS in your hierarchy. Users of iOS devices see the company network in the list of wireless networks and can readily connect to this network.

You can configure the following device types with Wi-Fi profiles:

  • Devices that run Windows 8.1 32-bit

  • Devices that run Windows 8.1 64-bit

  • Devices that run Windows RT 8.1

  • Devices that run Windows Phone 8.1

    Warning

    To support Windows Phone 8.1, you must install the optional Windows Phone 8.1 extension. For information on how to install the extension, see Planning to Use Extensions in Configuration Manager.

  • IPhone devices that run iOS 5, iOS 6, iOS 7 and iOS 8

  • IPad devices that run iOS 5, iOS 6, iOS 7 and iOS 8

  • Android devices that run version 4

Important

To deploy profiles to Android, iOS, Windows Phone, and enrolled Windows 8.1 devices, these devices must be enrolled into Microsoft Intune. For information about how to get your devices enrolled, see Manage mobile devices with Microsoft Intune.

When you create a Wi-Fi profile, you can include a wide range of security settings. These include certificates for server validation and client authentication that have been provisioned by using Configuration Manager certificate profiles. For more information about certificate profiles, see Certificate Profiles in Configuration Manager.

What’s New in System Center 2012 R2 Configuration Manager

Note

The information in this section also appears in the Getting Started with System Center 2012 Configuration Manager guide.

Wi-Fi profiles are new in System Center 2012 R2 Configuration Manager. They provide the following capabilities and have some dependent configurations:

  • Deployment of Wi-Fi profiles that provision devices with the settings and certificates that they need to access corporate Wi-Fi hotspots.

  • Supported devices include those that run iOS, Windows 8.1 and Windows RT 8.1, and Android.