System Center Configuration Manager 2012 - OS Deployment Fails with Error 0x80004005

 

Some administrators may experience an error when trying to deploy an OS image using System Center Configuration Manager. Upon attempting to deploy the OS, a generic error is returned that does not indicate a specific cause, simply "Failed to Run Task Sequence - An error occurred while starting the task sequence. 0x80004005". Similar to this:

This error will be thrown before any portions of the task sequence begin at all.

In this case, check the clock in the BIOS of the affected machine and ensure that it is set to match the time in the forest where the SCCM server is located. Once this is changed, the deployment should continue successfully.