In most cases, this ends up being a symptom, rather than a root-level problem. For example, when a Client isn’t properly assigned, it won’t report inventory information back to the appropriate Management Point.

David is an author and consultant, working for Endurance IT Services in Virginia Beach, Virginia, specializing in Microsoft enterprise systems and Business Process Automation.

Symptoms ^

Clients fail to report inventory or fail to appear in the console entirely
Clients do not update old inventory data within expected intervals
The same computer appears multiple times with different Resource ID numbers

Potential causes ^

Improper Site Assignment
Improper or missing Fallback Status Point Assignment
Improper Proxy Server Assignment for Internet Clients
Network connectivity issues
Corrupted or Faulty Client installation
Antivirus on-demand scanning interference
DNS or WINS name resolution issues
Underlying system issues (hardware, dependencies like WMI, BITS, .NET, etc.)

Items 1 through 4 tend to be most common, with the remaining items less common or rare. I include them because I have seen them play a role in interfering with Client inventory and status reporting.

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Suggestions ^

Check the logs in the Client’s log folder (%windir%\System32\ccm\logs, or %windir%\syswow64\ccm\logs, for 64-bit clients). I tend to look in LocationServices.log first, which helps identify whether or not the Client is finding the Management Point.
Other Client logs to check include the InventoryAgent.log, which records inventory processing, as well as PolicyAgent.log and PolicyAgentProvider.log, which track policy change requests and policy updates from the Management Point.
The StatusAgent.log file can also help troubleshoot general Client operational issues. There are other logs as well which can help identify root causes for Client inventory reporting issues, which are explained on the first link provided below.