All things SMS, System Center Configuration Manager, Active Directory, Group Policy, Virtualization, Security, Gadgets, Technology, and the Daily Thoughts of an SMS Engineer named Anthony Clendenen.

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More MMS Goodness

April 09, 2008

This is from the 1E site, but down towards the bottom you can see the schedule for demos at the 1E stand. I will be presenting at least a couple times. Brian Tucker and Neil Kimberly will also be presenting at the stand on other topics. If you think I know SMS/ConfigMgr then you haven't spent much time talking to Brian and Neil these guys are AMZAZING! 1E MMS Focus 1E will be exhibiting as a Gold Sponsor at the Microsoft Management Summit at the Venetian Hotel, Las Vegas from April 28 to May...  ... Read the full post or  be the first to comment. Filed under: , , , , , , , , ,

Attending MMS 2008? Yes I Am - We Are

March 27, 2008

I have gotten a ton of emails asking me if I am going to be at MMS this year and when and up until now I have held off because I was waiting for some things to finalize. But today 1E sent out an email to customer letting them know the booth number, and when Sumir, one of the founders of 1E, was going to speak. Which is right after the State of the Union, and also at the same time as Paul Thomsen is presenting his session on ConfigMgr Client Health. So yes , I will be there from Sunday to Friday afternoon...  ... Read the full post or  the first comment. Filed under: , , , , , , , , , ,

The Deployment Guys : ConfigMgr 2007 and Microsoft Deployment Toolkit - Video Walkthrough

March 20, 2008

ConfigMgr 2007 and Microsoft Deployment Toolkit - Video Walkthrough Are you struggling with setting up ConfigMgr 2007 Operating System Deployment and integrating MDT? - download and view the video walkthrough that shows you how to: Setup the server environment for ConfigMgr 2007 OS deployment Configure the ConfigMgr 2007 Site Settings Configure the ConfigMgr 2007 Computer Management Settings Configure the ConfigMgr 2007 Operating System Deployment Settings Setup and use MDT integration with ConfigMgr...  ... Read the full post or  be the first to comment. Filed under: , , , , , , , , , , ,

Nomad Enterprise Webcast - March 5

February 27, 2008

It is not often I blog about 1E, I think it has only happened once before actually. Even before I got an offer from them they told me they didn't want me to blog about them or their products because they didn't want my blog to turn into PR for 1E. And over the last year I have not talked about the products at all. But as you may have noticed the number of posts I put up have also dropped dramatically. Well I spend most of my time working with the 1E products, back when I was at ESRI I spent...  ... Read the full post or  be the first to comment. Filed under: , , , , , , , ,

SoftGrid 4.1 and 4.2 Updates Available for Download Now

February 19, 2008

Posted today over the SoftGrid Team Blog, you can now get the latest updates for SoftGrid 4.1 SP1 and 4.2 HFRU2 on TechNet. There are some pretty significant additions and changes in these updates. I am pleased to announce public availability of SoftGrid 4.1 SP1 and 4.2 HFRU2. This cumulative update for SoftGrid v4.1 SP1 and v4.2 provides the latest updates to SoftGrid. In addition to stability improvements, this update contains the following changes: The log level of the "Error reading from...  ... Read the full post or  be the first to comment. Filed under: , , , , ,

WAIK for Vista SP1 and Server 2008 and XP SP3 Dates

February 06, 2008

Hopefully you have heard by now that Vista SP1 and Server 2008 went RTM on Monday . But can you use these with OSD or MD? Well of course you can with the new version of WAIK. Also it is being reported that Vista SP1 goes live on Feb 18th or 19th and Windows XP SP3 goes live on March 23rd or 24th. Download details here direct download here (1.1 GB). Overview The Windows Automated Installation Kit (Windows AIK) is designed to help corporate IT professionals customize and deploy the Windows Vista and...  ... Read the full post or  be the first to comment. Filed under: , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Microsoft Deployment FAQ Online

January 26, 2008

Grab this link and bookmark it as the MD team will be updating the post as the FAQ grows. Lite Touch Installation Q: Is it possible to change the text IT Organization in the task sequence dialog box? A: Yes! You can set the variable _SMSTSORGNAME in the custom settings.ini to match the text you want to use. For example to set the text to Microsoft Corporation, add the following line to your customsettings.ini: _SMSTSORGNAME = Microsoft Corporation Q: What is the purpose of each of the task sequence...  ... Read the full post or  be the first to comment. Filed under: , , , , ,

New Microsoft Deployment Blog

January 26, 2008

Ben, Daniel, Jon, and other players to be named later, have combined forces to start a new blog on Deployment over on TechNet. Check it out here . Regards, Anthony Anthony Clendenen | Solutions Engineer | 1E http://configmgr.com © Anthony Clendenen  ... Read the full post or  be the first to comment. Filed under: , , ,

Top Ten Events in Systems Management During 2007

December 31, 2007

First of all, Happy New Year, and may everyone find that in 2008 that your glass is more than half full, you and your loved ones are all very healthy and overly happy, that your careers are very prosperous, and that you gain all that you desire and more. As we welcome another year and reflect on the year ending it is always nice to note what was the highlights of the year. So below is my personal top ten of 2007 when it comes to Systems Management. 10. Thursday, October 23rd, System Center Partner...  ... Read the full post or  the first comment. Filed under: , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Microsoft Deployment RC1 Fix

October 26, 2007

Mike didn't even mention this at dinner last night... Issues with Microsoft Deployment RC1 - October 25, 2007 The development team has isolated issues in the initial Microsoft Deployment RC1 build. Toolkit was throwing errors when Configure ConfigMgr Integration, Configure Management Pack or Configure WDS PXE Filter features were invoked. The errors occur because two files were not properly signed in the Microsoft Deployment RC1 release. We have released an updated build which contains these...  ... Read the full post or  be the first to comment. Filed under: , ,

Microsoft Deployment Release Candidate 1 Available for Download

October 24, 2007

The latest installment of BDD, code named Deployment 4, now named Microsoft Deployment (MD) is available for download on the Microsoft Connect site. This is the much anticipated version that integrates with ConfigMgr's OSD and is the next evolution of BDD. With this new version you can expect to have a single solution for the deployment of both desktops and servers as well as WDS, and ACT. See below for more details on what is included. Business Desktop Deployment (BDD) is now Microsoft Deployment...  ... Read the full post or  be the first to comment. Filed under: , , , , , , , , ,

System Center Configuration Manager 2007 Podcasts

October 06, 2007

On the System Center Configuration Manager site there is currently a list of five audiocast or podcasts that you can listen to. They are all fairly short and cover a specific area of ConfigMgr. Wally kicks it off with the best practices for upgrading and setup, and also discusses a few new features and prerequisites. I am sure they will add more to this over time so if you are reading this months after it has been posted use the bottom link to get to the page and see the whole list. NOTE: The links...  ... Read the full post or  the 2 comments. Filed under: , , , , , , , , , , , ,

BDD 2008 Beta 3 Available On Connect

September 17, 2007

The ConfigMgr compatible version of BDD (Beta 3), which I will call BDD 2008 for now, is available through open beta on the Connect site. The RTM version is expected to be out in November of this year. In this version there is the previously discussed multicasting , USMT, WAIK, and ACT 5.0. On Friday October 5th there is also a webcast on deploying an OS with ConfigMgr, you can register for it here . Official announcement below. Deployment 4 is the code name for the next version of Business Desktop...  ... Read the full post or  be the first to comment. Filed under: , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Multicasting in Server 2008

September 03, 2007

Kevin is right, this has already been talked about , but he does a nice job of explaining the two types of multicasting. Two drawbacks to this however...First you cannot multicast across subnets, well you can but if your network supports this you are wide open to a SQL Slammer type of attack where one laptop brings your network to its knees. Second, you have to have Server 2008 to make this work. A simple, less costly solution, that you can utilize now is to use the 1E OSD Plus Pack , or SMSNomad...  ... Read the full post or  the first comment. Filed under: , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

BDD 2007 Patch Proper Installation

June 16, 2007

In case you do not want to install BDD 2007 v 1.1 and just want the hotfix instead make sure you install it correctly. Ben Hunter and Michael Niehaus both point this out what could go wrong on their blogs. Be sure to use the correct installation command line as detailed by Michael Niehaus. If you do not install the patch in the correct manner you may find that it has changed your customized scripts or even updated the location of the distribution share in the registry. Here are some alternatives...  ... Read the full post or  the first comment. Filed under: , ,

Business Desktop Deployment 2007 v 1.1

June 08, 2007

Did you miss it? If so you can catch up . This includes a number of fixes and in case you don't want to download and install BDD again you can wait for the KB ( 937191 ) to come out and install it instead. Download details: Business Desktop Deployment 2007 Regards, Anthony Anthony Clendenen | Systems Engineer | 1E Inc. We are considered a premier SMS Solution Provider by Microsoft. See us at http://www.microsoft.com/smserver/partners "1E's tools add significant value to SMS in particular...  ... Read the full post or  be the first to comment. Filed under: , ,

Ben Hunter : Top Ten - Most Common BDD 2007 issues

May 18, 2007

What do you mean you still don't read Ben's blog? It is non-stop information all around BDD, all great, all packed with information, and updated regularly. To make it even easier for you to subscribe here is the RSS feed for his blog. Top Ten - Most Common BDD 2007 issues I see the same issues coming up over and over again with BDD 2007. So, I decided it was time for my own Top Ten List! Number 1. - Partitioning within the Unattend.xml BDD likes (no needs) to look after partitioning itself...  ... Read the full post or  the 2 comments. Filed under: , ,

Booting Your Vista Box From A WIM File Stored Locally

May 13, 2007

Let me first say Happy Mothers Day to all the wonderful Mothers out there hopefully you are having/had a superb Mothers Day!!! Today is Mothers Day in the US if you hadn't guessed. This is just amazing, this is the third time today that I have found someone already had a solution to a question I was asked just this last week. This is one, managing SMS clients in both workgroup and a domain, and problems with WinPE and RealTek drivers. This is a very cool solution to someone asking me something...  ... Read the full post or  be the first to comment. Filed under: , , , , , ,

BDD 2007 Source Code Available For Download!

April 14, 2007

Overview The Microsoft® Solution Accelerator for Business Desktop Deployment (BDD) is best-practice guidance for desktop deployment. BDD is targeted at companies that want to reduce deployment time, effort, and cost by increasing the level of automation. It allows administrators to deploy desktops with Zero Touch and Lite Touch interaction at the target PCs. This accelerator also helps organizations move to a managed environment with standardized desktop images. BDD 2007 was released in January 2007...  ... Read the full post or  be the first to comment. Filed under: , , ,

Windows Automated Installation Kit (WAIK) User's Guide for Windows Vista Updated

April 02, 2007

Direct download . From the readme... Contents Introduction to the Windows AIK Documentation Update 1................... 2 Critical Updates........................................................................... 2 Windows AIK Setup and Installation Known Issues.............................. 3 Windows Setup Known Issues........................................................ 3 General Windows Deployment Known Issues..................................... 5 Windows System Image Manager (Windows SIM...  ... Read the full post or  be the first to comment. Filed under: , , , ,

Johan's Vista Install Notes From The Field

March 30, 2007

Friday session. Deploying Vista 64 bit you must use 64 bit Windows PE, in Vista SP1 you can deploy 32 and 64 bit from the same version of PE. Vista image on the DVD is already Sysprep'd Bootmgr or bootmgr.exe reads BCD store first. Source folder - boot.wim is Windows PE 2.0, this includes the Windows recovery environment, which is not included in the WAIK version of PE. If you change boot index to 1, you will boot the recovery console or command prompt instead of PE GUI. Shift - F10 opens command...  ... Read the full post or  be the first to comment. Filed under: , ,

Microsoft Implements Multicast to Imaging - Finally!

February 08, 2007

If you have used multicast to image computers in the past you know it can be much faster than unicast, for obvious reasons. This is also one of the biggest complaints I hear about using RIS, or its replacement WDS. Well it looks like WDS is going to get multicast, and even a better multicast than what is available today. Read Keith's post below to get more details. Multicast imaging support coming to Longhorn Server Lets face it, our new deployment tools rock. However, one significant customer feature...  ... Read the full post or  the first comment. Filed under: ,

New SMS and Vista Virtual Labs

January 16, 2007

Deploying Windows Vista with SMS 2003 After completing this lab, you will be better able to: Install the SMS 2003 OS Deployment Feature Pack Update. Install USMT 3.0 to capture and restore user state information. Create an Image Capture Wizard CD. Image a Windows Vista client computer. Import the Windows Vista image into an SMS 2003 image package. Deploy the Windows Vista image to upgrade a Windows 2000 client computer. Windows Vista Image Engineering This lab is intended for IT professionals responsible...  ... Read the full post or  the 3 comments. Filed under: , , , ,

Building and Deploying Vista from an Image

November 28, 2006

Aaron has put together a great list of resources for building a Vista image. If you have not used Vista, or read about it, the install process as well as how the OS is built is different than XP and prior OS’s. In addition with the new OSD FP/USMT we move to .xml files, but probably the most interesting technology so far is WAIK. WAIK will allow you to edit an image without having to lay it down on a system and then recreate the image. You for got a driver, want to add that new company standard...  ... Read the full post or  the 3 comments. Filed under: , , , ,