Today I found an interesting web video from MokaFive’s CTO “John Whaley” on Virtual Desktop (http://www.mokafive.com/solutions/it-administrators.php).  He does a good job explaining the differences between deploying a virtual desktop on a server (such as Microsoft Hyper-V, although he didn’t call out any product) versus deploying a “master image” onto a desktop.  Again, he didn’t call out an one product, but I’m assuming he’s trying to get viewers to lean towards their “Live PC” solution.

John calls out the following Pro and Con’s for a Server based solution:

1. Pro- Management
2. Con- No offline
3. Con- Expensive
4. Con- User Experience

I can’t disagree with that list, but it obviously lacking some of the disadvantages for the other side (running the virtual machine on the desktop).

1. Con – Security: This is no different then a regular PC.  If the laptop get’s lost or stolen, how to you ensure that the data is secure or gets wiped.
2. Con – Bandwidth: Although the user isn’t getting screen refreshes across the wire like in a Server deployed Virtual Desktop solution, you still need to get your updates across the wire.  Again, no different than a typical PC, but now you could get updates for TWO pc’s.  The base OS and the VM.
3. Con – Hardware: Now that you’re going to run yet ANOTHER OS (remember the base OS) on a single machine, does that PC have the power to do it?  If not, you’ll need to purchase new hardware (there again we have more management and IT headaches) or upgrade the hardware (IT now has to touch a machine…expensive)
4. Con – Performance: The performance of the Virtual Desktop is now dependant on the underlying hardware.

To be fair here, this is the same kind of issues that you get with any Virtual Desktop solution that runs on the client’s machine.  Another good example of this is a solution from Microsoft called “Microsoft Enterprise Desktop Virtualization” (MED-V).  It leverages Microsoft Virtual PC on the client end to run the “Virtual Desktop”.  By using Microsoft Virtual PC (VPC) alone, you can deploy a Virtual Desktop to a number of machines.  But that doesn’t give you the centralized management out of the box such as MokaFive.  In order to get that level of management, you’ll need to use a combination of Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager and the Microsoft Deployment solution accelerator.  What Microsoft does with MED-V is allow the user to have multiple OS’s running on the same hardware, but the end-user only “sees” the base installed OS and the Shortcuts to the applications running on the OS “under the covers”.  To the end user, they get the best of both worlds (now I hear Hannah Montana in my head due to my daughter Sophia singing all the time….back to article).  The user still gets to use their existing applications PLUS the managed applications provided by IT.  There are a number of good reasons to go this way, you can read more about that from Microsoft (http://www.microsoft.com/windows/enterprise/products/med-v.aspx).

The VDI solution between MokaFive and MED-V are a bit different, except that they both run on the client machine.  So now the REAL questions is, “Is it better to have a Virtual Desktop run on a Server or a Client machine?”  The answer is the favorite for all consultants, like myself.  “It Depends”.  The reason is because it depends on the end-user scenario, budget, hardware, and more.  In reality, you could do both.  By leveraging the Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack (MDOP), you get access to MED-V as well as “Microsoft Application Virtualization” (APP-V) which simplifies the deployment of applications across traditional PC/OS deployments to terminal servers and virtual desktops.

To close, there are a number of virtual technologies in the market place today and growing focused on Virtual Desktops and how to best handle application deployment, management of the OS, and User State.  You need to first look at your end-user scenarios and then shop around for the right technology.  From experience, I strongly suggest you also take a look at your existing Microsoft licenses.  You may find you already have much, if not all, of the licenses you’ll need in order to do what you want.

Follow me on Twitter: http://twitter.com/agramont/

Disclaimer: While there are many products and technologies for VDI, including VMWare and Citrix, I’ll stay focused on using all Microsoft products…for now.

For the past few years I’ve been talking to many customers about the benefits of Virtualization.  Not just for servers using Microsoft Hyper-V, but also Application Virtualization and Desktop Virtualization.  Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) has been around for a number of years.  Many people think of this as Terminal Services.  I guess that’s partially right since it is a desktop for an end user that is processed on a remote server.  With Terminal Services(TS), it’s a single Server OS instance and each user connecting to that TS shares the same OS instance with all of the other users.  What the end user gets is their own “Session”.  Is it their own desktop?  Kinda.  It’s still a Server OS and there are issues with some software compatibility.

This is were VDI is a bit different.  With VDI, you still have a number of end-users connecting to a given server, but now they connect into their own independent instance of an operating system.  The server itself is doing Server Virtualization, but in the case of VDI it’s virtualization the client OS instance.

There are many articles and blog posts that talk about all of this, so I won’t go any further into the glories of VDI.  The purpose of this blog post/series is to document my journey in building a VDI solution using the following components

Hardware

• Physical Server A – This is my main virtualization server.  I’ll talk more about this later.
• Dell PowerEdge R300 (1U)
• Intel Xeon Quad-Core L5410 2.33GHz
• 24GB RAM
• OS Drive: 250GB SATA * 2 (Mirrored)
• Operating System: Windows Server 2008 R2 (Release Candidate)
• Physical Server B – This is my storage server.  I wanted to get the best performance I could on the virtual machines.  My big bottleneck was disk I/O.  In previous labs, I had server A configured for Hyper-V and the virtual machines where on an External USB Drive.  The throughput of USB was killing my performance and the USB Enclosure kept running into weird issues.  Thus, I needed a better option.  I built a “Server” based on a Barebones configuration via TigerDirect.  Via my MSDN Subscription, I downloaded and deployed Windows Storage Server 2008 (SP2) on the new box.  This gave me the ability for ISCSI support which I then used to for my Virtual Machine storage on Server A.
• Bar Bone Server purchased via TigerDirect.com
• AMD Phenom 9500 Quad-Core 2.20 GHz
• 4GB RAM
• OS Drive: 1 TB SATA 7200rpm
• Data Drive: 1.5 TB SATA 7200rpm * 3 in a RAID 5 configuration
• Operating System: Windows Storage Server 2008 (SP2)
• TrendNet Wireless Router – This is my wireless router (separate from my home wireless network..more on that later).  It was pretty cheap on TigerDirect, but more importantly its also a Gigabit Ethernet Switch as well.  This is the main firewall and connection to the Internet.  I’m thinking this could be an issue for me down the road because of the lack of Firewall features (E.g. mapping a host header to a given virtual machine), but I’ll tackle that when I need to.

Software

• Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack (MDOP)
• Application Virtualization
• Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager 2007 R2 (SCCM)
• Microsoft System Center Operations Manager 2007 R2 (SCOM)
• Microsoft System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008 R2 (VMM)
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2
• Microsoft Windows Storage Server 2008
• Microsoft Windows 7

In building out this lab, I’ll be using the “Step-by-Step” guides provided by Microsoft, but I’ll of course go a bit off script and I’ll post what those are later.

• Installing Remote Desktop Session Host Step-by-Step Guide (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=147293)
• Deploying Remote Desktop Web Access with Remote Desktop Connection Broker Step-by-Step Guide (http://gos.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=131928)
• Deploying Virtual Desktop Pools by Using Remote Desktop Web Access Step-by-Step Guide (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=147907)
• Deploying Personal Virtual Desktops by Using Remote Desktop Web Access Step-by-Step Guide (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=147908)
• Deploying Personal Virtual Desktops by Using RemoteApp and Desktop Connection Step-by-Step Guide (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=154800)
• Deploying a Virtual Desktop Pool by Using RemoteApp and Desktop Connection Step-by-Step Guide (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=154803)

My goal is not to re-document the steps in those guides, but do document any issues or improvements that I find along the way.  At the end of all of this, I want an environment that I can show to customers how VDI works and it’s benefits.  My next major goal is getting a partnership with ChipPC or Wyse so i can leverage their cool devices for a wicked on-premise demo.  I think that would be much better than just a PowerPoint.

Stay tuned for more…  (Post any suggestions or questions) 

Follow Me on Twitter: http://twitter.com/agramont/

The intent of this series of blogs is to provide a basic guideline for Service Providers looking to offer CRM as a target platform for ISV’s looking to deploy their application on the Internet as a Software as a Service (SaaS) model.  It’s also a guide for ISV’s to understand that the design decisions they make during development will have a profound impact on their available hosting with regards to deployment architectures and pricing.

• Part 1: Introduction
• Part 2: CRM as an Application or Platform
• Part 3: Shared or Virtualization Deployment & Licensing
• Part 4: Provisioning & Control Panels
• Part 5: Making the Leap

Introduction

With the release of Microsoft Dynamics CRM 4.0 (MSCRM4), Microsoft has provided not only a great CRM application, but also a business application platform.  There are many software vendors and consulting organizations that have already leveraged MSCRM4 in the traditional deployment where the application or solution is installed locally on a customers server.  This scenario is typically called “On-Premise”.  While this deployment model works great for some customers, many business departments are looking to gain access to applications that improve their business, but without the hassle and cost of deployment and operations within their IT department.  It's not that an IT department can't handle new applications, but it takes time, money, and knowledge to add a new application into the business.  Business applications that are hosted on the Internet and accessible via a traditional browser is known as “Software as a Service” (SaaS).  The business world is all abuzz about SaaS and it’s potential impact to deliver rich applications to departments, on-demand, with a monthly fee, and without the need for upfront deployment or hardware costs.  Sounds Great, right?  Well for some scenarios it is pretty great, but there are a number of other reasons why this might not be so hot (e.g. Security, Internet Outage, Performance, End User Training, etc.).

Here are some examples of where the SaaS deployment model is so interesting for many customers:

1. Trial – Your software may be great and the value is high, but how will the customer know if they can’t try it in all it’s glory?  Sure they could download the software and use it, but not it requires hardware, time, and the knowledge to get it installed and configured.  With the SaaS based model, they can get access to your application instantly!  Even if they are interested in an on-premise deployment, they can at least get the feel for it right away which will help with their buying decision.
2. Temporary Usage – Some customers may decide that they do want the on-premise version.  This could be for any number of reasons the customer may have or because your on-premise version has more capabilities (e.g. integration with a VOIP solution, devices, etc.) than the SaaS version.  In this scenario, the customer goes beyond the trial online and wants to continue to use it.  Let’s say it’s going to take six months for the customers IT team to purchase, deploy, and operationalize [killing the English language] an environment for the on-premise version.  So until then, the customer uses the SaaS version.  This gives the customer some flexibility in their deployment, instant access to the application which will improve their business, and increases your sales and revenue.
3. Migrations – I’m sure you’d seen a number of customers that would LOVE to go to a new version of a software application they’ve been using, but the time and cost to upgrade hardware, update the data, and learn the new platform is just too much for them.  This is another great scenarios for SaaS to meet the business needs of the customer, removing the strain on their IT department, and increasing revenue for you (SaaS Vendor).
4. SaaS Everything – There is a growing trend for many organizations to outsource more and more of their applications.  Well, that’s what the industry says at least.  For those businesses, you at least need to have SaaS as a delivery option for them or you may lose some business.

There are a number of Service Providers out there today that are offering hosted solutions for Microsoft Exchange Server (for consumer and business mail), Windows Server (for web hosting with Internet Information Server which is part of Windows Server), SQL Server (for databases), and SharePoint Services (for document and information collaboration).  MSCRM4 is a natural extension for Service Providers to also offer this service.  While there is much competition in the space of CRM systems on the Internet, including the current leader Salesforce.com, MSCRM4 is easily configurable, extensible, and leverages the Microsoft .NET Framework which will enable the army of Microsoft developers hooked on their Microsoft Visual Studio development environment to build rich business applications.

When developing software, the sky is the limit!  Especially when developing on the Microsoft platform and technologies, but you must be careful that you follow some basic guidelines to ensure your application can be hosted as a SaaS application and meet your target business objectives.  There is much to consider and I hope you find the rest of this series helpful.

Note: If there are specific areas you’d like me to cover in future posts, please post a comment below or contact me here.

As many of you may already know, I stated a new consulting company named , “Agramont Services”.  For over 10 years in the IT and Hosting business, I thought it would be pretty simple to have all of my IT needs in order to get my business on the Internet and all of the other IT requirements.  Man, what a headache.  It’s not that setting all of this is hard, but it still requires some research time to figure out what you want to do.  Below is my quick and dirty list of the various websites and services that I used when starting my business. 

• Domain Name: Misk
• Pricing: $10 per domain/per year
• You need this to get your http://www.myWEBSITEandEMAILaddress.com/
• Website: Aspnix.com
• Pricing: $77.70 (Shared Web Hosting, Personal Plan)
• Services Provided
• IIS 7 - 7 sites, 10 GB Data
• SQL Server 2005 – 3 DB, 2 GB
• SQL Server 2008 – 1 DB, 2 GB
• DNS Domain Management
• Business Email: Microsoft Online Services (Trial) – When I was looking for a Hosted Exchange offering, I thought Microsoft’s platform
• Pricing: Per User/Month: $15.00 (There are lots of other options and price plans, but this was the one I was evaluating)
• Exchange Server 2007
• SharePoint Serer 2007
• Live Meeting Server
• Business Email: Sherweb Hosting (Purchases)
• Pricing: Per User/Month: $8.95
• Exchange Server 2007
• Minimum Accounts: 1  (we purchased 2).
• ActiveSync to connect to your Windows Mobile device: Included
• Blackberry support ((Activation Fee: $29.95) $9.95/month ).  I didn’t need this, but maybe you do.
• SharePoint Serer 2007
• Includes 100 MB Site (of course you can pay for more.
• Live Meeting Server
• Corporate Instant Messaging and Presence
• Web Conferences (audio only available when using the client)
• Audio Conference is NOT included
• Audio Bridge: ConferenceCalls.com
• Pricing: $30 (This is just what I purchased.  Your pricing will vary depending on a number of variables)
• I found these guys to provide a really low price and the service worked great
• Rates (US):
• 2.7¢ / min. Toll & Dial Out
• 3.7¢ / min. Toll-Free Dial In
• Call Routing: 800PBX
• Pricing: $9.99 for 300 minutes
• Have a professional 800,866,888 phone number for your business
• Defining extensions that will then connect a call to your mobile, home, or other phone number.
• Includes Voicemail, customized “announcements” during connection wait times.
• Audio/Web Bridge: Go To Meeting
• Pricing: Per User/Month: $49.95
• Unlimited audio/web Conferences per month
• Integration with Outlook Clients
• Faxing: OneSuite 
• Pricing: Per User/Month: $49.95
• Faxes are forwarded to up to five email accounts
• Unlimited incoming
• Unlimited Outgoing

So here is the short story.  I started out with the Microsoft offering for Hosted Exchange using a Trial service.  The bad part is they require a minimum of 5 accounts for their top package which includes SharePoint and Office Communication Server.  Since I only needed two accounts, I went with a different hoster.  Also, I used the Audio Bridge Service from http://www.conferencecalls.com/ for a few weeks and then I went with http://GoToMeeting.com for my audio and web conferencing needs.  Because of that, I removed the previous costs from the monthly and annual service.

This is what I used to get me started, but it doesn’t mean that it’s the best option for you or required for your kind of business.  I didn’t include the cost for a P.O. Box (I use UPS Store), Phone (I used Vonage), Bookkeeping, etc.  I hope to post about those topics soon.

Have questions? Post a comment!  Found a better service? Post a comment!

I was on the “US East Region Breadth Monthly Partner Call” today and they provided some cool resources.  Some of you may be wondering what this call is all about.  Microsoft is always been known as having a strong partner channel.  The provide a number of resources (some listed below) that are they to help partners connect with customers and provide high valued planning, deployment, and operational support to clients.  While the program isn’t always the best, they constantly strive to improve and adapt to the market demands, even in the current economic climate.

On a monthly basis, the U.S. East Region team for Microsoft focused on breadth partners have a call to provide an update on programs and incentives for partners.  Below are some of the resources they discussed on the call and I thought I’d share.

• Small Business Center: http://www.microsoft.com/smallbusiness/hub.mspx
• Resources for small businesses.
• Local Engagement Toolkit: https://www.microsoft.com/smallbusiness/local/partner/default.aspx
• Resource site for Microsoft partners looking to do business directly within your local markets
• Get access to marketing materials and connection information
• Connect directly with Microsoft business development managers
• MS Local Widget: http://www.mslocalwidget.com/
• Provides small business related content that you can put on your site with the HTML code they provide.
• Microsoft will keep updating the content for you.  Now you can have even more compelling small business content on your site for FREE!
• U.S. Licensing Boot Camps: https://partner.microsoft.com/us/40059924#register
• Microsoft is providing local licensing bootcamps as well as a virtual version
• Even if you’re not a LAR, all SI’s should still now licensing.  It ensures you have a better grasp of the financial impacts of your solution for the customer and could also impact your end architecture.
• One resource that was not mentioned was the Microsoft Gear Up Site (http://www.ms-gearup.com/home.asp).  It provides tons of great information on Microsoft licensing.
• Microsoft Incentives: http://www.microsoftincentives.com/
• Central location for all Microsoft licensing “deals”
• This is a great resource when looking to maximize your customers budget.  The less they pay in software, the more than can pay with you.
• gamePlan: http://microsoftgameplan.com/uspartner/
• Marketing materials focused on selling your solutions and Microsoft products during the recession
• Microsoft VAR Partner Connect: https://partner.microsoft.com/us/salesmarketingsection/usregions/40060475
• One stop shop for all Microsoft partner related materials for training, marketing, and selling.
• Security Software Advisor Program: https://www.forefrontsecurityrewards.com/ 
• In short, this is a Rebate program!  Up to 30% of the Forefront purchase sent to you directly from Microsoft
• If you influence the customer in purchasing Forefront Security deals AND do the deployment, you’ll get the “rebate”

If this looks like a lot to learn, but you’d like to have someone on your team to help make sense of this for your business, then you should look at Agramont Services for guidance.  http://agramontservices.com/

I’m thrilled to announce that I have created a new company named, “Agramont Services, LLC” which is based in Fredericksburg, Virginia and focused on my many passions.  The focused on the new company is to provide strategic IT consulting services to Enterprises, Hosters, ISV’s, and Microsoft Partners.  Check out the website for the “Business” scoop on the company.

http://www.agramontservices.com/

“Why start Agramont Services?” is a question I’m sure you’re asking.  When I was at Microsoft here in the Washington D.C. area, my role was focused on helping Microsoft’s upper mid-market account and working with local managed partners to get them ready on Microsoft’s latest products.  It was a great role and an awesome team to work with, but I also saw something else in the marketplace and a niche I thought I could fill. Often times there is a Chicken & Egg moment when it comes to Microsoft’s new products, customer awareness, and Microsoft partner readiness.  While Microsoft pushes forward with their new products, Microsoft partners aren’t ready because customers aren’t demanding it.  Since customers aren’t demanding it, because their trusted partners haven’t told them about it.  Ugh.

A key area of focus of mine is to work directly with partners to help drum up customer demand on their behalf and at the same time reducing their risk and costs since they don’t have to pull a billable resource off of the bench to do this.  They just pay Agramont Services (ok…me).

“What about Hosting?” is a question I’m getting a lot.  While I’d like to deliver more of my services with clients in the local Washington D.C. metro area (and possibly the entire U.S. east region), I’ve decided to also focus on the hosting and Software as a Service (SaaS) market.  On the hosting side, the traditional web, database, and email hosting is a commodity.  My focus will be on the emerging technologies such as Cloud computing, Virtualization, Hosted Unified Communications, and SaaS applications.  There are many traditional software vendors that are looking to move their application to a SaaS model (some of whom I’ve already done some work with) and I plan on offering my services to help them make that transition.

My goal is to have a balance between project based services and “Micro-Consulting”/Retainer based services.  There are many customers that have a specific need and they only want your for specific delivers.  That’s fine and I’m happy to do that work.  But there is a growing market (especially with all of the layoffs, budget reductions, etc.) to have consultants available for a variety of services on a fixed-monthly fee (Micro-Consulting).  I’m hoping I can make Micro-Consulting a core component of my business.  I like the thought of having a consistent customer relationship and with a predictable monthly revenue stream.  We’ll see how that goes.

Please visit the website and contact me if you have any projects you’d like to discuss or perhaps you’d like my expertise on-call via my “Micro-Consulting” service.

- Conrad

I’ve been doing development on the Microsoft platform for quite some time, including web development.  Internally we had an interesting discussion on what are the various web development tools and technologies from Microsoft and how does a developer get up to speed.  This could be because their coming from a different platform (e.g. PHP) or perhaps they just haven’t freshen up their Microsoft skills in quite some time.  This got me thinking and I wrote the below text with this in mind.  This either points out the obvious or it could help someone learning to tap into the Microsoft products, tools, and communities.  It’s not obvious where to start, so lets see if this helps….

I’m a Microsoft developer and have been for quite some time, but I’ve been focused on developing on the “old stuff” for quite some time.  Let’s say its Active Server Pages (ASP) code running on Windows Server 2000 and SQL Server 2000.  Yup, that’s pretty old.  I’d like to start developing on the latest technologies, so a quick trip to http://www.microsoft.com/web/default.aspx shows me all of the various technologies that I can chose.  So to start, I downloaded Visual Studio 2000 Express Edition which gives me quite a lot.  It includes a developer IDE (Visual Studio Express) and a database (SQL Server 2008 Express).  You can download each component individually (what a pain) or use a new tools name “Microsoft Web Platform Installer” which will install everything using a single installer (thank heavens).  Using Visual Studio Express, I can build powerful web applications using ASP.NET code.  I can even build a build the application using AJAX since it’s part of ASP.NET. 

Microsoft provides a variety of communities to gain additional knowledge around their technologies.  When building a web application, I can post questions to the Microsoft ASP.NET or IIS.net community.  There are other communities which are cool when it comes to Microsoft providing a bit of a peek inside of the machine as their own staff tells us some juicy details on their technologies that aren’t really available in a technical article via their main development portal, Microsoft Developer Network (MSDN).  Their Channel9 website (when flying on an airplane, channel 9 is the audio feed between the pilots and ground control) provides a number of blog, videos, and podcasts for developers.  The Channel10 feed is really less developer focused, but shows off a lot of the cool stuff that Microsoft is working on.  Keep an eye on both of these since you never know when something is very developer related.

This is great stuff, but it lacks a bit in regards to providing a rich interactive experience for my end user.  This is something that Adobe Flash has, but I don’t want to pick up another development language (Adobe ActionScript).  So in steps in Microsoft Expression which gives me access to design tools for building graphics (Expression Design), Windows Applications (Expression Blend), the web front end to my application (Expressions Web), and even media (Expression Media).  By using Expressions Blend, I can now build rich interactive applications that is built on the Microsoft Silverlight platform.  Silverlight allows you to build applications that are, well, Flash-like, but you can develop it using a Microsoft .NET language and development environment that you’re already familiar with. So you, or your designer buddy, can build the graphics and interactive experience using Microsoft Expression Blend on Silverlight and then you can do the background work (e.g. database access, authentication, etc) using Visual Studio.  Same codebase, same project file, but each role (developer or designer) using what they know best.  This removes the need to throw code and functions over the wall.  I hate it when a web developer create an awesome web page and dumps me the HTML to then slice and mingle into my code.  The first drop isn’t too bad, but when there are HTML changes, I have to then dissect it and figure out what to change in my many components.  If only we could work from the same files! (light bulb) Yes, that’s Microsoft Expression Web (for the designer) and Visual Studio (for the developer).

Now that my application is really taking off, I need more developers, designer, and testers to contribute.  I’ve moved beyond what’s inside of Microsoft Visual Studio Express (oh, did I forget that so far everything I’ve been using is free? Except for Microsoft Expression), so now I need to move to the professional version of Visual Studio 2008.  Yes this costs money, but now I’m doing more serious coding and I’m doing team coding. Lucky for me (I guess), Microsoft has “Visual Studio Team System 2008 Team Suite” which enables an entire development team to collaborate on development projects with Source Control, Testing Suite, Code Analysis, and more included.  Oh, and since I started my code on Visual Studio Express, I don’t have to redo any of my current project in order to quickly take advantage of what Visual Studio Team System has to offer me.

A few months afterwards I was ready to take some of my newly developed web applications onto the web.  The next step was finding a web hosting provider that was able to manage the web platform for me.  There are a number of Microsoft web hosting partners available, so I took a look at http://www.microsoft.com/hosting/findahostingprovider.mspx .  All of these offer just about the same level of support and pricing, but I think I want something that offers a better job at offering me a flexible web platform.  This is where the new Microsoft Azure Services Platform comes into play.  It integrates directly within Visual Studio, provides a staging platform (local and in the cloud) to test my application, and a production environment that allows me to quickly span my application to a number of computer nodes based on my demand.  While that requires me to redesign my application a bit, I’ll put that off for now and concentrate on that for future application.  Hey, maybe my existing application can be deployed onsite with the customer or at a traditional web hosting provider and I can use the Azure Services Platform to provide additional functionality to my customers on-demand.  Again, a thought for a later revision.

So where do I go from here?   Well  since most of my development work is web based, a great event for me to attend will be the Microsoft Mix event which is held in Las Vegas.  Mix focuses on content which focus on the web developer and designer.  They not only show off what’s available today, but also what’s coming out within the next 6-18 months.  It’s very different than the Microsoft Professional Developers Conference (PDC) which focuses on development across all of the various Microsoft products and technologies.  A cool event, but learning how to develop against Microsoft Surface isn’t really on the radar of a web developer.

What’s that PHP dude?  You’re not sure where you fit in (it’s like high school all over again)?  Microsoft has figured out that you most likely build your PHP application on Windows and deploy on Linux.  That’s why they developed “FastCGI” that allows you to still develop on PHP, but run it on Windows…faster! And you can run mySQL on Windows Server 2008 and there is a Microsoft SQL Server 2005 driver for PHP.  So there you go.

Now there you go Ruby on Rails developers, you want some Microsoft love too, right?  (Stop booing and hissing)  Microsoft has developed “IronRuby” which is a Ruby language implementation that will run on the Microsoft .NET Framework.  Thus you’re now part of the Microsoft developer love fest!  Enjoy.

Anyhow, while my progression through the Microsoft development track for web developers seems smooth (but via a long a winding road), it’s still challenging for a developer looking to regain their Microsoft developer edge or a Linux/Java/PHP/etc. developer looking to crack their way into this cool platform.  I could make this problem even greater by taking into account that I can build interactive applications for Windows using Windows Forms, Windows Presentation Framework and leveraging what’s new with Windows Vista or Windows 7.  You want more issues?  How about expanding the scope of my application to leverage the Windows Mobile platform or take advantage of new device platforms like Microsoft Surface (be sure to check this out!).  The good news in all of this is that the core development environment stays the same, it’s Microsoft Visual Studio.  The language, well you get to choose what you like best, so long as it’s a Microsoft .NET Framework based language and there are plenty to go around.

In order to help customers get a better understanding of the value of some of our newly release products, we have created a series of webcasts to help bring some introductions to those products.  Below is a list of the sessions.  Click on the link to find out more about the session and to register for the event.

Microsoft Virtualization Strategy and Roadmap
4/10/2008 4:00 PM (EST)
http://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/WebCastEventDetails.aspx?EventID=1032375021&EventCategory=4&culture=en-US&CountryCode=US

Win2008 Series: Readiness & Deployment
4/17/2008 4:00 PM (EST)
http://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/WebCastEventDetails.aspx?EventID=1032375025&EventCategory=4&culture=en-US&CountryCode=US

Microsoft Desktop Optimization
4/23/2008 10:00 AM (EST)
http://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/WebCastEventDetails.aspx?EventID=1032375014&EventCategory=4&culture=en-US&CountryCode=US

Win2008 Series: Managing a branch office
4/25/2008 10:00 AM (EST)
http://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/WebCastEventDetails.aspx?EventID=1032375028&EventCategory=4&culture=en-US&CountryCode=US

Win2008 Series: IIS 7 Management
5/2/2008 10:00 AM (EST)
http://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/WebCastEventDetails.aspx?EventID=1032375036&EventCategory=4&culture=en-US&CountryCode=US

SQL Server 2008 Preview
5/22/2008 10:00 AM (EST)
http://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/WebCastEventDetails.aspx?EventID=1032375041&EventCategory=4&culture=en-US&CountryCode=US

Win2008 Series: Network Access Protection
5/30/2008 10:00 AM (EST)
http://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/WebCastEventDetails.aspx?EventID=1032375045&EventCategory=4&culture=en-US&CountryCode=US

Win2008 Series: Terminal Services
6/6/2008 11:00 AM (EST)
https://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/WebCastEventDetails.aspx?EventID=1032375759&EventCategory=4&culture=en-US&CountryCode=US

Next Generation Web: Designers, Developers, Administrators Unite!
6/13/2008 10:00 AM (EST)
http://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/WebCastEventDetails.aspx?EventID=1032375058&EventCategory=4&culture=en-US&CountryCode=US

Win2008 Series: Hyper-V + System Center Virtual Machine Manager v.Next
6/20/2008 10:00 AM (EST)
http://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/WebCastEventDetails.aspx?EventID=1032375063&EventCategory=4&culture=en-US&CountryCode=US

Once the sessions are done, I'll update this post with the links to go back and watched the recorded sessions.

As noted in a previous post, I deployed a demo environment leveraging Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V.  While this worked pretty good, I wasn't able to run all of the virtual machines at the same time due to insufficient memory (yes, even 8 GB wasn't enough), so I decided to leverage some additional laptops that I had lying about.  And even use another machine that's pretty decent and currently used as my home Windows Home Server machine (it has plenty of extra power).  So here is what the new deployment looks like:

• Name: HomeHyperv01
• Dell Precision 690 (Intel Quad-Core, 8GB RAM) [Workstation]
• Windows Server 2008 with Hyper-V in Full Installation  (Plan on changing this to Server Core when Hyper-V goes RTM)
• Images
• DPM01
• IW01 - Exchange Server 2007 (will look at replacing this soon as this copy is based on Win2003 + Exch2007 x32 Trial Edition)
• MGMT01 - All System Center, MDOP, and ForeFront products
• Plat01 - Windows Server 2003 (Virtual Server 2005 R2)
• SQL01 - SQL Server 2005
• Name: HomeHyperv02
• Dell Inspiron (AMD Turion64, 2 GB RAM) [Laptop]
• Windows Server 2008 with Hyper-V in Full Installation
• Images
• AD01, Domain Controller for DemoCorp
• HomeDC, Domain Controller for Home Network
• Name: HomeHyperv03
• HP Compaq nc8430 (Intel Core Duo Centrino, 4 GB RAM) [Laptop]
• Windows Server 2008 with Hyper-V in Server Core
• Images
• IW02 - MOSS & OCS
• SQL02 - SQL Server 2008
• Name: Server
• Custom Machine (Dual CPU, Intel Xeon 2.8 Ghz, 4 GB RAM) [Workstation]
• Windows Home Server
• Images
• WinXP01 - Windows XP
• Vista01 - Windows Vista

In order to help with my overall management, I put all of the servers in a Domain called "Home.local", except for the server named, "Server" which is my "Windows Home Server" as WHS can't join a domain.  Bummer.

My next project/blog post is to deploy Microsoft ForeFront Client Security.  I of course want to protect my client machines, even though it's just for demo.  Once I have that done, I'm going to deploy a Windows Server 2008 server in order to enable Network Access Protection in my environment.  Once I have that, I can then show off how Windows Server 2008 with NAP + Windows XP SP3/Windows Vista + ForeFront Client makes for a very well secured environment for my network and my desktops.  After that I plan on using System Center Configuration Manager 2007 (SCCM) to capture and deploy a copy of those images on demand.  Lots of cool stuff.  I plan on sharing and then recording a demo of the finished product.  Let's just hope it doesn't take me 3 months to get around to it.  Hey, I do have a day job.  :)

Each week there are a number of interesting questions that I get from my own internal Microsoft team, our Microsoft Partners, and even our customers.  Many of these responses I send through the tunnels of communication like Email, Instant Messaging, phone, and even (can you imagine) face-to-face conversations.  While getting this time sensitive information out the people who are asking the questions is important to meet some end goal like closing a deal, kicking off a project, or just gathering data, it really doesn't help anyone else out in the blogosphere.  So I'm making an attempt (notice I didn't say commitment) to provide a weekly update to my blog with some of the useful information I come across.  So here goes the first one....

This weeks topics:

• Mix08 Sessions Online
• Silverlight 2 Beta 1
• Silverlight for Mobile
• Hardcore Demo Laptop
• System Center Operations Manager 2007 Service Pack 1
• Apple licenses Microsoft ActiveSync for the iPhone
• Microsoft Virtual Desktops
• SQL Server Data Services
• Microsoft Zumobi

Mix08 Sessions Online: The Microsoft Mix08 event in Las Vegas produced a ton great sessions.  Those sessions are all available for your geek out pleasure at: http://sessions.visitmix.com/

Silverlight 2 Beta 1 is now available:  There are so many great things about Silverlight it's tough to figure out where to start.  I guess I should shoot off some of the things I find some cool about the technology:

1. Leverage your .NET Development skills to build rich interactive web applications (yes, like Adobe Flash) using the same IDE (Visual Studio 2008 & BLOCKED EXPRESSION and languages that you've come to learn, know, and trust.
2. Cross Platform (Windows & Mac...not like the commercial) and Cross Browser  (Internet Explorer, FireFox
3. Build high quality application that includes things like High Definition video!

Hard Rock has a HUGE memorabilia collection all over the world.  Using Silverlight 2, they bring this collection to the Internet world in a very cool way.  Check it out: http://memorabilia.hardrock.com/

Silverlight on Mobile Devices:  That's right, you will soon be able to use the Silverlight 1.0 platform on mobile devices.  That includes Nokia phones as Microsoft and Nokia announced that last week in Las Vegas. 

I must also make note that one of our local customers in the Washington D.C. Metro Area was on stage during the keynote and showed off their very cool Silverlight for Mobile application.  The customer is AWS Weatherbug and the application brings weather information to your mobile device in a very rich fashion.   Here is a link to the application.  You can try it out today on your browser using Silverlight 1.0: http://sl.weatherbug.com/?zip=98052

Hardcore Demo Laptop:   Dell is now selling a laptop that carries 8GB of RAM!  Now that makes for either a fantastic mobile development environment and/or demo machine.  It says the machine can have 8GB of RAM, but the online order form only allows you to select 4GB.  I think you'll have to call this order in yourself.  http://www.dell.com/content/products/productdetails.aspx/precn_m6300?c=us&l=en&s=bsd&cs=04#tn3

Service Pack 1 for System Center Operations Manager 2007 is now available: You can download SP1 AND watch the videos of the latest additions.  Don't forget to checkout the earlier getting started videos.  They are a great way to learn your way around the system when you're, well, just getting started.  :)  Here are some additional readiness material on the product (Webcasts, Virtual Labs, & Podcasts): http://www.microsoft.com/events/series/technetmms.aspx

Apple has licensed ActiveSync for the iPhone:  This further points out the massive growth in the Microsoft Exchange Server platform within the Enterprise (large and small) space.  This will, however, open the door for the iPhone to enter into the corporate market space.  That said, the Windows Mobile marketplace is still a growing and popular space.  The power of the Windows Mobile platform is one where we provide a great application platform WITH the phone, but we give the consumer and business user a tone of choice in form factor, price, phone operator, and more.  Plus with the upcoming releases of System Center Mobile Device Manager (which will provide a great way to manage and connect devices to your corporate resources) and Silverlight for Mobile, consumer and business users will continue to get a rich and well managed device to carry in their pocket, purse, or whatever.

Microsoft Virtual Desktops: There isn't a product from Microsoft called, "Microsoft Virtual Desktops", but the technology and licensing is available to make this work.  And just how FAR you want to virtualize depends on the organizational needs.  So here is a quick run down of the components:

1. Licensing: Before you can even think of deploying the technologies to do this, you first have to ensure that you're properly licensed.  Where many of the Microsoft server products have virtualization built into their licensing models, the client OS doesn't have that nearly as tied in.  Well, in the beginning that is.  There is now a licensing model that enable an IT department to run as many copies of a Windows Client OS (e.g. Windows XP and Windows Vista) within a virtual machine on any number of back end virtual servers.  This is called, "Vista Enterprise Consolidated Deployment" (VECD).  VECD is licensed per device.  The device being the end user computer or thin- client (different prices for a Fat/Rich or Thin client).  Each device can connect to any four virtual desktops at a time.  Can you leverage the OS licenses from a retired computer and stick it on a virtual server without needed to use VECD?  No, because that Windows Client OS is tied to the machine.  This remains true whether you decide to leverage Microsoft's virtualization technologies or not.  The license can't be transferred to another machine.  You can learn more about VECD here: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/products/windowsvista/enterprise/benefits/licensing.mspx
2. Virtualization Technologies: Now in order to run a Windows Client OS on the server side, you'll need to leverage a server virtualization technology to do that.  There are two flavors from Microsoft to enable this.  The first is Microsoft Virtual Server 2005 R2 (VS2005R2) which is a free product and available for download.  It runs on both Windows Server 2003 and Windows Server 2008.  It can run on an x86 or x64 platform and can host a number of different platforms including Windows XP and Windows Vista.  There are some drawbacks to VS2005R2, such as it can not host x64 guest machines, only one virtual CPU per virtual machine, and more.  With the release of Windows Server 2008 comes a new virtualization technology called, "Hyper-V".  There are a number of reasons why Hyper-V is a great technology choice for the IT market place.  First, this brings the server virtualization technology and puts it into the hands of all Windows focused engineers as it's just another role within Windows Server.  It also provides true 64-bit support for guests, up to 4 CPU's per VM (depends on the OS), can manage up to 2 TB of RAM for the machine, and much more.
3. Application Virtualization: Within the Windows Client OS, there is always a challenge in Software Distribution.  Especially for mobile users as applications can't just be "Presented" to the desktop via Windows Terminal Services or Citrix Presentation Server.  At the same time, IT departments don't want to just dump a ton of software on users desktops that they don't need.  So there is a requirement to enable the targeting of applications to people (versus targeting machines), enable on-demand deployment, and reduce the overhead and issues with traditional software installations on client machines.  This is where Microsoft Application Virtualization (formerly Microsoft Softgrid) comes into action.  More information can be found here: http://www.microsoft.com/systemcenter/softgrid/default.mspx
4. Virtualization Management: Now that you have all of this virtualization in your environment, you'll assume that you need a whole new management platform to manage it.  Well this is partially true, but with a twist.  Microsoft has a management platform and brand named, "System Center", which provides a collection of management products that focuses on separate scenarios.  The big difference that "System Center" has over other products is that it managed physical and virtualized platforms in the same way.  This reduces the number of technologies an IT department has to purchase, train their people, update their systems, and purchase support for.  From a "Virtual Desktop" perspective, this enables you to leverage a single management platform to manage not just your virtual desktops, but also within the desktop itself AND the server platforms they leverage.  Here is more information on the System Center Products: http://www.microsoft.com/systemcenter/

For more information on Microsoft Virtualization as a whole: http://www.microsoft.com/virtualization/default.mspx

SQL Server Data Services is announced: Microsoft release released information about a new service that they will host on the web.  This is a large Internet Scale database platform leveraging SQL on the back end.  If you're like me, you find yourself writing a ton of very interesting applications.  Some may be just a private project or perhaps it's a production service.  Regardless, you need a place to stick that database.  So in order to run a data-driven application on SQL, you'll need to either host it yourself or outsource that server, monitoring, and more to a third party.  Will Microsoft is now providing their own way of doing this.  Learn more here: dataservices AND here: http://blogs.msdn.com/ssds/

Microsoft Zumobi Goes Live: Zumobi is a Windows Mobile application that delivers rich content to your phone in a very cool way.  Download it today: https://www.microsoft.com/windowsmobile/domore/zumobi.mspx

Well this post turned out to be a bit longer than expected, but I guess that meant I had a long and productive week.  I hope to see you back next week!

- Conrad

This looks like a great webcast to attend.  I have it on my radar to attend!

Microsoft Technical Fellow and desktop guru Mark Russinovich will be hosting an interactive virtual roundtable—broadcast LIVE over the Internet on Wednesday, March 5^th. The subject? Windows Vista adoption and deployment. On the panel with Mark will be independent industry experts and IT pros from organizations that have already deployed Windows Vista—all openly discussing known challenges, solutions and workarounds, and sharing tips & tricks. But this event is really focused on the “virtual” participant—you!

Visit http://ms.istreamplanet.com/events at 9:00am Pacific Time on March 5th and ask your questions live during the event. Want to submit your question in advance? You can do that too by e-mailing your question to vrtable@microsoft.com anytime between now and the day of the event. The panel will answer as many questions as they can during the 60-minute event so take advantage of this opportunity to ask the experts and find out what you want to know about Windows Vista adoption.

For additional guidance, resources, tools, and straight-talk articles to help address your Windows Vista adoption questions, visit the Springboard Series for Windows Vista.

One of the challenges of being a good technical sales resource for Microsoft is staying fresh with the technology. Many times we get some great resources (Hands On Labs, Demo VM's, and On Demand Live Meeting technical sessions) within Microsoft corporate by providing us in the sales field some pre-baked labs. But it doesn't always give you that "Getting your hands dirty" feeling. So I decided to bite the bullet and build my own lab. And not just a lab that focuses on a single group of technologies, but I wanted to have a lab that deployed a large number of technologies.

If you've ever read some of my previous blog posts before, I try to give you a feeling of what I went through, including major issues and how to resolve them. I hope to make this a Blog Series and give you updates as I deploy new technologies, go through some updates, and develop new tools as needed.

Hardware

First off, I should point out the hardware that I'm using to do this. I've been fortunate to get a pretty strong workstation from work to do this. Here are the specs

• Model: Dell Precision 690
• CPU: Intel Xeon Quad-Core
• RAM: 8 GB
• Disks
  • 0: OS, 200GB (Split Partition: Windows Vista/Windows Server 2008)
  • 1: Data, 640GB
  • 2: Western Digital My Book, 500GB
• OS: Windows Server 2008 RC1 with Hyper-V Beta (x64)

Platform

In order to build pseudo-realistic lab, I need to host a number servers to give a good distribution of servers. In order to do this, I needed to go Virtual to make it work. When I first started to build the lab, I built it using Microsoft Virtual Server R2 with Service Pack 1 applied. The lab ran pretty well, but I wanted to run on the latest virtualization technology by Microsoft. So I then rebuilt my machine with Microsoft Windows Server 2008 RC1 with Hyper-V (Beta). At this point, Windows Server 2008 is in Release Candidate mode (So we'll be ready to ship that soon) and Hyper-V is in Beta mode (This actually came out early as it was due to ship with Windows Server 2008 RTM).

When I did the deployment of Windows Server 2008, I wanted to try out the Server Core installation to see how the performance would be, but at the time I didn't have the documentation to do this from the command line since there isn't a GUI in Server Core mode. So I went with the "Full Installation" as part of the setup.

Virtual Machines

Here are the virtual machines that I created and their specs.    

As you can see, there are quite a bit of virtual machines and technologies. So due to the lack of RAM, I can only start a few at a time. This has an impact of what I can show at any given time, but still allows me to have quite a bit going when I need it.

Deployment

I started the deployment by first doing a typical Windows Server 2003 R2 installation in a Virtual Machine. Once that was done, I installed all of the latest service packs, hotfixes, and whatever else Windows Update told me to deploy. With that completed, I always like to install the Support Tools found on the product CD. This gives me some handy tools whenever I need it. Not a good idea to do in a production system as a standard installation, but it suites me just fine in my lab.

The next step was to prepare the server for imaging. Well, I'm not really going to image them. What I did was used the SysPrep tool to wipe the server of all its unique information. Once this was done, I stopped the virtual machine and saved a copy of that VHD file (This is the virtual hard drive for the virtual machine) and made a number of copies of them. I know I could use Windows Deployment Service which is a core component of System Center Configuration Manager 2007, Windows Server 2008, and a solution accelerator (Microsoft Deployment), but that's a later blog post.

Active Directory

All of the servers are in a single forest/domain in Active Directory. I also created a specific OU for Service Accounts which were required by many of the server product installations (more on that in another post). By putting them all in a single OU, it makes it easier for me to keep track of them as I go along.

I also stored all of the user accounts I would create as standard corporate users in a different OU as well. This should keep my overall AD design a bit cleaner (I hope).

Networking

Each virtual machine has two network interfaces. One of them is assigned to an "Internal Only" private virtual network. This keeps all of the lab communication within that network. I then hook up a separate network interface(all DHCP) to a public network so that I can directly download other components. I'll shut that off once I setup an ISA server for the front end network. That's a task for a later date.

Next Steps

Now that everything is ready to go, I now need to install some backend components. I'll start off with some System Center products (Operations Manager 2007, Configuration Manager 2007, Virtual Machine Manager 2007, and Data Protection Manager 2007), SQL Server 2005, SoftGrid, and more. I'll describe this as a move along and post the results soon.

Have a question or suggestion for the DemoCorp series? Submit them to the DemoCorp Forum:

http://agramont.net/forums/34.aspx

I was fortunate enough to be asked to contribute to a new book focused on IIS 7.0.  I thought this would be a great way to dive deep into the product which would in turn help me sell the platform as Windows Server 2008 comes out (although the book focuses on Windows Vista).  The final name of the book is “How to Cheat at IIS 7 Server Administration“.  The target audience for this book is the IT generalist that is looking to quickly learn IIS 7 and perform the standard operational and support function.  This was my first time contributing to a book and it was quite the effort.  It took up many nights and weekends, plus I had a two week deadline (that was rough).  I may contribute again in the future, but I’ll have a better idea of what I’m getting into and plan accordingly (with my family that is).

Chris Adams was the Technical Editor and I was one of the contributing authors and I produced Chapter 6: Troubleshooting 101.  Although I’m not listed as an official author, my name is printed on the cover of the book and I’m listed as a contributor within the book as well.

• Paperback: 384 pages
• Publisher: Syngress (May 28, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1597491551
• ISBN-13: 978-1597491556
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 7.4 x 1.2 inches

Here is a blog post by Chris Adams as he gives a brief overview of the book: http://blogs.iis.net/chrisad/archive/2007/07/13/first-it-pro-focused-iis7-book-hits-market-how-to-cheat-at-iis7.aspx

Get your copy today!

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1597491551?ie=UTF8&tag=agramontnet-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=1597491551

There has been much advertisement around the new System Center brand and all of the great things the suite of products will provide to customers, but one of those products has quietly shipped. System Center Essentials 2007 (SCE) is a new product focused on the small to mid-market customer who has 1-3 IT Generalists.

Essentials 2007 is a new management solution in the System Center family of IT systems management products specifically designed for midsized businesses (up to 500 PCs and 30 Servers). Essentials 2007 provides a unified management solution that enables IT professionals in midsize organizations to proactively manage their IT environment with increased efficiency.

SCE leverages the components from System Center Operations Manager 2007 and WSUS 3.0, but puts it all into an easy to deploy and single UI management console. It typically takes only a half-day to deploy, configure, and use in a product environment.

Here's a quick list of things SCE can do for an organization (Taken from the "Top 10 Reasons to Purchase Essentials 2007". Visit the page for details on each of these topics):

• Unify your IT management experience (Essentials 2007 provides a single console for your core management needs.)
• Keep your applications and your network up and running (Essentials provides multiple views of the application data in your network...)
• Troubleshoot problems more quickly (Essentials provides a rich knowledge base out of the box ...)
• Simplify your Patch Management (Essentials 2007 provides integrated patch management ...)
• Deploy Applications easily (Deploying applications has never been so easy...)
• Keep track of hardware and software assets (No more spreadsheets to maintain ...)
• Improve your users up-time (Reduce the time you spend dealing with end-user issues ...)
• Get up and running fast (Deploying Essentials 2007 couldn't be easier...)
• Gain visibility into your IT environment (Start your day with a Daily Health Report...)
• Get an affordable comprehensive IT Management solution designed for you (Essentials is priced for the budgets of midsize businesses...)

For an organization with 15 servers and 20-400 clients, this is a slam dunk of a product!

For partners, this is a great addition to your services and solution offerings. In most Windows Infrastructure deployments, an SI will add in a half day to deploy WSUS. Now that time should be used to deploy SCE.

There is also a managed service component that is currently in Beta that will allow an SI partner/Hoster to manage a collection of customer deployments of SCE via Operations Manager 2007! This is very exciting as the customer will have their own management product on premise, but the SI partner/Hoster can provide high level management services (and ongoing application deployments, management, and issue resolution) from their own datacenter. In this model, the Partner is paying for their own OpsMgr deployment and the customer is licensing SCE on their own.

You can download the 90-day trial version and then upgrade it to the Full Version by using a tool that comes with the product (after you purchase it of course). http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/eval/sce/default.mspx

Here is some additional information on System Center Essentials 2007

• System Center Essentials: http://www.microsoft.com/systemcenter/sce/default.mspx
• System Center Essentials 2007 Tech Center: http://www.microsoft.com/technet/sce/default.mspx
• System Center Essentials 2007 FAQ: http://www.microsoft.com/technet/sce/2007/evaluate/faq.mspx
• Forefront and System Center Essentials 2007: http://www.microsoft.com/infrastructure/default.mspx
• Forefront and System Center Essentials 2007 press release: http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2007/may07/05-02SecManPR.mspx

Make sure to check out the upcoming webcast on System Center Essentials on May 24^th: http://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/WebCastEventDetails.aspx?EventID=1032336458&EventCategory=4&culture=en-US&CountryCode=US

System Center Operations Manager 2007 will NOT be available via MSDN or TechNet download. An evaluation version of OpsMgr 2007 is a currently available for immediate download. If you're interested in purchasing the product, you can upgrade from evaluation to RTM using a tool that comes with the RTM version (on the DVD). The RTM bits are available for download on MVLS now, and will be in the May VL media kits. Upgrading from Eval to RTM should not have any impact on the client machines.

Note that this is the case for English only, as the other languages won’t have the eval upgrade utility included until a later date (Summer 07)

Download the System Center Operations Manager 2007 evaluation (~280 MB):

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/eval/scom/default.mspx