23/11/2008

MDT and SCCM - How to get started

I'll be making a series of posts about:

  • Microsoft Deployment Tookit (MDT) 2008
    and
  • System Center Configuration Manager (SCCM) 2007

One of the first things anyone wishing to learn about these technologies will want to do is setup a lab environment.
The sheer number of components and dependancies can make this a daunting task!

Quick Start Guide
The best reference I've found on how to do this is "Quick_Start_Guide_for_Configuration_Manager_2007.doc"
This can be found within "Getting Started with MDT 2008 Update 1.zip" available in the download area for "Microsoft Deployment Toolkit Update (MDT) 2008 Update 1".


The doc contains information on:

  • Pre-requisities (Software and Infrastructure)
  • How to setup the pre-requisite Infrastructure
  • Preparing the MDT Environment
  • Importing and Creating a Task Sequence to Create a Reference machine
  • Deploying Vista and capturing an image of a Reference Machine
  • Importing and Configuring a Task Sequence to Deploy a Target Computer
  • Deploying a Captured Image from a Reference computer onto a Target computer

This doc is ESSENTIAL reading as a first step.

Personal Observations on the Document

Sadly the document dosn't contain pictures, is lengthy (48 pages), and despite containing individual steps, is (IMHO) not easy to follow.

I'm a huge fan of pictures (to quote a cliche "a picture paints a thousand words") and am convinved it's possible to convey this (vital) information in a much more "digestable" form. However (for now), trawling through this doc seems unavoidable to achieve a working environment and understand the "intricacies" of MDT and SCCM "integration".

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