Microsoft System Center Enterprise Suite Unleashed

Microsoft System Center Enterprise Suite Unleashed is the first and only definitive real-world guide to the entire Microsoft System Center Enterprise Suite. It brings together tips, tricks, best practices, and lessons learned by top consultants who’ve deployed System Center in some of the world’s largest enterprises and most successful small businesses.

Drawing on years of early adopter and production experience, Rand Morimoto, Chris Amaris, and their team cover the entire System Center lifecycle and its components for system configuration, operations management, data protection, virtual machine management, help desk support, change management, asset control, capacity planning, and mobile device management. You’ll learn about individual components and how to integrate them to build automated, exceptionally efficient managed environments.

For smaller businesses, the book also presents Microsoft’s streamlined, lower-cost IT management offering, System Center Essentials 2010.

• Use System Center Configuration Manager 2007 to image, update, manage, and support servers and clients
• Proactively monitor your systems to identify and fix problems before they fail
• Use System Center Data Protection Manager 2010 to provide reliable, timely backup/recovery
• Implement and manage all aspects of virtualization, including virtual guest sessions on both Microsoft Hyper-V and VMware
• Make the most of System Center Service Manager 2010’s integrated tools for managing help desks, incidents, assets, and changes
• Use System Center Capacity Planner to properly size, procure, and deploy new systems
• Remotely track, secure, patch, update, and support mobile devices with System Center Mobile Device Manager
• Simplify small business IT management with System Center Essentials 2010’s wizards and auto-configuration components

Chris Amaris, MCSE, CISSP/ISSAP, CHS III, is the chief technology officer and cofounder of Convergent Computing. He has more than 20 years experience consulting for Fortune 500 companies, leading companies in the technology selection, design, planning, and implementation of complex information technology projects. Chris has worked with Microsoft System Center products such as Operations Manager and Configuration Manager since their original releases in 2000 and 1994. He specializes in messaging, security, performance tuning, systems management, and migration. A Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP) with an Information System Security Architecture Professional (ISSAP) concentration, Certified Homeland Security (CHS III), Windows 2003 MCSE, Novell CNE, Banyan CBE, and a Certified Project Manager, Chris is also an author and technical editor for a number of IT books, including Network Security for Government and Corporate Executives, Exchange 2010 Unleashed, and Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 Unleashed. Chris presents on messaging, systems management, security, and information technology topics worldwide.

Tyson Kopczynski, CISSP, GCIH, with more than ten years of experience in IT, has become a specialist in Active Directory, information assurance, Windows automation, PKI, and IT security practices. Tyson is also the founding author of the Windows PowerShell Unleashed series and has been a contributing author for such books as Microsoft Internet Security and Acceleration (ISA) Server 2006 Unleashed and Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 Unleashed. He has also written many detailed technical papers and guides covering various technologies. As a consultant at Convergent Computing, Tyson works with and has provided feedback for next generation Microsoft technologies since their inception and has also played a key role in expanding the automation and security practices at Convergent Computing. Tyson also holds such certifications as the Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP), the SANS Security Essentials Certification (GSEC), SANS Certified Incident Handler (GCIH), and the Application Platform, Active Directory, and Network Infrastructure (MCTS).

Alec Minty, MCSE, is a senior engineer for a large Internet company in the San Francisco Bay area. He has more than 10 years’ industry experience with extensive knowledge designing and implementing enterprise-class solutions for a diverse array of organizations. Alec has been an early adopter of database technologies, operations management, systems management, and security technologies. He specializes in designing, implementing, migrating, and supporting complex infrastructures for a variety of large utility, telecommunications, and engineering organizations. Alec’s experience spans the business and technology areas; he has in-depth experience in the deployment, migration, and integration of key business technologies such as SQL Server, Windows, Exchange Server, Active Directory, ISA, and Identity Management. Alec is coauthor of SQL Server 2005 Management and Administration and MOM 2005 Unleashed and is a contributing author on Exchange Server 2007 Unleashed and ISA 2004 Unleashed, all published by Sams Publishing.

Rand H. Morimoto, Ph.D., MVP, MCITP, CISSP, has been in the computer industry for more than 30 years and has authored, coauthored, or been a contributing writer for dozens of books on Windows, Security, Exchange Server, BizTalk, and Remote and Mobile Computing. Rand is the president of Convergent Computing, an IT-consulting firm in the San Francisco Bay area that has been one of the key early adopter program partners with Microsoft, implementing the latest Microsoft technologies including Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2, System Center Service Manager 2010, Windows 7, Exchange Server 2010, and SharePoint 2010 in production environments more than 18 months before the initial product releases.