Saturday, April 27, 2013

Mastering System Center 2012 Configuration Manager 1st edition, Steve Rachui



An Expert, Hands-on Guide to ConfigMgr 2012

If you're responsible for Microsoft's new System Center 2012 Configuration Manager (ConfigMgr), you'll want this detailed guide on hand. It offers intermediate and advanced coverage of the topics you need most—planning and installation, migrating from ConfigMgr 2007, deploying, setting up security, monitoring and troubleshooting, and automating and customizing ConfigMgr 2012 with scripts. Hands-on exercises and practical advice from the expert author team bring real-world scenarios into sharp focus, helping you master skills you can put to use right away.

Coverage includes:

Developing a plan for configuration and deployment

Asking the right questions to make sure you cover all the bases

Getting up to speed on a new hierarchy, console, and security

Migrating, installing, and site role configuration

Converting legacy packages to the new Application Model

Distributing, deploying, and updating software

Reporting, compliance settings, and inventory

Securing your devices with Endpoint Protection

Managing non-Windows mobile devices and virtual machines

Troubleshooting and setting up disaster recovery

Master Microsoft® System Center 2012 Configuration Manager

Plan, Install, Deploy, Monitor, and Troubleshoot an Installation

Roll Out Patches and Updates and Manage Inventory

Meet the Needs of the PC Configuration Lifecycle Management (PCCLM) Market

Learn in the Context of Real-World Scenarios and Tasks

As a consultant focused largely on building SCCM environments, I recommend this book to all my customers. The book does a great job explaining all the major concepts of SCCM's vast feature set and leaves readers with a solid foundation and understanding. They make great decisions on where to delve into great detail, and where to just hit the important ideas.

Other reviewers have complained that it is not as detailed as the product documentation on TechNet. While this is true, the book is not meant to be documentation but instead a tool for learning about SCCM. The book builds intermediate and advanced skills using outstanding real-world examples from some of the most experienced SCCM professionals on the planet.

Even though I've worked with SCCM 2007 and then 2012 every day for the past 5 years, I still find lots of good nuggets of information in this book. These guys know what they are doing.

I purchased this book prior to deploying the product in an enterprise environment in an attempt to get some insight from experienced writers. I was hoping to have to learn fewer lessons the hard way :-), and wanted to shorten my Lab time with the product. It did not even come close. This book offers Nothing you can't get for free or from Microsoft's tech library on the product. It's just a consolidation of the common info everyone has shared for free in one book. . . which might appeal to you.

This book has value if you have never read anything, anywhere, at all about SCCM 2012 and you just want one book (resource) to get you orientated with the product, and understand some basic functions and nomenclature. If this is what you need, then purchase this book. If you want master class knowledge of the product, this is not the place to find it.

I've no idea where the "filled with extra stuff" comments are coming from. Fact is, many people buying this book are going to be **very** concerned with the differences between CM7 and CM12. Where migrating from SMS 2003 to ConfigMgr 2007 wasn't particularly difficult (yeah, lots of additional features in CM7 vs SMS, but it looked the same, and aside from the SUP vs ITMU, you could afford to ignore the additions if you had to), CM12 is an almost totally different animal.

As a System Center engineer for the last 5 years, I've found this book to be invaluable in planning our CM7 to CM12 migration. It lists the gotchas. It details the differences between the two versions because...it needs to. The hierarchy model has changed. Application delivery has changed. FEP integration has changed. How you assign DPs and create Boundaries have both changed drastically. And unlike SMS to CM7, you can't just run the CM12 installer to run your migration.

This book will guide you through all that drama.

After ConfigMgr 2007's release nearly 5 years ago, I was disappointed by the quality of the first two CM7 text books. It wasn't until ConfigMgr 2007 Unleashed that they finally got it right. But here, an extremely useful and cogent text book was released right from the get-go. You can tell that Steve, Kent and the rest of the authors have been involved with CM12 for quite some time.

Way to go guys. Thanks a ton. Seriously.

This book will get you started, but it's hardly going to save you from scouring the Internet and sifting through your SCCM logs to get everything working. Many of the sections are very brief and poorly organized, while other sections seem like they could be more concise. This book will save you some time getting setup, but don't expect to be a SCCM Master (as the title implies) after reading through it!

I must admit that I'm no pro when it comes to the likes of SCCM. I dabbled with SCCM 2007, vNext and the Beta versions of 2012 so I had a general grasp on the software, but implementing it in production was proving to be a real hassle. Basic installation went OK thanks to the help of www.Windows-Noob.com but I kept getting monitoring errors. These were due mostly in part to my lack of experience with the software and its requirements.

This book is great, and a lot more help than I thought it would be! The information is helpful and very descriptive. I guess I fell/fall into the noob category here, and it has been quite a blessing for me. It's worth the $30 if you plan on making SCCM 2012 a part of your organization.

I picked up this book after already working with a new Config Manager 2012 deployment when I got tired of getting lost in the Technet library. It lays things out much more simply and gives real world scenarios and honest advice. A lot of the sections are pretty heavy on just stepping through wizards, but it's the nature of the beast when Microsoft actually puts out a product with intuitive wizards.

I will agree that it's not super in-depth. Very critical procedures are barely scratched upon - for example, building collections. That's something that can make or break your infrastructure, and it is barely covered. They even mention making these custom collections in their 'real world' scenarios, but did it ever show me how to make an All Servers collection, or an All Laptops collection, short of just making it manually?

I think this is great start, especially for people like me that dove right into Config Manager 2012 and were quickly lost and/or confused. Is it a definitive reference? Nope.

Product Details :
Paperback: 816 pages
Publisher: Sybex; 1 edition (May 1, 2012)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1118128982
ISBN-13: 978-1118128985
Product Dimensions: 7.4 x 1.7 x 9.1 inches

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