New install of SMS

[brea]

Hello and thank you for any assistance. Also HAPPY NEW YEAR!

I am tasked with looking into rolling out SMS into our network. We are going to have approximately 180 remote sites connected to our Win2000 network through many site-to-site VPN's. I have 2 domain controllers, w2k sp3, currently that run several tasks on our network. I am looking for some assistance/reccomendations from the people that have been doing it for some time. Here are my questions.

1. Do the remote PC's have to be members of the domain and what are the considerations here?

2. With the Domain Controllers doing other tasks such as DHCP and DNS will this cause a strain on the DC's thus requiring that I break up to server roles better and maybe add another DC?

3. Are there any "gotcha's" out there that are things that you can only know if told or expierence yourself?

Again thanks for the replies and the help.

 

[Jpoandl]

1. Do the remote PC's have to be members of the domain and what are the considerations here? No the SMS clients do NOT have to belong to the domain. If the client machines are not part of the domain, you can not use Domain based accounts for security. Instead, you will have to use local security accounts. Therefore, it would be nice to have at least one common local account on every PC/server that is not part of the domain. This account will need local admin rights. You will then configure your SMS site server to use this account for Client Installation Account and for Software Installation Account...for example. Use this format %machinename%\accountname

2. With the Domain Controllers doing other tasks such as DHCP and DNS will this cause a strain on the DC's thus requiring that I break up to server roles better and maybe add another DC? Probably not...I've seen many environments where DC's have multiple roles and usually this is not a problem. You can always move the roles later.

3. Are there any "gotcha's" out there that are things that you can only know if told or expierence yourself? I would suggest that you roll out SMS slowly. Start with your main office and make sure things are working like you expect before continuing your rollout. Make sure to define you network because knowing your WAN links and your subnets are very important to SMS.

Joseph L. Poandl
MCSE 2000

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