The Cumulative Update 6 (CU6) for OpsMgr 2007 R2 has shipped   Our previous cumulative update (CU5) shipped back in July 2011, so this one has been a while in the making.   The KB article describing the fixes, changes, and instructions: http...

      Cumulative Update Rollup 1 (UR1) for OpsMgr 2012 has shipped. Download:  http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=29697 KB link:  http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2686249   Here is a list of the fixes...

Setting up notifications for email, IM, or command channels is almost identical to how this was configured in OpsMgr 2007 R2.  This article will just serve as a walk through to the process, such as immediately after deploying OpsMgr 2012.  The...

System Center Orchestrator 2012 is extremely easy to setup and deploy.  There are only a handful of prerequisites, and most can be handled by the setup installer routine.   The TechNet documentation does an excellent job of detailing the system...

There is already a very good quickstart deployment guide posted on TechNet here:  http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh205988.aspx   The TechNet quickstart provides an excellent walkthrough of installing OpsMgr 2012 for the “all in one...

OpsMgr has the capability to run a synthetic transaction, to query a remote database from a watcher node.  This can be used to simulate an application query to a back end database, and we have built in monitoring to set thresholds for: Connection...

Microsoft started including Unix and Linux monitoring in OpsMgr directly in OpsMgr 2007 R2, which shipped in 2009.  Some significant updates have been made to this for OpsMgr 2012.  Primarily these updates are around: Highly available Monitoring...

This is a pretty common request, and I have been meaning to write up an example of this. Suppose you have the following scenario:  You are monitoring 1000 Windows Server with OpsMgr.  In your management group, you have 100 servers that are Test...

Testing the functionality of the network monitoring components of OpsMgr is pretty simple, when you have access to a lot of switch, router, and firewall equipment, and can get past the SNMP strings and access lists.  But what if you have this in...

The concept of this article is to give you a general overview of the security model, and rights required, to deploy and operate System Center Operations Manager.  For each section, I will link to more detailed documents and articles.   What...

Recently I discussed some of the changes in the Base OS MP version 6.0.6958.0 OpsMgr- MP Update- New Base OS MP 6.0.6958.0 adds Cluster Shared Volume monitoring, BPA, new rep   One of the changes in this newer version of the MP is the addition of...

I recently wrote about the new Base OS Monitoring Packs that shipped, adding many new features and fixes for monitoring the OS.  You can read more about that new release HERE .   While this MP update contained many fixes and new features...

One of the many new features in OpsMgr 2012 is the Agent control panel applet.     While this applet has several key features, the primary use is the ability to add and remove management groups from the agent/server.  While this was possible...

  Tim McFadden of Microsoft PFE has done it again.  He continually writes handy tools and solutions to help the OpsMgr admin.  His Scheduled Maintenance Mode solution is wildly famous.  His latest tool published is something I will...

Recently I discussed that we released a new Base OS MP 6.0.6957.0 which added many new features to the base OS MP’s.  In some of these new features, we got some feedback on some issues, and we are shipping an updated version of the MP to resolve...

  Get it at:   http://www.microsoft.com/download/en/details.aspx?displaylang=en&id=21357   This is the first MP update for Active directory we have seen in two years. This MP update contains mostly fixes to the top reported customer...

***Note:  This post is edited to reflect the newly shipped MP version 6.0.6958.0   Get it from the download center here:  http://www.microsoft.com/download/en/details.aspx?id=9296     This really looks like a nice addition to...

A new MP has shipped for Configuration Manager 2007, which is MP version 6.0.6000.3   This MP update will upgrade your existing MP.  It was updated to resolve the top customer issues with this management pack.   The following changes, also...

The following document will cover a basic install of System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2012 at a generic customer.  This is to be used as a template only, for a customer to implement as their own pilot or POC deployment guide.  It is intended...

A new KB has just been posted with some really, really good information. http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2592561 This is especially important for larger environments where you might have struggled with this MP.  This KB article goes through the concepts...

KB Article on a workaround to be able to apply SP4 here: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2591380 Read about it at:  http://blogs.technet.com/b/momteam/archive/2011/08/10/scom-2007-r2-and-sp1-now-supports-sql-server-2005-sp4.aspx

SPN’s (Service Principal Names) settings are very similar in OpsMgr 2012 as they were in OpsMgr 2007.  However, since the SDK (Data Access) service runs on ALL management servers now… the SPN’s for the SDK (DAS) account will be different now. If...

This may be old news, but it is a handy reference for OpsMgr admins, when asked to monitor for specific events from security event logs:   Windows Server 2003:  http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc163121.aspx Windows Server 2008: ...

When you use Operations Manager to monitor your SQL servers using the SQL Server Management Pack, there are some options that you will need to think about up front.    One of those areas is the SQL Agent, and SQL Agent jobs.   I will cover...

The Cumulative Update 5 (CU5) for OpsMgr 2007 R2 has shipped     The KB article describing the fixes, changes, and instructions: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2495674 Get it from the download Center: http://www.microsoft.com/download/en/details...