SMS 2003 Transitions to Extended Support

This week SMS 2003 moves out of mainstream support, and enters what is called Extended Support.  This is a natural transition for every Microsoft product.  Information about the SMS 2003 product lifecycle can be found here. 

SMS 2003 has been an incredibly popular product, and has been considered the most widely deployed management tool in the world.  Many customers who at some time were running a version of SMS have since migrated to Configuration Manager 2007, but we recognize this is not the case for everyone.

The industry has moved at a pace unparalleled by most.  Technology has accelerated in capability, adoption, depth, breadth, and complexity.  From a management perspective, the landscape configuration management technology embraces has grown from basic inventory and software distribution to new areas like OS deployment, Virtualization, Asset/ Performance and Workflow management, data protection, NAP and model based configuration management.  In addition to capabilities, new working styles, scenarios, users (Gen ‘Y’) and security models have become daily routine for Administrators. 

The management landscape has changed, there is no debating it.

System Center Configuration Manager 2007 is in the 4th release since SMS 2003.  With a 5th (R3) entering beta soon, and with the mainstream support cycle ending for SMS 2003, we wanted to collect as much assistance as possible in 1 place for our customers who may be considering a migration to our current platform.

Today we are excited to launch a new collection of web resources for you.  A URL many SMS Admins know, has been redesigned after months of collaboration to now provide you with rich content in a few categories:

• Overview – Here you will find collateral about ConfigMgr, why upgrade content, and overview material
• Multimedia – This section organizes for you all known webcasts, videos and podcasts about planning, deployment, migration and more
• Community – This area is a highlight list of our friends and partners in the industry.  Blogs, Forums and Related Communities that will help you get additional perspective and discussions
• Training – 26 Online labs are here for you, on demand, free of charge. 
• Technical Documentation – This area contains all of the online technical documentation for planning, deployment, migration and upgrading from SMS 2003 to Configuration Manager 2007
• Trial Software – This section provides you with access to the current product lineup in evaluation format, Virtual machines or trial install software, whatever your preference, they are all available

We hope you find value in the site, and the content is helpful in your efforts to embrace System Center Configuration Manager 2007.  If you have any feedback we would love to hear from you.

Thanks for your support

Jeff Wettlaufer 
Sr. Technical Product Manager
System Center