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T. technician in a high school with around 1600 students 250 staff and 800+ client computers mostly running W7

I'm looking for a better way to manage clients (deploy software, track changes, inventory etc) I like the look of SCCM 2012 features but the case studies seem to be aimed at large multi-site infrastructural rather than a single mid sized site.

Is SCCM suitable for a mid sized single site or is it aimed at much larger corporations, if so what would be more suitable

Just a note about me and my situation. I work as a technician in a school part of a team of 3. My boss seems content with a network that works (just about) not a productive well maintained network that is easy to run and maintain. I'm still fairly early on in my I.T. career so sorry if I'm not up to speed on all products.

EDIT: Thanks for all the help I'll take a look at SCE and SCCM and get some proposals drawn up to take to my boss/deputy head

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There are a couple of Educational specialists in the chat room if you'd like to head in: chat.stackexchange.com/rooms/127/the-comms-room – Dan Sep 18 '12 at 13:17
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You might want to look at System Center Essentials. Although as an educational establishment, the full SCCM is probably not out of reach financially, the Essentials package, and documentation, may be more manageable. – dunxd Sep 18 '12 at 13:17
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@dunxd Actually, Microsoft usually has pretty deep discounts for education. – MDMarra Sep 18 '12 at 13:19
That's what I said :-) – dunxd Sep 19 '12 at 10:39

3 Answers

up vote 11 down vote accepted

I would not call 800+ computers "mid sized". I was successfully deploying the successor of SCCM in a bank with 850 employees. In your case it is a lot more likely nowt knowing your tools that will be the problem - somehow I have a problem imagining the team of 3 people in a school being the highly competent people that companies employ for a lot more money. The learning curve WILL be brutal for you.

But once you are over it, it will help a lot - the whole System Center suite. 800+ machines is WAY too big to run around to install stuff.

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I hear you, I would describe my skill set as average at best but at the same time I probably know more about correct systems administration and have a better insight that the 2 people I work with. I'm willing to learn everything I can about the software prior to deployment but I didn't want to spend hours reading SCCM guides and books only to work out it wasn't a suitable system. any advised further reading? – Le_Quack Sep 18 '12 at 13:18
Documentation, pretty much - that is how I get into pretty much everything. Set up a small virtual environment and play with it. – TomTom Sep 18 '12 at 13:58
Agree, I'm an admin in a company that until recently was about 900 seats across two sites, and couldn't imagine doing it without SCCM. Using it well will save you a lot of time and effort, and you really aren't that small in SCCM terms. (We now have 35 sites in 20 countries, though only a couple hundred more users, and it really is invaluable). – GAThrawn Sep 25 '12 at 5:51
up vote 6 down vote

Forget you're a school and look at your numbers critically. You have 800 computers and nearly 2000 users. That's not a small company and I wouldn't really say "midsize" either. Schools IT is often neglected, but the truth is you should be using good quality enterprise hardware and software.

And, indeed, that includes SCCM. It's hard for any of us to say what will definitely work in your environment, but you could certainly pick worse places to start.

Of course, this is all easier said than done, but trust me when I say I've nearly every 'level' of educational IT.

There's very little that's truly overkill for a network of this size - plenty that are too expensive, though!

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up vote -3 down vote

You can use WSUS with an add on product (like SolarWinds Patch Manager) for better reporting, pre-tested 3rd party application packages and scheduling of updates.

WSUS is an excellent tool for software deployment/updates and it is very scalable. Leveraging that infrastructure (since the agent is already there on your Windows systems) should be considered.

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Jennifer, it would be nice if you mentioned you worked for SolarWinds (or the link in your profile would indicate you are linked to them in some way), the FaQ states, you must disclose your affiliation in your answers. Mods will enforce this. – tombull89 Sep 18 '12 at 17:40

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