Published: February 25, 2008   |   Updated: June 30, 2008

The Microsoft Assessment and Planning Toolkit (MAP) makes it easy for you to perform assessments for the following key scenarios:

• Identify computers capable of running Windows Vista.
• Identify servers capable of running Windows Server 2008.
• Identify computers that can be upgraded to Microsoft Office 2007 and report currently installed Microsoft Office products.
• Capture performance data for servers and workstations.
• Create recommendations for server consolidation using Hyper-V or Virtual Server 2005 R2.
• Report on the hardware and software installed in your organization.
• Perform inventory and assessments of large networks.
• Report on Desktop security settings such as Windows Firewall, anti-virus and anti-malware

Note   Configurations are required on remote computers to perform the assessments and monitor performance data. Refer to the Inventory Technologies page of this article for information about required configurations to enable remote inventory and performance monitoring.

Download the Microsoft Assessment and Planning Toolkit

Windows Vista Hardware Assessment Scenario

The Windows Vista hardware assessment is completed by the Assessment Wizard. It provides the following information for determining hardware compatibility of existing clients for Windows Vista:

• Readiness of current hardware for Windows Vista migration.
• Differentiation between the “Windows Vista Capable” and “Windows Vista Premium Ready” user experience.
• Recommendations for hardware upgrades to meet the Capable and Premium Ready hardware requirements.
• Assessment of devices installed on the computer, including whether the device drivers are available via Windows Update or on the Windows Vista installation media.
• Compatibility of the current system BIOS for Windows Vista.
• Summary of applications installed on the computer.
• Summary of desktop security settings such as Windows Firewall, anti-virus and anti-malware.

The following table describes the process and tools available from Microsoft to plan and migrate to Windows Vista.

Table 1. Windows Vista Assessment and Migration Process

Optimizing Hardware Specifications to Your Organizational Needs

While the minimum requirements for the Windows Vista operating system are highlighted on the Windows Vista TechCenter, it is a good idea to validate hardware performance with your intended application stack and end user expectations before baselining your organization’s standard hardware specifications. When standardizing on Windows Vista operating systems – especially for those using the Windows Aero appearance settings – many organizations have found that 2 or more GB of RAM, 2 GHz or faster processors, and compatible graphics adapters yield good results. Organizations using Windows Basic appearance settings in their PC environment can reduce these recommendations considerably and approach published minimum system requirements for those PCs. This may be useful if your organization is in the middle of a hardware refresh cycle and would like to standardize the operating system version to qualified existing hardware. Depending on how workstations are used in your organization, you can tailor hardware specifications and operating system configurations – including appearance settings – according to your user roles and operational needs.

Note   The Assessment Wizard cannot definitively identify if a computer can take advantage of Windows BitLocker™ Drive Encryption for Windows Vista. Nor can it definitively identify if the user interface can be configured in Aero Glass mode. If the Aero™ Glass or BitLocker Drive Encryption features are important to your organization, you need to perform additional research to identify if your computers support these features.

Windows Server 2008 Hardware Assessment Scenario

The Windows Server 2008 hardware assessment is completed using the Assessment Wizard. It provides the following information for determining the hardware compatibility of existing clients for Windows Server 2008:

• Readiness of current hardware for Windows Server 2008 migration.
• Defining whether the server meets the recommended or minimum hardware requirements.
• Recommendations for hardware upgrades to meet the minimum and recommended hardware requirements.
• Assessment of devices installed on the computer, including whether device drivers are available via Windows Update or on the Windows Server 2008 installation media.
• Identification of the roles currently installed on the server.
• Summary of applications installed on the computer.
• Summary of discovered SQL servers.

The following table describes the process and tools available from Microsoft to plan and migrate to Windows Server 2008.

Table 2. Windows Server 2008 Assessment and Migration Process

Microsoft Office 2007 Assessment Scenario

Microsoft Office 2007 assessment is completed using the Assessment Wizard. It provides the following information for determining the readiness of existing client computers for Microsoft Office 2007:

• Determination if the current operating system (OS) supports the installation of Microsoft Office 2007.
• Assessment of the system hardware to ensure that it meets the system requirements for Microsoft Office 2007.
• Inventory of the currently installed Microsoft Office products.

The following table describes the process and tools available from Microsoft to plan your migration to Microsoft Office 2007.

Table 3. Microsoft Office 2007 Assessment and Migration Process

Performance Monitoring Scenario

The Performance Metrics Wizard manages the process of remotely monitoring key disk, network, and CPU performance counters on remote computers. You choose the consolidation candidate computers to monitor by creating and importing into the wizard a text file containing the computer names. Performance monitoring is required to perform the placement of machines in a virtualized environment. The Server Consolidation and Virtualization Wizard completes this server placement, using the results of the Performance Metrics Wizard. The Performance Metrics Wizard performs the following assessment tasks:

• Performs an inventory of the computer being monitored.
• Conducts detailed monitoring of physical and logic disk performance counters.
• Conducts detailed monitoring of network utilization.
• Conducts detailed monitoring of processor utilization.
• Conducts performance monitoring over a long period of time.

Server Consolidation and Virtualization Scenario

The Server Consolidation and Virtualization Wizard is used to complete the server consolidation and virtualization assessment. This wizard performs the following functions to complete the assessment:

• Performs an inventory of the computers considered for consolidation and virtualization.
• Consumes the performance monitoring data collected by the Performance Metrics Wizard.
• Allows the user to provide a “model” virtual server that will host virtual machines (guests).
• Determines the number and placement of guests on the virtual server.
• Provides detailed reports and proposals describing which servers can be virtualized and on which virtual server host computers the consolidation process can be carried out.

Note   The Server Consolidation and Virtualization Wizard uses sophisticated algorithms for calculating the peak utilization of servers, considered for placement in a virtualized environment. This includes estimating high average CPU utilization and maximum observed disk and network input/output (IO). Server placement in the virtualized environment is based on peak utilization calculations.

Inventory of Large Networks Scenario

For environments with more than 50,000 computers, we recommend that you configure the Accelerator in scale-out mode. Scale-out mode is a configuration option with the Accelerator that enables you to use many machines to inventory remote computers in parallel and store the inventory data back to a full version of SQL Server 2005. Configuration of this option includes the following steps:

1. Installation of SQL Server 2005 using a “MAPS” named instance and collation set to “SQL_Latin1_General_CP1_CI_AS.”
2. Installing the Microsoft Assessment and Planning Toolkit (MAP) on your “master” server.
3. Configuring SQL Server 2005 and the master server to allow remote connections to the MAPS named instance.
4. Configuring “helper” computers that will perform inventory and store the data on the master server.
5. Performing an inventory in scale-out mode.

Note   Refer to the “Scale Out Wizard” section of the Getting Started Guide document for configuring the Microsoft Assessment and Planning Toolkit (MAP) scale-out mode. The Getting Started Guide is available on the Start menu after the tool is installed.

Community and Feedback

To interact with other members of the Microsoft Assessment and Planning community, learn more about the tool, and get help with questions, visit the Microsoft Assessment and Planning forum on TechNet at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=110990.   

To send feedback or suggestions for improving the Microsoft Assessment and Planning Toolkit (MAP), send e-mail to mapfdbk@microsoft.com.