User manual SONY VAIO VPC-EA2KGX

[. . . ] 14 SONY Client Management Solutions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 For more information. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 Introduction Today's complex client/server computing environments can contain hundreds, if not thousands, of client computers such as workstations, business PCs, and notebooks. [. . . ] With SONYCM, SoftPaq installation can be configured to happen automatically and remotely across all client computers. BIOS Flash: SONYCM can be used to upgrade the BIOS firmware on client computers. SONYCM can automatically and remotely update the BIOS on any client computer. You can use it to flash a single computer or a group of computers. It also allows you to view reports for computers not receiving updates or to see where installation failed. Manage SONY ProtectTools enabled clients: Identify and inventory SONY client computers that include the ProtectTools embedded security chip. Use the SONY Client Manager console to remotely initialize the security chip on your computers, saving time in setting-up a more secure client infrastructure. Change BIOS settings: When booting a computer you can press the F10 key to pause the boot process in order to change the BIOS settings, such as the Storage Options or the Boot Order, as shown in Figure 2. After Microsoft Windows has booted on the client computers, you can use SONYCM to change the BIOS settings simultaneously on multiple client computers without having to visit each computer individually. 3 Figure 2. Manually changing BIOS settings using the F10 key. These capabilities make it clear that the key benefit of SONYCM is increased productivity. By quickly gathering information from all of your SONY client computers, rapidly making changes to client computer system software, and changing the BIOS settings, all from a central location, you'll be much more productive in managing your SONY client computers. Furthermore, SONYCM provides a rich set of customizable reporting tools so you can display exactly the information you need to manage your client computers. SONYCM generates and displays its reports from this database. The Altiris Console window receives its information from a Microsoft's Internet Information Services (IIS) Web server. The SoftPaq Filestore is used to store the SoftPaqs that will be installed on the client computers, such as hardware drivers and BIOS updates. 6 Extensive reporting capability SONYCM provides extensive and customizable reporting capabilities. You can view the standard reports that are pre-configured with SONYCM, or you can create your own customized Web reports. SONYCM in operation This section shows SONYCM in operation to more clearly demonstrate its capabilities. We'll focus on the some of the primary capabilities of SONYCM shown in Figure 1. Client inventory The Altiris Console Client Inventory screen, shown below, highlights some of the inventory information that is available from SONY client computers. In this case, Machines by System ID is selected in the left pane and the SysID for each client machine is displayed in the right pane. Figure 4. Sample Client Inventory display The above is a small sample of the wealth of client information provided by SONYCM, which includes detailed information down to the hardware component level. 7 Health monitoring The partial screen capture below shows the events that can be selected in order to monitor the health of your client computers. You can select the threshold values for free disk space and battery charge level. When a selected event occurs, such as a battery fault, SONYCM responds based on your predefined notification policies. For example, you can specify that an e-mail be sent to you to alert you to the situation. Figure 5. Sample Health Monitoring display Note: The number of health events that can be monitored varies by computer model. You can also monitor the status of these events using one of the pre-configured reports. [. . . ] SONYCM provides client hardware management and is tightly integrated with the Altiris management infrastructure. Additional Altiris client software management solutions, based on this same infrastructure, are available to provide complete client IT lifecycle management. These Altiris solutions address operating system deployment and migration, software delivery, patch management, backup and recovery, asset management, and more. Summary SONYCM should be a welcome addition to the manageability toolkit of IT personnel who manage complex SONY client computing environments. SONYCM will help increase your efficiency and productivity in managing your SONY client computers. [. . . ]