Microsoft Systems Architecture drives Windows 2000 Server into corporate datacentres

Microsoft South Africa, together with industry-leading partners, has unveiled the Microsoft Systems Architecture (MSA) programme. This programme allows enterprise customers to simplify implementation while minimising the time and cost associated with Windows 2000 Server integration into corporate computing infrastructures. The Microsoft Systems Architecture for Internet Data Center (IDC) is the first in a series of prescriptive architecture guides (PAGs) enabling enterprises to get online datacentre operations up and running quickly and efficiently.

"Microsoft, together with its industry partners, is providing customers with a blueprint for IT success through the Microsoft Systems Architecture programme," said Albie Bester, solutions specialist for core business infrastructure at Microsoft South Africa. "MSA integrates best-of-breed implementations of hardware, software, services and support designed to help reduce the time, cost and risks generally associated with enterprise deployments. MSA delivers optimised Windows Server infrastructures that are rigorously tested in the lab and have proven themselves to be highly reliable and scalable."

MSA comprises three core components integral to configuring and maintaining an optimised Windows 2000 Server-based computing environment:

* Prescriptive architectural guides that provide pre-configured, lab-built and tested system architectures, together with complete documentation.

* A services model for supporting customer implementations of the prescriptive architectures.

* A support model that defines superior ongoing system support from the associated vendors.

PAGs are designed with the goal to help customers create an enterprise computing environment that is secure, highly available, reliable, scalable and manageable. Customers benefit immensely from integrated systems architectures including all core technologies - operating systems, servers, storage and networking - that have been built, tested and proven before the customer ever starts an implementation. PAGs reduce implementation risks and improve return on investment and time to market.

"The Microsoft Systems Architecture reference architectural guides combined with our design and implementation process gave our company peace of mind in our decision to deploy an Internet datacentre," said Robert G"ogele, CEO at Siemens Business Services in SA. "The proven guidance from Microsoft, combined with our experience from previous projects, helped us to set up a datacentre with known costs and integrated knowledge of the hardware and software we were looking to use in our implementation of a service integration platform."

Microsoft and industry partners are working together to develop PAGs (both Microsoft and industry-partner-led) that provide customers with an integrated set of essential data on the following:

* Infrastructure support for specific enterprise computing functions, such as directory services or messaging.

* Enterprise datacentre configurations, such as IDC.

* Full corporate end-to-end computing requirements.

These architectures are built and tested in Microsoft`s labs or in industry partners` labs, resulting in designs incorporating all the infrastructure technologies that have been optimised for Windows products.

Microsoft provides a qualification programme to ensure PAGs meet specific criteria:

* Meet or exceed standardised test results.

* Produce high-quality implementation and support guidance and documentation.

* Demonstrate the partners` ability to provide a high level of support for the combined vendor solution.

MSA-qualified prescriptive architecture guides offer customers a number of proven options based on their unique architectural and platform requirements.

The Microsoft IDC PAG, including information from Cisco Systems, Hewlett-Packard, Microsoft Consulting Services and Nortel Networks is available to customers at no charge on Microsoft`s TechNet Web site, which can be linked to from http://www.microsoft.com/systemsarchitecture/.

Additional industry partners currently developing, or committed to developing, and delivering systems-architecture guidance include Siemens Business Services, AST, Accenture, Unisys, IBM and IBM Global Services, Dimension Data, Comparex and NetIQ.

More information about the MSA programme is available on the Web at http://www.microsoft.com/systemsarchitecture/.

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