Product Reviews

In the world of desktop management, LANDesk Management Suite (LMS) has been around longer than most. It was originally launched back in 1985 by LAN Systems before being acquired by Intel in 1991. Last year saw LANDesk Software break free as an independent company in a move that allowed Intel to concentrate on its semiconductor products. Since then, LMS has seen some significant improvements, but nothing that compares to the features this latest release introduces.

The main focus is still on software deployment, but the suite has been substantially redesigned, which sees components such as the Server Manager offered as optional tools, although this utility was only integrated into the main management interface in the previous version. It wasn't available at the time of writing, but the new Patch Manager option also looks interesting. This aims to check for vulnerabilities on selected systems and ensure Critical Updates are deployed across the network as soon as they become available.

Installation has always been comparatively smooth. LMS still uses domains to group systems together, with each one requiring a core server. Windows Server 2003 is now supported either as a management server or as a managed server. A useful checker utility makes life even easier, as it advises on whether all system requirements for the various components have been met. Naturally, LMS requires a database and supports either SQL Server or Oracle, but smaller sites may use the bundled MSDE 2000, which can be automatically installed and configured by default.

Each system in the LMS domain requires an agent, and deployment has been nicely streamlined, as they can be installed manually, forced with a login script or pushed to selected systems. We've always found the LMS methods some of the easiest and most reliable. Configuration profiles determine which functions are installed and you can choose from a wide range of features. These include remote control, licence metering, scheduling and inventory, and you can also decide whether to allow users to interact with the various tools.

All the action takes place at the management console, which can run on the core server or other remote systems. This has seen a major overhaul, with the old Desktop Manager interface replaced with a new version

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that's far easier to use. The Network view has been tidied up considerably, a Toolbox side panel provides faster access to all LMS functions, and you can also customise the LMS view to suit and save it as a profile for later use.

Administrators with large support departments will appreciate the new role-based administration, as this now requires users to log on to LMS using Windows NT authentication. They can now create users and groups to determine which components of LMS different staff members are allowed to access and what managed systems they're able to interact with. LMS can also run discovery routines to identify devices purely by their IP address, so it's possible to keep track of unmanaged devices.

A key priority of LMS has always been software distribution and OS image deployment. The Peer Download feature speeds this up even more, as it allows clients to check if a peer system on their local subnet already has the required package in its multicast cache to avoid generating unnecessary traffic across WAN links.

Inventory was one of LMS's weakest points, but this receives some improvements in accuracy, and we found LMS 8 is capable of identifying more components than its predecessors. Furthermore, the new Inventory Extender add-on installs extra tools that may be used to find more specific information about your systems. This allows the inventory to be customised to handle particular hardware devices.

Change management has always been a valuable tool for companies worried about equipment going missing, and LMS can compare the latest inventory scan with the database and warn if it finds any discrepancies. However, this now goes much further, as it can do this in real-time and will notify administrators if, for example, it spots a hardware device being installed or plugged into a workstation; although, for this to function, you'll need to install the System Manager. We found general performance of this web-based component to be remarkably sluggish, but it does provide plenty of information taken from the main inventory. You can also monitor critical components such as hard disks, memory and general performance, while support for IPMI (intelligent platform management interface) compliant systems means it's possible to manage them irrespective of their state. LMS alerting has always been extensive, so there are a wide range of notifications to choose from, including email, pager, SNMP trap and network broadcasts.

It's been barely a year since its departure from Intel and in this time we've seen LMS benefit from two significant updates, which together have made it a sophisticated product. Microsoft is due to release a new version of its System Management Server soon, but for now LANDesk Management Suite 8 clearly has the upper hand. It offers a wealth of tools to take care of the daily chores inherent in workstation management.