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ModernEUC BLOG posts

Jorge Pereira

Windows Activation Evolution

As organizations deploy Windows 10 Pro and Windows 10 Enterprise with Modern Device Management the processes for activating Windows 10 are changing, and new options are available.

Most of us are familiar with the traditional product key registration for Windows devices.   For businesses (large and small) the common activation scenarios for activation have included:

  • OEM Pro – needs internet connection for one-time activation
  • Multiple Activation Key (MAK) (Pro or Enterprise) – needs internet connection 1 time per system
  • Key Management Services (KMS) – on premise KMS server doing continual activation
  • Firmware-embedded – never needs to be on internet connection, it can be in a deferred activation state and never watermark
Read More »Windows Activation Evolution

Gathering Existing Devices Windows Autopilot Device IDs

Update 8/1/2020: Microsoft has updated their official blog post a number of times since this post to include automated ways from Intune and ConfigManager.

We have published a number of posts about what Windows Autopilot is and how to setup and test. Now that so many organizations have taken note of Modern Device Management advantages they want to know how to include those devices into the Windows Autopilot.

It needs to be clarified that Modern Devices Management in the context of Windows Autopilot, is comprised of three parts:

  1. Device Registration
  2. Device Enrollment
  3. Device Provisioning

This article relates to step 1) for existing devices within an organization. Specifically the question it is trying to answer is:

Is there a way we can generate the IDs without someone sitting down in front of hundreds / thousand of individual machines and manually starting the PowerShell script?

Here is high level steps what I have seen done out there:

Read More »Gathering Existing Devices Windows Autopilot Device IDs

Microsoft tools manage 175M endpoints

Not long ago, in August 2018, I wrote a blog post Microsoft Platform: Workspace Transformation in which I mentioned that each of the products included in the Microsoft 365 platform have already “changed and will continue to change the landscape of the way we are to manage end-user compute space”

I mentioned several products by name including:

  • Azure Active Directory
  • Windows 10
  • Microsoft Intune
  • Windows Analytics
  • Windows Autopilot
  • Office 365 ProPlus
  • Microsoft 365

What has surprise me the most about the last year, is the adoption speed and acceleration of the platform.

Read More »Microsoft tools manage 175M endpoints

5G – A game Changer for Device Management

5G is fast coming to market with roll outs expected across the world in 2019 and 2020.      This technology is not only an core enabler for IoT, Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, but also has significant implications as an enabled for Workforce Transformation and Modern Device Management.   

As many of you know there is an immense amount of work going on behind the scenes to enable 5G, the next generation of cellular network technology.  It is going to trans-formative technology offering three key advantages: 

    • Broadband capabilities multiple times the speeds today.     Speeds of 1Gbps to be the norm with 10Gbps possible. 
    • Massive connectivity scale   – Allows the avalanche of devices powered by IoT coming into the market which the current technologies lack  
    • Low Latency allows much faster respond times –  Expected to be less than 5ms.    

 “5G will enable the era of hyper–connectivity where devices, machines, and humans will be interconnected in a very rich way.”    

Liam Quinn, Sr. Vice President, & Sr. Fellow, Dell Technologies Source: Dell Technologist Luminaries Podcast May 2019 

South Korea rolled-out 5G to the public in early 2019and it has been a game changer for them already. 

Read More »5G – A game Changer for Device Management

Updating Windows 10 Edition with Autopilot / Intune

As opposed to previous versions of the Microsoft Operating System, where each edition came as a separate ISO, there is only one package for the latest Windows 10 OS that can be “unlocked” when activated to have the edition you need.      (there are some restrictions/requirements based on licensing)

One of the most common questions I get when talking about Modern Device Management is how to upgrade the edition that comes with the device  from  Pro to Enterprise as part of the enrollment / provisioning process.

Read More »Updating Windows 10 Edition with Autopilot / Intune

Windows Autopilot White Glove Details Announced..

What is Windows Autopilot white glove?

The new Windows Autopilot white glove process, which lets IT technicians, partners, and even OEMs pre-provision devices before they are delivered to the user. Using this process, all device configuration tasks, including apps (machine-targeted or user-targeted), certificates, and policies, can be completed in advance, making it so that when the user gets the device, the device can be ready for productive use within a few minutes.

Is it available yet? 

Read More »Windows Autopilot White Glove Details Announced..

Modern Device Management: More than Just Technology

Today, many companies are moving or seriously considering the move to Modern Device Management (or Modern Management) as their next step of their Digital Transformation Journey.  Most considering the move, have already completed their Windows 10 migrations and are looking for efficiencies to their deployment workflows.     Having said this,   I get asked on a daily bases:

 “What should I consider when moving to Modern Management?”

The first and most important item to address is a cultural one.  Simply said:

All of us need to switch “our current thinking” of how devices are deployed and managed. 

Let me address a bit more as to why this mind-set-change is  important:Read More »Modern Device Management: More than Just Technology

Microsoft Office Support Lifecycle Explained

Microsoft Office is a widely used product suite which includes tools like Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Project, Publisher, Access, and OneNote.

It has been around since 1988 and has gone through many versions, each of which has a specific support cycle with defined dates.    All versions of Microsoft Office products before Microsoft Office 2019 are eligible for ten years of support following their release, during which Microsoft releases updates for the product. The ten-year period is divided into two five-year phases:Read More »Microsoft Office Support Lifecycle Explained

Semi-Annual Channel(SAC) Targeted release will be retired

Yep – you heard correctly!

No more Semi-Annual Channel Targeted (aka CB) or  Semi-Annual Channel Broad (aka CBB) releases!

Although this is not a new topic (John Wilcox gave us a heads up back in May 2018)    the Semi-Annual Channel(SAC) Targeted release (formerly known as CB or Current Branch) will be fully retired after Windows 10 v1903.

What this means for Enterprises? Read More »Semi-Annual Channel(SAC) Targeted release will be retired

Windows 10 LTSC Pros / Cons

UPDATE February 2021: Microsoft announced that the next version of Windows 10 Enterprise LTSC will be released in the second half of this calendar year (2H21) and will carry a 5-year support lifecycle, instead of the 10-year lifecycle supported with previous version.      Full Microsoft announcement post here.

Now that Windows 7 is less than a year ( 250 working days and counting!) away from officially end of life, we have many organizations that are not prepared to deal with the constant cycle of updates Windows 10 brings and are looking into different alternatives.   The challenges on the last released update to Windows 10, v1809, did not help these late / cautious adopter organizations that the new Windows as a Service cycle is better that the previous approach.

Some of the paths they are looking include:

Read More »Windows 10 LTSC Pros / Cons

Unified Endpoint Management Field 2018

This post  was inspired by a tweet  from VMware’s COO Sanjay Poonen (part of Dell Technologies)

It is simply amazing how much the End User Computing  space has changed in the last four year…    For many of us in the industry the  way we were managing PC devices needed a radical change.    We simply could not continue to perpetuate the existing model.Read More »Unified Endpoint Management Field 2018