The questions were a pretty fair set of questions that tested your knowledge of installing Hyper-V, creating and deploying Virtual machines, and using System Center Virtual machine Manager (SCVMM) to manage them.   There were no tricky or obscure scenarios so if you know how to get Hyper-V and SCVMM 2008 (beta available) happening then your should find it pretty reasonable.  I would definately recommend you have a go at it if you are involved with virtualization.

 There is a preparation study guide at https://www.microsoft.com/learning/en/us/exams/70-652.mspx which gives a pretty good indication of what will be tested so make sure you understand the usage and relevance of all the aspects of the technologies mentioned in that guide.   Pay particular attention to Clustering/Quick Migration requirements, make sure you understand how to use snapshots and be familiar with what you can do with Authorization Manager.   I would recommend that even if you don't have sufficient hardware available to you to build a multinode cluster at least build a single node cluster just so you know what's involved.  Adding a second node is pretty trivial anyway but you would benefit by knowing the process of failing over (Quick Migration) a VM from one node to another.  There are plenty of good blogs around to help you with setting up a Hyper-V cluster in particular one from Robert Larson https://blogs.technet.com/roblarson/archive/2007/12/17/building-a-host-cluster-with-hyper-v-beta-1.aspx

Install it, learn it and test it.  That's as hard as it gets.

Microsoft have just released a beta version of SCVMM 2008 via https://connect.microsoft.com

Grab it and have a play.  I know a site that already has it in "production" side by side with their Virtual Center console to manage their VMware ESX environment.

The 32 bit versions Windows Server 2008 Std, Vista SP1 and Windows XP SP3 are now supported as guest OS's and Vista SP1 and Windows XP SP3 are now supported as Host OS's.

The Virtual PC SP1 update can be downloaded from https://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=28C97D22-6EB8-4A09-A7F7-F6C7A1F000B5&displaylang=en .  Both 32bit and 64bit versions are available.

Release notes for Virtual PC 2007 SP1 are available at https://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=9f3d3eb5-5e03-4712-999c-e96f91bdf128&displaylang=en .

 After installing VPC 2007 SP1, the Product Version will be 6.0.192.0 and Additions version for this build are 13.820

The update is available as KB948515.msp and can be downloaded from https://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=a79bcf9b-59f7-480b-a4b8-fb56f42e3348&displaylang=en .  There are both 32bit and 64bit versions available.

The update fixes a few minor issues previously reported with Virtual Server 2005 R2 SP1 as well as addressing a number of compatibility issues with Windows Server 2008 and Vista SP1.   Full details of what is included in the update is available in the following KB article: https://support.microsoft.com/kb/948515 .

The KB article above also lists all the additional Host & Guest operating systems now supported for Virtual Server 2005 R2 SP1.

After installing the update the new product versions will be Product Version: 1.1.629.0 and Additions Version: 13.820

I have found quite a few people asking similar questions on the Internet but no one seems to have offered a solution that works so I thought I'd post my findings.

Firstly, for those who haven't hit this before, the "C:\Documents and Settings" directory where user profiles are stored in Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 systems has changed to "C:\Users" in Vista and Windows Server 2008.  (I regularly encounter XP users who have upgraded to Vista getting confused by this one)

So now in Vista and Windows Server 2008 the "All Users" directory in the C:\Users directory is a hidden directory so you will need to "Show hidden files and folders" in Windows Explorer by going Tools|Folder Options|View to show it.

Once you have visability to the C:\Users\All Users directory you will notice that it is just a shortcut then if you try and access it you will get an "Access Denied" dialog box.  Real Handy.

Looking at the properties of the "All Users" directory shows that it points to the C:\ProgramData directory (this is a new system directory that did not exist in older versions e.g. XP etc).  The C:\ProgramData directory is also a hidden directory but if you have already done "Show hidden files & folders" as above then you will see it.

 The C:\ProgramData directory has a sub-directory called "Start Menu" but you will get Access Denied on this one too.

 This is now getting a bit long so lets go straight to the answer ... the Startup directory I needed is now at "C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup"

So essentially, under Vista and Windows Server 2008 the "All Users" profile is now manifested as the C:\ProgramData directory and there are shortcuts from the C:\Users\All Users directory to the new location for compatibility reasons but in most cases you will get an Access Denied dialog box when you attempt to access the shortcuts but you will find most of what you are looking for under C:\ProgramData\Microsoft.  You can also access this via C:\Users\All Users\Microsoft

I can't offer you any explanation as to why the All Users profile underwent such a change in Vista (and Windows Server 2008) but for now I have solved my challenge and have got my startup program working for all users.

I hope this helps those similarly confused ...

In both Vista SP1 and Windows Server 2008, the Remote Desktop Program has been updated to version 6.1 (6.0.6001) and one of the changes is that the functionality previously associated with the /console switch is now called the /admin switch.   Wasted a few hours chasing this one down.  We use a lot of remote desktop connectivity with virtualization so more than a handful of people are going to get caught.

If you use "mstsc /v:servername /console" in a script file then the /console will be ignored (with no warning) and you will be connected to a normal session that is not the server console.  If you specify the /console switch in the RDC GUI connection dialog then it will tell you "an unknown parameter was specified in the computer name field".  

All is good if you use /admin instead of /console.   It would have been great if the developers had seen fit to at least detect the /console switch and issue a message along the lines of "/console no longer supported, use /admin instead" but I guess that's why blogs exist.

Anyway, there is a detailed discussion on the rationale behind the change here:

https://blogs.msdn.com/ts/archive/2007/12/17/changes-to-remote-administration-in-windows-server-2008.aspx

You can get full details surrounding the release here https://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2008/default.mspx

or you can go straight to download the x64 Hyper-V bits here:

https://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=8F22F69E-D1AF-49F0-8236-2B742B354919&displaylang=en

Here's a few highlights:

1.      Quick Migration and high availability providing solutions for planned and unplanned downtime

2.      Support for running Hyper-V with Server Core in the parent partition

3.      Import/Export of virtual machines

4.      Hyper-V now integrated with Windows Server Manager

5.      Integration components are now included in Windows Server 2008 meaning that when you install Windows Server 2008 in a Hyper-V virtual machine, Windows will automatically install the ICs.

6.      VHD Tools support (compaction, expansion and inspection)

7.      Emulated video card has changed from an S3 Trio video card to a more generic VESA compatible device. (This change resolves numerous video issues with non-Windows operating systems like Linux).

8.      Support for up to four virtual SCSI controllers per virtual machine

9.      Numerous fixes for compatibility, performance and scalability

I ran it up on my little Dell D820 over the weekend and it really flys .... performance is awesome.

Just put it on my Dell Precision 490 today and it is very cool.  Now to run up a few decent VMs...

Reduce your learning curve and check out the videos up at the TechCenter at: https://technet.microsoft.com/en-au/scvmm/bb688094.aspx 

I have been asked many questions about where is the best information about deploying SCVMM and there is a great location called the System Center Virtual Machine Manager TechCenter up at the Microsoft Technet site. Check it out at:

https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/scvmm/default.aspx

You can read more about System Center licensing at https://www.microsoft.com/systemcenter/howtobuy/faq.mspx 

The Enterprise SML is expected to be available in Q4 CY07, and pricing will be available closer to release.