Deploying your lab with System Center 2012 R2

With the recent availability of the R2 preview of Windows Server 2012 and System Center 2012, I’ve decided to rebuild my little demo / lab environment. Here are the most useful links that I had to use.

1. Getting the evaluation versions : System Center 2012 R2 and Windows Server 2012 R2 preview can be downloaded at this location : https://technet.microsoft.com/evalcenter/dn205295.aspx 

   Please note that VMM 2012 R2 requires the presence of the Windows ADK which can be downloaded at this location : https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=309908 

2. System requirements: https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dn281935.aspx 

   Note: The self service portal relies on SharePoint 2010 therefore you must install the SSP components on Windows Server 2008 SP1 or Windows Server 2008 R2

3. All System Center products rely on SQL server to store their data. You can find the compatibility matrix of System Center components and SQL on this page : https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dn281933.aspx

   To build my lab, I’ve used the SQL 2012 SP1 version that you can freely download from here : https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/evalcenter/hh225126.aspx 

Now you are ready to proceed with the installation. I’m not going to walk through all the installation steps.

When you install SQL, pay attention to the Collation settings. If you are going to be in a pure English configuration the default settings are ok but if you are going to manage a multi-lingual environment, please read the following article : https://blogs.technet.com/b/servicemanager/archive/2012/05/24/clarification-on-sql-server-collation-requirements-for-system-center-2012.aspx 

Finally here is the configuration of my lab. All the systems are running in a virtual environment except the host :

In my next post I’m going to explain the System Center configuration that I’ve implemented in order to be able to test almost all the components of this R2 release.