Windows 7, Enterprise Desktop Administrator

Exam 70-686 - Windows 7, Enterprise Desktop Administrator

Skills measured

This exam measures your ability to accomplish the technical tasks listed below. The percentages indicate the relative weight of each major topic area on the exam. The higher the percentage, the more questions you are likely to see on that content area on the exam.

Please note that the questions may test on, but will not be limited to, the topics described in the bulleted text.

Planning and managing a client life cycle strategy (16%)

• Plan and manage client licensing and activation
  • Applications and operating systems; activation method; KMS vs. MAK; prerequisites; choosing a SKU; licensing infrastructure; licensing compliance audits; inventory audits; virtualization licensing considerations; making recommendations for licensing strategy and compliance
• Plan and manage software updates
  • Application updates and operating system updates; evaluating and approving software updates; enterprise applications; designing an update strategy; choosing an update tool; planning and deploying a service pack; schedule considerations; network considerations; test updates; auditing for security compliance
• Plan and manage a physical hardware and virtualization strategy
  • Analyzing existing hardware environment; determining which systems meet minimum requirements; tradeoffs of physical vs. VDI environment; network load considerations; disk space; direct connection vs. brokered connection; determining a VHD strategy; choosing 32 bit vs. 64 bit

Designing a standard image (17%)

• Design an image creation strategy
  • Identifying operating system and enterprise applications that will be included with the standard image; thick, thin, or hybrid; role-based or geographic-based images vs. single core image; image localization
• Design a custom image
  • Identifying applications to be installed; identifying features and components to be enabled or disabled; testing the customized image
• Define an image update strategy
  • Performance optimization; security considerations; efficiency; offline servicing vs. online or post-image updates; re-creating; recapturing

Designing client configurations (17%)

• Design standard system settings
  • Choosing methods, including logon scripts, startup scripts, and Group Policy; designing profiles; designing error reporting; designing audit policy
• Define client security standards
  • Application control policies; encryption; stopping unnecessary services; designing firewall rules; defining anti-malware settings; changes to Kerberos and NTLM; configuring user rights; defining UAC policy; designing a security template for system lockdown; defining account policies; designing security standards for removable storage
• Define Windows Internet Explorer settings
  • Defining security zones; cache location; branding; in-private mode; restricting or allowing plug-ins; add-ons; privacy policy; browser protected mode

Designing a Windows 7 client deployment (15%)

• Analyze the environment and choose appropriate deployment methods
  • Building the infrastructure; advantages of lite-touch vs. zero-touch vs. local install; capacity and scale considerations; determining required changes to the infrastructure
• Design a lite-touch deployment strategy
  • Unicast vs. multicast; auto-cast vs. scheduled-cast; staggered deployment; scheduling considerations; network load considerations; choosing a client boot method for deployment; unattended answer files; restricting who can receive images; choosing a delivery mechanism
• Design a zero-touch deployment strategy
  • Designing and configuring task sequencing; unattended answer files; scheduling considerations; staggered deployment; network load considerations; restricting who can receive images
• Design a user state migration strategy
  • Determining which user data and settings to preserve; local vs. remote storage considerations; determining mitigation plan for non-migrated applications; securing migrated data; testing designed strategy; wipe-and-load migration vs. side-by-side migration

Designing application packages for deployment (17%)

• Design a delivery or deployment strategy
  • Auditing for prerequisites and minimum requirements; choosing a deployment method such as virtualized, Remote Desktop Services, Group Policy, or software distribution; server-based or client-based install; scheduling considerations; staggered deployment; network considerations; package creation standards
• Manage application compatibility
  • Testing incompatibility; choosing a method for resolving incompatibility, such as upgrading, Remote Desktop Services, shim, or VDI; auditing incompatible software

Identifying and resolving deployment and client configuration issues (19%)

• Identify and resolve Internet Explorer issues
  • Security zones; Web applications; advanced settings; Group Policy restrictions; certificates
• Identify and resolve Group Policy issues
  • Delegation; inheritance; policies are not effective; blocking; permissions; loopback processing; user vs. computer settings; filtering; performance
• Identify and resolve networking issues
  • Wireless; remote access; VPN; certificates; performance; IP communication; Windows Firewall
• Identify and resolve authentication and authorization issues
  • User rights; distinguishing between client-based and server-based issues; time synchronization (Kerberos)