14 DAY TRIAL // Customers using Microsoft’s endpoint security solutions might already be aware that the company released the latest iterations of the Forefront enterprise products as a part of its Business Ready Security strategy. On December 3rd, 2009, both Forefront Threat Management Gateway 2010 (TMG) and Forefront Unified Access Gateway 2010 (UAG) were released, although availability was a somewhat different matter. TMG 2010 was indeed launched at the start of this month, but customers needed to exercise their patience when it came down to UAG 2010.
Microsoft promised at the time that UAG would be released to manufacturing in mid-December. Following RTM, the company planned to make UAG 2010 generally available, allowing companied to share trusted corporate resources with both employees and partners. As of December 17 2009, Forefront Unified Access Gateway (UAG) 2010 is available for download.
“Forefront UAG provides secure remote access to corporate resources from a diverse range of managed and unmanaged client endpoints. The Forefront UAG Evaluation Version provided in this download is appropriate for IT professionals who want to deploy and evaluate Forefront UAG in a corporate environment,” Microsoft noted.
Customers must understand that UAG 2010 will truly shine when deployed in IT infrastructures that also feature Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2. When it comes down to connectivity options, IT administrators will still be able to rely on SSL VPN tunnels to allow employees and partners to connect to an organization’s network; however, provided that their company is ready to make the jump to IPv6. UAG comes with support for Windows DirectAccess (DA). And it is with DirectAccess that VPNs can become a thing of the past, replaced by seamless, always-on connectivity.
“Note the following when deploying this Evaluation Version: • Except for the limited trial period, functionality of the Evaluation Version is the same as the full version • Forefront UAG updates and fixes can be installed on the Evaluation Version • To verify whether you are using an evaluation version of Forefront UAG, click About Forefront UAG in the Help menu of the Forefront UAG Management console, and verify whether the word Evaluation appears in the version information. • The trial period for the evaluation version is approximately 120 days. To check how much time remains until the Evaluation Version expires, run the Uagver.exe command line tool. This tool is provided in the evaluation .iso, and is located in the root installation folder. • The Evaluation Version is installed in the same manner as the full version,” Microsoft added.
Unified Access Gateway 2010 is available for download here.