With Windows Vista Service Pack 1 having RTM'd on February 4, 2008, and out to the general public as of March 18, Microsoft has made available for download its free toolkit designed to streamline and automate the deployment of desktop and server operating systems. Being offered as the evolution of Business Desktop Deployment (BDD) 2007, the Microsoft Deployment Toolkit (MDT) 2008 process and toolset is set up to facilitate the installation of Vista SP1 and Windows Server 2008. Previous variants of the tool, from the time it carried the label of Business Desktop Deployment (BDD), were used by approximately 1 million clients, according to the Redmond company.

"We've reached a pivotal moment in time, the release to Web of Windows Vista SP1, we [also] released Microsoft Deployment Toolkit (MDT) 2008, the latest generation of the Microsoft Solution Accelerators designed to simplify and ease your deployment experience. There are a lot of things to consider when deploying a new OS and, if your organization has 50 desktops or more, MDT is designed to help you navigate the potentially complex desktop environment. Our goal is to save you lots of time and effort in planning and building out a standard desktop experience all the way to rolling OS images out into production," stated Jeremy Chapman, Microsoft Product Manager.

Microsoft stated that the Deployment Toolkit 2008 supports Windows Vista Business, Enterprise, and Ultimate (32 and 64 bit) RTM and SP1, Office Professional, Professional Plus, Enterprise, and Ultimate 2007, Windows Server 2008, Windows Server 2003 R2 (32 and 64 bit) and Windows XP Professional with Service Pack 2 (32 and 64 bit) or Windows XP Tablet PC Edition. As you can see, support for the upcoming Windows XP SP3 has not been added at this point.

"Microsoft Deployment Toolkit (MDT) 2008 unifies the tools and processes required for desktop and server deployment into a common deployment console and collection of guidance. The fourth generation deployment accelerator adds integration with recently released Microsoft deployment technologies to create a single path for image creation and automated installation. MDT's tools and end-to-end guidance reduce deployment time, standardize desktop and server images, limit service disruptions, reduce post-deployment help desk costs, and improve security and ongoing configuration management," Microsoft added.

Microsoft Deployment Toolkit (MDT) 2008 can be downloaded from here.