Patch Management and System Inventory on a Windows network?

Posted by Scott on Server Fault See other posts from Server Fault or by Scott
Published on 2011-02-15T00:39:43Z Indexed on 2011/02/15 7:27 UTC
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Windows

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patch-management

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system-administration

What are some good ways to have patch management and systems/hardware inventory for a Windows (Server 2003 or 2008) network?

For example, at a minimum knowing the basics for all the machines out on the network such as OS version, patch level, what hotfixes they have, processor, ram, etc.

Even better would be knowing more details such as peripherals.

Ideally if there were a way to push service packs, and hotfixes (and other software?) to the machines, that would be great.

What are some options for this?

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