A year ago we introduced SCCM in our org with the help of a MS consultant. Our network consists of a central site with satellite sites in a hub & spoke configuration. Links to the satellite offices vary in bandwidth. Secondary Site Code 123 Secondary ServerA (DP)(Boundary A)<--------------Central Site(MP,DP,PXE)----------------------->ServerB (DP)(BoundaryB) The secondary servers have been uninstalled and reinstalled under the Central Site as BRANCH DISTRIBUTION POINTS. This configuration was chosen to flatten our hierarchy. Site Code 123 ServerA Physical location<--------------Central Site(MP,DP,PXE)----------------------->ServerB Physical location ServerA (BDP)(Boundary A) ServerB (BDP)(BoundaryB) It’s assumed that packages will be distributed from the Central Site to the BDP servers via BITS and the clients receive packages via SMB. Is this correct? Is this a functional / recommened configuration?

How many clients are at the child location? Range from 30 - 400 Do you intend to do OSD there? Yes (But will not be a BDP) (Server DP) Would you rather use sender addresses to control traffic? Tell me more I prefer secondary sites over BDP's any time I have a server OS in in the child location. Why? This method doesnt flatten the hierachy.

As I said before there's no right or wrong answer so TIFWIW..... I personally would not use a BDP at a site with more than 10 computers unless there was not a server OS computer there. If you plan to do OSD there you will likely need a SMP and a PSP may as well use a secondary site. I use senders to limit traffic to my secondary sites from 7am-7pm no low priority traffic is allowed. I set all my packages to low. This prevents network traffic from killing the WAN during business hours. What do you plan to gain by flattening the hierachy? Personally I think secondary sites are easier to troubleshoot and manage than BDP's. I see no advantage of flattening by using a BDP instead of a secondary site. BDP's were designed by the product team to fill a gap in a particular scenarion which was small branch offices (25 comptuers or less)without servers. People tend to overuse them IMO.John Marcum | http://myitforum.com/cs2/blogs/jmarcum |

If you have 400 clients at one site you will need a secondary site server. http://www.enhansoft.com/