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Support for Integration with Intel SBA
Intel® Small Business Advantage (Intel® SBA) provides an out-of-the-box hardware-based security and productivity suite designed for the small business user. Intel SBA is pre-installed by the computer manufacturer or supplier, but is only configured when the end user wants to start using its features. Some Intel SBA features can configure and define settings in the Intel ME (just like Intel AMT).
For more information about Intel SBA, see http://www.intel.com/go/sba/index.htm.
Some Intel® vProtm platforms can support both Intel SBA and Intel AMT.
When Intel vPro platforms are configured by Intel SBA, the functionality of Intel AMT is not activated. Intel AMT is activated by configuring the computer using Intel SCS.
On these supported platforms, you have two choices:
- Uninstall Intel SBA – Prevent your users access to Intel SBA functionality. To do this, you must uninstall Intel SBA.
- Integrate with Intel SBA – Allow your users to continue using Intel SBA functionality after Intel AMT is configured.
Important Information About Integration:
- To detect if Intel SBA is installed, you can use the SystemDiscovery CLI command of the Configurator (see Discovering Systems). Data about Intel SBA is located in the SBAServiceInfo section of the discovery data output.
- The “integration” option is supported only by the host-based configuration methods available in Intel SCS (ConfigAMT and MaintainAMT). If Intel SBA is installed, these methods will automatically try to integrate with Intel SBA.
- During integration, Intel SCS “takes control” of the Intel ME from Intel SBA. To do this, Intel SCS creates a special Digest user account for Intel SBA. This user account is only given the limited permissions that Intel SBA requires. Intel SBA will then automatically use this user account when it needs to define a setting in the Intel ME.
- Some Intel SBA functionality can only operate correctly if the power management setting is configured to Always on (S0-S5). This is also the recommended setting for Intel AMT (see Power Management Settings). If the configuration profile is defined with a power management setting of Host is on (S0), this is what will occur:
- If Intel SBA is already configured, the power management setting will NOT be changed and will remain configured to Always on (S0-S5). This is to prevent “breaking” Intel SBA. A warning message is recorded in the log file that the power management setting was not changed.
- If Intel SBA is installed but not configured, the power management setting will be configured to Host is on (S0). Intel SBA will be put in the “Incompatible” integration mode and will not be allowed to change this setting. Later, if Intel SBA is configured, Intel SBA features that require the capability to wake up the platform will not be available.