We currently have Windows XP and Windows 7 Workstations in our domain, and Server 2003 and Server 2008 servers. I am starting some early testing of Windows 8 workstations, and I am trying to understand what we may need to do in order to apply our current GPO for Windows 8 workstations, and make some new ones for only Windows 8 workstations.
Currently I mainly manage workstation GPO'S for the Windows XP And Windows 7 workstations from a Windows 7 "management" workstation using GPMC from RSAT. I do not really work with the Domain Controllers or Server's themselves, but I do know that our Domain and Forest Functional Levels are currently Windows Server 2003, that we have mostly Server 2008 DC's and that don't currently have any Server 2012 servers.
I have started adding Windows 8 workstations to the domain, and they are getting some GPO's however I have not really started configuring anything specific for them yet. I was thinking I could create a Windows 8 management workstation, install the RSAT version for Windows 8 on it, and then use GPMC from that workstation to mange any Windows 8 specific GPOs that we may have, where we may want to utilize GPO settings/features that are new with Windows 8, and maybe also to mange some GPO's we will apply to both Windows 7 and Windows 8 workstations.
I'm wondering if this should work as I'm thinking, or if I am missing some more advanced configuration that may need to be done to the domain to be able to apply GPO's to Windows 8 Workstations as well as our current Windows 7/XP. I am trying to avoid having to do anything that may effect the way group policy current works with our Windows 7/XP Workstations, since they are our main live workstations .
I did see this article about updating ADMX files for Windows 8 / Sever 2012, but I'm not sure if this will be needed to just apply settings to Windows 8 workstations? http://blogs.technet.com/b/craigf/archive/2012/08/28/upgrading-the-admx-central-store-files-from-windows-7-2008r2-to-windows-8-2012.aspx
I understand a little about ADMX files and how they work with GPO's but I would like to learn more if anyone can point me to a article that explains more about them that would also be great.