The Windows Firewall is another tool that can be used to protect your systems from network attacks. While you can configure it in the management operating system, this will have no effect on traffic meant for the virtual machines. The Hyper-V virtual switch operates independently of the components that the management operating system's firewall has access to. You can completely block all traffic in and out of the management operating system without impacting the guests in any way.

The Windows Firewall is a common component of all the current Windows servers and desktop operating systems and should be familiar to administrators. As such, we won't be providing detailed instructions in this book. However, there are a number of guides available. Microsoft's TechNet site contains a launching page with a large number of resources devoted to the subject, and is viewable at http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/network/bb545423.aspx.

While the total subject of the Windows...