In order to start building Cloud you have to have resources. Such resources are storage, network and compute power (servers). Let’s say you have those but the servers are nothing without operating system. The operating system connects these resources together. To get the OS on a server you have to install and configure it. But if you start to install and configure OS on every server manually it will be resource intensive and could lead to inconsistency in the configuration of your servers. Of course there is solution for this problem and it is called automatic deployment. Microsoft offers such solution and it is free – Microsoft Deployment Toolkit. MDT offers full automation in deploying Windows but it can be integrated with System Center Configuration Manager to increase its powers in automatic OS deployment.
In the video below offered by Microsoft you will see Session 1 from Deployment day on Tech Days 2012 conference in Belgium. Presenter is Rhonda Layfield which is Sr. Deployment Architect. Video is Level 200 according to me and will show you the basics around MDT and what is new in 2012 version. Click on the link below and watch.
Cloud Administrator in Azure World 
Have you ever thought about publishing an ebook or guest authoring on other blogs? I have a blog based on the same ideas you discuss and would love to have you share some stories/information. I know my audience would appreciate your work. If you are even remotely interested, feel free to shoot me an e-mail.
Never thought about publishing a book. May be some day when I have more experience in the field 🙂