Microsoft SharePoint 2010 Unleashed

PowerShell—The New STSADM

With the release of SharePoint 2010, PowerShell becomes the most important tool for SharePoint administration automation. Every administration operation is first delivered for PowerShell, and some operations (for example, advanced customization during installation, multitenancy administration, and so on) are available via PowerShell only. The built-in cmdlets have much more options than Central Administration UI and STSADM commands.

Administrators can still combine all three interfaces; an administrator that only periodically needs to create a single site collection should probably still use Central Administration, but PowerShell should be the first choice when it comes to administration and automation.