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Thursday, December 8, 2011

T01 E3B M0F errors when pxe booting in SCCM 2007


T01 E3B M0F errors when pxe booting in SCCM 2007


I had the above issues and after looking around the internet and some trial an error, this is the solution that I found:
1: Stop the WDS service.
2: Old out the  C:\WINDOWS\TEMP\PXEBootFiles\Windows folder
3: Start the WDS service.
4: Check smspxe.log again and see if Unable to delete directory... exists.

This solved my issues, and my folders in ...\SMSBoot\x86 ...\SMSBoot\x64 and ...\SMSBoot\ia64 were populated with the needed files.
seemed to work for me.

Wednesday, November 30, 2011

Extending a Share Quota in server 2008


In server 2008, you use the Share and Storage Management tool to provision shares and storage. In this tool you can create a quota for a share. this is a good idea to stop data sprawl which can occur, especially on shared drives. But what if you want to manage, extend or decrease this quota?
for some reason in their infinite wisdom, Microsoft doesn’t allow you to do so from the Share and Storage Management Tools Window. To increase the quota size:
  1. open File Server Resource Manger
  2. expand Quota Management and choose Quotas
  3. This will present all the available Quotas (known as Source Templates) that you have configured.
  4. Find the source template you want to extend, right click and choose edit quota properties
  5. From here you are shown the Quota template from which your folder pulls its settings, the specific space limitations of this share and any warnings that you have configured for out of space notifications
  6. As you an see above, I have set the Quota to be 350GB in this instance (from a 100GB template) and configured email and event log notifications (note that for email notifications to work you will need to configure SMTP in IIS)
  7. click ok and your quota has been set!
please note that this article can also be viewed at our sister site dizzyit.com at : http://dizzyit.com/2011/12/01/extending-share-quota-server-2008/

Wednesday, November 16, 2011

SCCM PXE Error after booting – The certificate associated with this media has expired


SCCM PXE Error after booting – The certificate associated with this media has expired



you boot into configuration manager and you get this message which just makes your day:
Error: the certificate associated with this media has expired. New Media with a valid certificate will need to be created.
This is pretty easy to fix assuming you have a self signed certificate. To do so:
1. Log into you SCCM server and go to Site Database → Site Management → Site Settings → Site Systemsand select the SCCM server that maintains your PXE load point
2.In the right hand side  pane, right click on the “ConfigMgr PXE service point” and choose Properties.
3. Select the Database tab and look for the the Create self-signed PXE certificate option in the lower half of the screen.
4. here you can change the date for the self signed PXE certificate to a date in the future then choose OK
5. To verify that all is now OK  go to Site Database → Site Management → Site Settings → Certificates.Double click on the PXE certificate and make sure that there is an entry that is NOT listed as blocked
6. from here you should be able to boot into the boot media without issue. however, if the certificate has expired you will need to re build your boot media.

This article can also be found on our sister site DizzyIT.com : http://dizzyit.com/2011/11/16/sccm-pxe-error-booting-certificate-media-expired/

Sunday, November 13, 2011

Create Network and Sharing Center Shortcut in Windows 7


In windows 7, it can be troublesome getting a Network and Sharing Center Shortcut for the desktop, which in my case is something i wanted for an SOE i was building. after some research i came across the following sollution:

1. go to the desktop, right click and select create new shortcut
2. In the create shortcut text box paste the following text:
C:\Windows\explorer.exe shell:::{8E908FC9-BECC-40f6-915B-F4CA0E70D03D}

3. Choose Next and then type in a name for the shortcut. I normally just use Network and Sharing Center as that’s what your creating a shortcut for in the first place!
4. Choose Finish and you’re done! from here if you wanted you could go and chance the icon and name from within the properties for the shortcut.



this is also repeated on our sister site www.dizzyit.com at: 

Wednesday, November 9, 2011

Initial Configuration Tasks screen missing in Server 2008


Initial Configuration Tasks screen missing in Server 2008


You either love it or hate it, the initial configuration tasks screen that comes up when you first login to a Server 2008 box.
down in the bottom right hand corner is a little check box where you can elect to not show the window at logon. This is great until you realize that perhaps you do indeed want to view this at logon in the future, or perhaps right now.
get the page back go to start -> Run or Start -> search and type in “oobe” without the quotes and the page will re- appear.

Printer Error 0x000003eb when installing printer

Printer Error 0x000003eb when installing printer



When trying to connect to a network printer you get the following error 0x000003eb :
For me, this turned out to be a printer driver issue. To determine this, i created a new printer on the server using the same IP, driver, permissions etc and the problem again occurred.
I then changed the printer driver to a random driver  ( of a printer model that i know works OK on the server) on both the new and existing printer objects and ta-da the printer worked.
While researching this, i also found reference to the print spooler service crashing, however this was not a symptom in my case. IMHO, if the service is crashing when you install your printer, this probably points to a driver issue anyways

Thursday, September 29, 2011

remove network printers from command line or script


remove network printers from command line or script



There are several options when it comes to removing printers via command line / script.The first option is to use the "rundll32 printui.dll" method. For this, open a command prompt and type:

rundll32 printui.dll,PrintUIEntry /dn /n \\printsvr\printername

if you want the operation to be silent, then use the /q switch at the end. this is especially useful if you have multiple printers that you want to remove via a batch file and/or if you are unsure if the printers are installed on the end users machines. If the printer is not currently installed and you attempt to remove it without the /q switch then you will receive an error. The figure below shows the command in its entirety:

The next method would be to use a VB script such as this :
to make the script work, just replace the \\PRINTSERVER\PRINTERNAME" field with the details of your network printer and save as a .vbs file. to call the script just open up an administrator command prompt and type in " cscript scriptname.vbs " where scriptname is the name of your script.
To delete more printers just another line to the  " Dim sPrinterName "  lines with the printer number at the end, and then again  add another objNetwork.RemovePrinterConnection sPrinterName2, True, True line that reflects the printer number you just added.
Likewise, to remove only one printer just remove one of the above lines.


Option Explicit

  Dim objNetwork, objPrinters

  Set objNetwork = CreateObject("WScript.Network")
  Set objPrinters = objNetwork.EnumPrinterConnections

  ' ### Delete selected network printer

  Dim sPrinterName1
 Dim sPrinterName2
  sPrinterName1 = "\\PRINTSERVER\PRINTERNAME"
 sPrinterName2 = "\\PRINTSERVER\PRINTERNAME"
  objNetwork.RemovePrinterConnection sPrinterName1, True, True
 objNetwork.RemovePrinterConnection sPrinterName2, True, True

I found with this method however that it will error out if that printer does not exist. im not enough of a VB guru to tell you if its possible to quieten it down to run silently.

When all is said and done, there is a much better way of doing this, and that is with Group Policy Preferences. this gives you centralized control over your printer environments, allowing you to add and remove and update printers for small groups or your entire organisation.
Group Policy Preferences will be covered for printers in an upcoming entry.

Thursday, September 22, 2011

how do i add domain users as local admins?

how do i add domain users as local admins?


In environments where you must have local admin access (yes, this is far from ideal but we can get to that later) its not a good idea to add domin users to local admins unless you like you users to have admin rights over each others machines. this can be especially fun in a school / college environment!

a better way to manage this is to have the logged in user on the machine (aka interactive account) become a local admin for its logged in tenure.

the command to do so is (from a dos prompt or batch file):

net localgroup Administrators interactive /add










once again, its far better to avoid local admin access, but if you have to use it, this is the best way i have found to manage it


Tuesday, September 6, 2011

how do i add a network printer for all users?


use this for making printers install for all users instead of the current user in Windows 7

To install the printer for all users, follow these steps:
1. Click Start, click Control Panel and double click Devices and Printers.
2. Click Add a Printer.
3. Select "Add a local printer".
4. Select "Create a new port". Choose "Local Port" as the type of the port.

5. In the box "Enter a port name", type the address as the following format.
\\ [IP address of the host computer]\[The Share Name of the printer]
Then click Next.
6. Choose the correct driver in the driver list. If no available driver, click the button Windows Update, wait for the process finishes and then look for the driver again.
7. Shared this printer to all the users.
8. Finish the installation.

How do I old out a Windows 7 User profile?

“Old-ing” out user profiles is a little different in Windows 7 as discovered recently. This is procedure I found on the interweb and should be followed in place of XP style method
Move C:\Users\%username% to another folder e.g. c:\temp

Delete C:\Users\TEMP to another folder e.g. c:\temp

Delete the
registry key matching the users SID from
"HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\WindowsNT\CurrentVersion\ProfileList". Check the value "ProfileImagePath" to make sure you
Pick the correct profile.

Restart once again and then you're done.

How do i un-install Windows software remotely?

a couple of ways to uninstall windows programs other than add remove programs. mainly used for silent and unattended uninstalls.

WMIC

  • use "wmic product get name" to find the exact installed name of the product
  • to uninstall type "wmic product where name ="" call uninstall
Registry

  • Open Regedit
  • find HKLM\software\microsoft\windows\current version\uninstall
  • this will list the string for uninstalling the product in verbose mode normally.
  • to find the silent install locate the exe as listed and query it with a \? swtich to find the silent install option ( more often than not it is /S)