Folder redirection \ Offline files \ Search Service

[gshaw]

I'm setting up a new VM file server to move our staff from XP to 7, part of which is going to involve resetting the Documents folder structure (as it's a mess at the moment from a previous setup)

I've got the standard permissions as per the usual MS and external articles but there's a couple of queries around the edges I'm trying to find the "official" line on

• does Offline Files have to be enabled on the share?
• do you enable the Windows Search service on your file server?

Reason for this is I've never been much of a fan of Offline Files, seems to cause more trouble than it's worth but the thing seems to be harder to remove in 7 (haven't been able to fully turn it off on our classroom machines I migrated in the summer) yet some articles I read suggest search and some other features won't work unless it's turned on?

Also regarding the Windows Search service, seems like I have to enable it on the server to turn off the "unsupported save location" error you get in Windows otherwise, only problem is I've seen that it's limited to how many documents it can handle (1 million?) and max number of concurrent connections. Even the server itself says it's only suitable for small scale use but yet clients still complain if it's not turned on?

[Ergo]

I've got the standard permissions as per the usual MS and external articles but there's a couple of queries around the edges I'm trying to find the "official" line on

• does Offline Files have to be enabled on the share?

I would recommend this only be enabled if you are allowing offline files. If you are not allowing offline files then ensure you disable offline files for users, and set the "prevent redirected folders being automatically set as offline" GPOs.

• do you enable the Windows Search service on your file server?

Yes, we always enable this - partly to get rid of the error, but does also speed up searching from Win7 clients. I have not seen problems based on the number of files, but then we also recommend separate file servers for Student, Staff and Shared files (separate VMs in most installs) to allow better load balancing across physical servers.

I would also recommend enabling Remote Differential Compression on both Win7 clients and Win2008 Servers which can improve speed of uploading/downloading files.

Regards

Dave

[gshaw]

All working nicely on our test machines so far (IT techs make great guinea pigs ) but still wondering best practice re: Offline Files.

Reading stuff like this Offline Files - Does it really suck or are we doing something wrong? - Spiceworks suggests it's still not that great but I've also read somewhere else MS designed folder redirection in 7 to be used with Offline Files and it's not seen as good practice to run purely "online"?

[dana_lehman]

We have a digital arts class that was working with windows movie maker and I had to enable offline cache on the share for it to work properly.
Not sure what the exact setting is but I think it was in the advanced share properties on server 2008.

[robyholmes]

Offline files takes a bit of getting setup to work without extremely long logins. Also disable on any computers which don't go offsite or network. Otherwise it works ok depending how often the users sync with the network etc. I would advise on the shares to leave offline caching on apart for shares you don't ever want off site, even if you don't want to use offline files at the moment. That way its just one less thing to think about when you enable via group policy.

[kcymer]

We disabled offline files as we do not use it and in the past it cause some problems.

With search - when we setup new domain we have switched that on and than the server was almost unusable - because it indexing files all the time, so CPU and memory was always at 100%, making log ins really taking long time. So in the end we have disable it.
Yeah you get annoying message unsupported save location but it does not affect anyone, apart being annoying. Since than we have splitted files of staff, year 7.8.9 and year 10 and 11 to different file servers, for load balancing, so might give it a shot now.