altecsole

Probably the easiest method is to deploy your riprep image to new hardware (assuming the HAL is the same), add the drivers for your devices and then re-image the workstation. The new image should then work fine for both sets of hardware. Also, have a look at the riprep section of this MS Knowledge Base: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314479 To force your setup to do a full plug and play scan during setup you use the /pnp switch with riprep.exe. You can do this from the run command; \\RISServerName\Reminst\Admin\i386\Riprep.exe /pnp. With this switch a full plug and play enumeration will be carried out on each hardware that the image is deployed to. Good luck.

Make sure that your power supply is up to it. We had intermittent drive problems with one of our servers that had six drives installed, it turned out that the psu wasn't up to the job despite the fact that it came with the big server case with eight drive bays.

We got an Intel motherboard which with an onboard raid controller. It came setup for raid 0 and 1, but we paid about £50 to add a chip to upgrade it to raid 5. We got an extra GB of RAM because it was only about an extra £50 which, considering the total price was probably worth it. Also, I completely forgot to mention; it's also a DC (one of three).

We bought a Server case and motherboard, got a SATA RAID controller and put in four 500GB drives running Raid 5. We put on Windows 2003 R2 and , touch wood, it's working great. With 2GB RAM it cost us just under £1500. For a file server you'll find the additional feature in 2003 R2 a real bonus. We also bought a couple of Bufallo TeraStations. These cost about £600 for 1.5TB RAID 5, but you don't have the flexibility with them as you do with a Windows box. We use them for network backup. By the way, have you only got one DC? If so, I'd definitely want a second one for backup.

Install any applications you want including. Browse to the ris_server\reminst\Admin\i386 folder and run riprep.exe. Follow the wizard. The files will get copied to the RIS server and then the workstation will shutdown. Part of the process includes Sysprep so you don't need to worry about that. If you turn on the workstation after the process is complete it will go through a mini setup (this is because Sysprep was run on the workstation). You can enter the relevant details and continue to use the workstation. Give it a go, you can't break anything. Try imaging back onto a different machine so you still have your original workstation to tweak if things aren't quite right. One other thing - make sure that your workstation hard drive is the same size, or smaller, than the hard drives of the machines that you are going to put the image onto. It won't work otherwise. Hope this helps.

Yes, thanks. Didn't explain myself very well. That's what I had to do. What I meant was that the syntax used in this case is the same as you'd use with vbscript, so learning vbscript too would be an advantage. Like you say, until PowerShell is included as part of the OS there will always be a place for vbscript. In particular, things like startup scripts and logon scripts. PowerShell seems much better with things like WMI, so you pick the most appropriate one for the job (that's what I intend to do).

Why else would you want to do this? I assumed (correctly) that this was for testing purposes. As far as I know there is no way to test group policies offline? I use VMWare workstation on my laptop to run a virtual domain with a test OU setup like I described.

Why would you want to? Just create a test OU structure, add a couple of users and computers and do your testing using these accounts. Create new group policies for specific tasks. Once they're working you can then link them to your existing OUs, or incorporate the settings into your existing GPs.

If possible, I'd learn them both. Powershell is really the way forward but some things are still easier to knock together using vbscript. For example, try creating a shortcut using Powershell or, as I had to do, changing a shortcut path using a script. You can do this in vbscript, but I couldn't find any way to do it in Powershell. In the end I called some vbscript from within Powershell to do the job. The ability to use vbscript within Powershell is fantastic, but you need to learn some vbscript to make full use of it.

Whoops, I'm too late. Glad you got it sorted.

I suggest you create a Test OU and put a test machine in it. Then, create the policy for the Test OU (use MS Group Policy Management Console) using the setting that mrforgetful suggests. If you've got a couple of domain controllers give the policy time to propagate (about 5 minutes should do). Logon to you test machine and open a Run command. Type in gpupdate /force /boot and hit Enter. This will force the machine to update the group policy settings and reboot. Once it's rebooted see if the changes have been applied. If not, we'll see if we can figure out why not.

You could add a Startup script via a group policy that adds the domain admin to the local group. For example, here is how you'd do it with a batch file: net localgroup Administrators "Your_Domain\Domain Admins" /add You can also do this via Restricted groups using group policy. As I said before, we also use a startup script batch file to set the local Administrator password. In this way we can change it across the domain when we feel the need.

We change our local administrator password using a startup script when necessary. Add the following to a batch file: net user Administrator new_password

If users can still logon then a DC is there, but something is messed up. I just thought promoting another DC may fix the problem? If all else fails it's worth a try?

You may have an issue with Terminal Server licensing if it's running on that server. You may have to point the server at itself, and also point your other TS at it too.

How about adding a virtual machine and promoting that to a domain controller? With a bit of luck it may work and you then then try to demote and then promote your misbehaving DC? I may be talking the proverbial, so ignore me if I am.

I'm not branding you a liar. The impression I got from your original post was that you were having a rant against Viglen. What's wrong with that you may ask? Nothing, if it's down the pub with your mates, but this is (hopefully) a respected forum for IT professionals working in education. As such, I felt, the tone of your post was inappropriate. That's just a personal opinion. No doubt others will let me know if I'm wrong? I'm no Viglen disciple. Their hardware, on the whole, is okay. I don't buy it now, but I have in the past. I'm sure you are a nice fella. You've replied with some valid and reasoned points so maybe the discussion is constructive after all? I'm sure you will be a valued member. I apologise if you think I've been out if line with my replies. Like I say; I'm sure others will let me know if they think so too.

Would that be the same problem that you detailed in http://www.edugeek.net/index.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=7617 where you say the fault was actually with the wireless network card drivers? A company the size of Viglen will always have to sub contract. I'm surprised they left you with no working whiteboards and dangerous wiring. It's all about balance. It's very easy for someone to come on the Internet and write a list of bad things about a company. That can be very damaging to the company. Yes, we all want to be warned of bad experiences, but please try to keep it balanced. From reading your initial post it would seem that Viglen have never supplied you with anything that you were satisfied with. Is that the case? I'd be surprised if it were. It's always easy to knock the big boys but think carefully before you do it with such gusto.

How did the servers fall apart? CD drives in classrooms are just asking for trouble. The abuse they get means they last no time at all. What were the wireless access points inferior to? Three yeears for a laptop that's being used in an educational environment is good. I wouldn't complain about that. What does 'I swear down' mean? I worked in a school that had Viglen kit and the customer support (on the very few occasions we needed it) was always excellent. Perhaps he learned to be objective about all things. Nothing is ever always good, or bad. Maybe if you learn that too there will be hope for you yet.

What version of C#? 2005 has a Settings file that you can use for this kind of thing. Have a look at http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa730869(vs.80).aspx

Looks good. Can you list the steps you took to create this?

Also; you will find that even when you move files to the local hard drive iTunes still likes to keep a folder with settings in the users My Documents folder. I find that (if you redirect My Documents) setting this to 'Make available offline' ensures that everything runs nicely.

in iTunes; change the location where music files are stored to the local hard drive.

Yes Probably not. I'm pretty sure that the versions of sysprep are different so it's probably best to use that one that's in the deploy folder on your 2000 CD.

I wrote a couple of vbscripts that we set to run at logon and logoff. Basically they write a logon entry to a mySQL database when users logon, and then delete it when they logoff. It's then pretty simple to check who's logged on and where. I can post the scripts if anyone's interested?