SkreeM1980

I can't think of anything that would impact on 84 without being specifically configured. If the VLAN's have changed has any of the IP addressing of the servers? When we VLAN'd our network i had to reconfigure the accounting server addresses within the MFD's web interface to point at the new IP for the server. Skr

We transferred the roles with no problems at all, I did it in hours, and took a System State backup to a file from the DC's holding the roles before the move which could have been used as an authoratitive restore if needed. The problems only started after the i had demoted the 2003 DC's and found a couple of things that were a struggle(VMWare view composer for one), fixed by changing the default domain controller policy to allow legacy connections SKr

This is a definate case of needing the user profile hive cleanup tool installed and running on the machine. The profile is deleting on logoff, however these files are in use and cannot be deleted. If the Hivve cleanup is already installed it may be worth using a modified version of the script above on machine startup to clean all these out each time the computer boots. you could use On Error Resume Next Dim obtainfolder Dim Pathfinder Dim strPath Set fso = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject") strPath = "C:\Documents and Settings\" userexcludelist = "Administrator,All Users,Default User,localservice,networkservice," Set f = fso.GetFolder(strPath) ' Loop through all subfolders For Each fldrItem in f.SubFolders fldrName = fldrItem.name If Right(strPath,1) <> "\" Then Pathfinder = strPath & "\" & fldrName Else Pathfinder = strPath & fldrName End If If InStr(1, ".00", fldrName, 1) Then set obtainfolder = fso.GetFolder(Pathfinder) obtainfolder.Delete true Else End If Next ' Clean up objects Set fso = Nothing Set fc = Nothing

We used to have online backup service, and it was a nightmare to deal with, ensuring that it was working properly every night. I think that if you have the local copy then a remote like everybody says it can be alright. There is a company i woulnd't recommend but would prefer not to post publicy as they failed to monitor our service accurately even though they were charging a fortune. Skr

I did my DC's to 2008 the other day, there is a really good MS whitepaper on it, which when i get in to the office i will find and link post the link. It was remarkably painless, although in our case i had 3x 2003 DC's (1 of them 64bit) and a spare(?) server. The 32Bit servers were DNS & DHCP and one of them also runs the backup software. In order to get everything to work properly i also needed to get the new servers onto the IP's of the old servers ... Oh and i did it on a live network, although it was half term we still had approx 100 staff in. The process we followed was Install spare server as 2008 R2 Perform the AD schema updates (used the 32 bit version from the r2 CD and ran it on the existing server holding Schema Master FSMO role) Wait for AD to Replicate DCPromo on the new server In place upgrade on the 64Bit 2003 DC Install DNS both 2008 Point Pri DNS on the 4 DC's to OLDDC02 Change IP of OLDDC01, do ipconfig /registerDNS and stop/start NETLOGON service Change IP of NEWDC01 do ipconfig/registerdns and stop/start NETLOGON service Move FSMO roles to NEWDC01 Demote OLDDC01 Change Pri DNS of 3x DC's to NEWDC01 Install DHCP on NEWDC02 do netsh DHCP Server Export all on OLDDC02 stop DHCP on OLDDC02 Change IP of OLDDC02 run ipconfig/registerdns and stop/start netlogon service Change IP of NEWDC02 run ipconfig /registerdns and stop/start netlogon service do netsh DHCP Server import all on NEWDC02 Dcpromo OLDDC02 The only pain i had was that somehow one of the new DC's managed to get DNS forwarders that didn't work, causing some problems with delivering outbound email. and i had to install WINS again for some shortnames to work. Skr

I think i may have changed my mind on this following some other conversations i was having with Other college IT managers yesterday. I have also been advised that I should move away from telnet where possible for switch management. Skr

A switch installed will mean you can run 100m from the switch, by placing this in the middle means you can go to almost 200m from the main cabinet. In theory you shouldn't have more than 2 switches in any link back to the core, but in reality you can get 3 in if you really needed. Skr

I'd suggest you take a look at the A+ study guides and see what the basic topics covered are then pick the most important ones that you can fit in your time window. Although building a PC week by week is a pretty cool project based way of learning.

It's worth taking a look at the kyocera range, we've not use the colour but have deployed 45 odd B/W printers to replace P2055's P2015's and some other old HP stuff. We're getting them on a managed contract so have all servicing and toners included. We've opted for a cost per page only option, but there would also be quarterly lease and lower cost per page. The hardware works really well though, nice and fast plus Kyocera have some good eco credentials as Imaging drums etc aren't part of the toner so the carbon footprint and recycling is better. Skr

There are some pretty cost affective NAS/SAN boxes out there that can either have the file shares on directly or use iSCSI to connect to the server, my advise would be only use iSCSI if your servers are 2008 as it loads really late in the boot process on 2003 an can cause issues.

The actual event ID's you are getting may help us to give you assistance?? The scheduled restart of the services may also alleviate the pain you are experiencing from the lockup's as usually with these things the lockups are after it's been running for a while ... so restart services at say 6am and 6pm may stop you running long enough to get the lockup?? Have you looked at the Solarwinds Free exchange service monitor, that may help you with getting it up and running or at least getting notified of the failure. Skr

Is it possibly a reverse lookup WINS entry? If you run WINS use the console, goto display all records and then filter by the name you are struggling with. Then if it is present click it and hit delete. if hyou get option to Tombstone click yes! Skr

I'm using ServerAssist, not the cheapest solution out there, however is very good and has http connectivity back to monitoring console so can have a single console for all your sites, but sould still fun a local console at each site for their servers too. The team at server assist are really good and take feedback onboard well, I've had features arrive in newer versions after a small wouldn't it be nice if... conversation.Server Monitoring and Network Monitoring for Windows, Linux, applications and SNMP Skr

You could also achieve the necessary with the SMTP server component of IIS, however probably more complicated to setup.

We've never used deep freeze and for the IT suite and classroom PC's the lockdowns with GPO work a treat. The students only see the icons they need, they don't have access to the c: drive and can't launch EXE's from Temp Folders, USB or My doc's meaning it would be very hard for them to affect the computer. Group policy to delete profiles on logo off seems to work on XP mostly as long as the UserProfileHive cleanup tool is installed. Staff are the problem as we have historically given them way too much access(local admins on PC's), and closing that down is an issue.

There is also a hack online somewhere that i used where you can edit the html of the login page and make it automatically insert the domain name ... i'll find the link from my favourites when i'm in the office.

I did a trial of the Ruckus, replaced an 8 port extricom for about 6 weeks, and it worked a treat. We also trialled Aerohive and have ended up doing a 50 AP deployment of it with plans to put possibly another 30 odd AP's this year with new buildings and uncovered areas. Skr

Steven, You need to configure the batch file as a machine startup script using group policy rather than a user logon script. You can make it leave the 2003 version on at the same time, for all applications except outlook. I can't see any reason you would want to though, we are just testing with a small group at the moment and all are so happy with 2010 that they don't want to use the PC's that have 2003 installed. Skr

Aerohive have some external AP's or you could also install the internal ones in IP rated boxes to save costs(we've done this and it works well). If you have the cloudbased management then there is no need for a controller.

I wouldn't use the management-vlan option, just have all the switches in a VLAN, better off not using vlan 1, if you have vlan 1 as a non routed vlan with DHCP you can use it as a cleanup/catchall vlan to find clients that are connected to ports not properly VLAN assigned. The WOL stuff is useful; we have some power management software, that is used to switch the it suites on for the start of the day so uses WOL, and we can fire up machines directly when wanting to config them or troubleshoot. obviously this is most useful on a large site as it can save a lot of running around. Skr

The areohive kit is fantastic, i deployed about 50 ap's throughout our college last year. Really easy to manage, i have the cloud based management platform, which works really well and is relliable. Having been on the official training course there are so many benefits to the controller less architecture, particularly the performance. also with automatic meshing it can be quite cost effective to install without having to cable to each AP location. you could also put a few AP's to provide the mesh than attach 2 AP's to the laptop trolley to provide sufficient connectivity to the classroom which may save money. The ruckus stuff is also good though, we trialled it alongside the aerohive and it was a very close run thing as to which we chose. a managed wireless solution is essential if you are ever going to expand beyond a very small number of clients or networks as having to make configuration changes on even 12 seperate AP's is a pain in the rear end. e.g. a PSK change or changing the IP of a gateway. Skr

Matt, you could achieve it by using seperate VLANS on different subnet addresses, however you will have to have something routing traffic to the proxy server and then it depends if it support transparent proxy or wether the settings have to be entered into Internet Explorer. You'll also need to do some ACL's on the router to ensure that traffic from the guest network can't communicate with anything other than the proxy server in the admin network. We achieved this by using a second proxy for guest/student and resident networks that was then connected to an optional interface on the firewall, ensuring seperation right to the edge of the network. the only thing that can see both the college network and the guest/.student/resident network is a multihomed server which does DHCP and DNS for the guest/resident/student networks. We did have this working with Ruckus originally with no problems as all the config is done in the switches etc. With my current Aerohive kit i can also force http traffic to a proxy if required. but my Bloxx device does transparent so not needed. your firewall may also be able to force the Http proxy?? Skr

Gotcha's we found: All the usual switching stuff which you've covered, although you also need a DHCP helper pointing at your PXE server if you ever want network boot to work. But the oddest problems were with some client software. Things that talk to network licensing servers/dongles can be funny and may need special configuration. We had one app that needed the licensing server IP entering in a config file, and another that needed the name entering as an environment variable. These programs usually use broadcast to locate the server, of course once you have VLANNED that doesn't work. Also if you use WOL there is a command about directed-broadcast you will need to enter in the core switch. ISsues since then have been when adding additionalo VLANS making sure that the path back to the core through multiple uplinks all have the tagged traffic enabled. takes a while to diagnose if it's not right.

I don't allow our support companies to install logmein on the servers, however we have an account and then can assign multiple users who are allowed access. This means we are always in control and can remove access from somebody if needed. Depending on what they are supporting for us we then give them an AD username that is restricted to the servers they need.

There is a way of forcing your local domain name into the intranet zone which really helps with this i used a script to import a .reg file onto all machines on startup with the following [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\ZoneMap\Domains\myadnamehere.local] "*"=dword:00000001 obviously replace myadnamehere.local with your AD name