carvjo

We were getting this - what we did to fix it.. * attempt to logon to a machine as student - get the failed message ** logon as an administrative user - then look at event logs for us - system events showed that GPO's relating to IE Branding were the problem - we deleted these and it has been fine since.. it could be any number of things - the clue will be in the event logs.. Hope that helps.. John

Use Eventviewer to take a look in the system events.. I discovered there was a GPO set for IE branding policy that caused logons to fail on my network - but it could be any number of things - the event logs should give a clue..

Hi I am looking for 25 or so thin client boxes that can PXE boot and load a 2x machine image.. Can anybody recommend a decent box - it would be nice if it had a bit of processing power, and sound capability.. but price is important.. Any recommendations..? Thanks..

Start "Windows Deployment Services" from "Administrative Tools". Browse to and expand "Multicast transmissions", right-click your deployment name and select "Deactivate".

Turn off multicast.. worked for me - image times went down from 3 hours to 20 minutes..

Windows 7 32 Bit: Problems with - Nelson Thornes NA Klar 1 & 2 Voila 1 & 2 Horizons 1 & 2 (and probably some of the older Nelson Thornes installers..) The workaround I found.. 1. Install the flash patch from the Nelson Thornes Support Site - then install the application 2. First Run - the applications as an administrator - this allows the creation of directories - also login as a teacher while running the application as administrator 3. Specify the Program Files\Nelson Thornes folder in AppLocker I've got a further problem that these programs use Internet Explorer to display the content - so I get the Information Bar (To Protect your Security because ActiveX is evil - click here to accept the risk - or similar!) - I managed to get that switched off briefly but it's back again now..! I can't be the only person to experience problems with Nelson Thornes software..? Stangely SIMS seems to run on 64bit (W7 and Server 2008R2) - despite being unsupported.. I've a cmd that runs SIMSAMPARKSetup.exe /S {QuietMode} {NoServerApps} [sIMSDotNetDirectory]="%PROGRAMFILES%\SIMS\SIMS.net" SIMSApplicationSetup.exe /S {QuietMode} {NoServerApps} [sIMSDotNetDirectory]="%PROGRAMFILES%\SIMS\SIMS.net" Then copies a good SIMS.ini to the windows folder Then another cmd to do the SIMSPerm stuff..

I've used some compatibles from UKtonercartridges.co.uk The carts are properly packed, wrapped in a bubble-bag, labelled and have similar pull-out plastic strips to HP originals. They work great.. The only difference I have noticed is the price - A HP53X is circa £100 - one of these is around £35 I did try some refills from one of the highstreet refillers - awful..!

And there was I thinking I had discovered something..! ..it works though..!

Fogive me if somebody has already aired this - but I thought I should share: A couple of years ago (Summer 2008) we bought quite a few HP Laserjet 2015N printers. Over the past year these have been failing with various combinations of the display lights freezing, going offline, not waking up. Often these could be reset (for a while) and would continue working.. but some wouldn't.. they just died.. A search of the HP forums revealed that quite a few HP printer owners were experiencing similar problems - sometimes HP would offer replacement mainboards, often they wouldn't.. I have found a fix that works - some chap on another forum, inspired by a similar games console failure/repair suggested this: Remove the mainboard - pre-heat a domestic oven to 220 Degrees C - Place the mainboard in the oven for 5 minutes. Take the board out - leave it to cool - refit it - and the printer works! (the last three dead printers here have been saved - even if they hadn't - no loss, if they hadn't been fixed they would have been scrap!) It has been suggested the problems and related fix is to do with the moving of production to China and reformulation of solder to meet some waste regulations.. I hope this helps others..

Hi - I've got a load of new Optiplex 380s - I quite like the new BIOS that can be driven with a mouse.. I am PXE booting mine - but it should be a similar procedure. I set the PXE boot as active - then change the boot order so PXE is top of the list. You will probably need to put the USB key in the machine or you won't get the boot order options (use one of the rear facing USB sockets) - then F2 to boot to the BIOS change the boot order and it should work fine on a reboot.. Alternatively you could try hitting F12 at boot time and select the USB key as the boot device.. There was a BIOS update (A01) in April this year that changed a few bits - if yours are on A00 it may be worth updating.

Yes - that makes sense - silly me! - There is a 120 day trial period after installing TS before the licences must be applied - so it would be possible to test this without spending any money.. If you have a Schools 3 or similar, your licencing agent should be able to get TS CALS for a few pound each on an annual licence, or a few tens of pounds to buy them.

VNC.. there are various flavours - each with their own merits UltaVNC looked OK last time I used it..

You need ThinApp 4.0.4 or later - this was the release with the fixes for Autocad

OK - after some investigation - this is what was found - a warning event in the system event logs ref. Internet Explorer Branding and GPOs.. The IE customisation stuff in GP is now turned off - I have logged on to a bunch of machines that were complaining earlier (as the original post) - and logons were all successful..

We've started the process of moving to Windows 7 - We have a test lab built with 25 machines all with a base Windows 7 Build. At logon we get (at random, not all machines - and after a couple of reboots non administrative logons may work for a while): Windows could not connect to the Group Policy Client service This prevents a non-administrative user from logging on. The event logs aren't a lot of help - and googling the problem shows people have had this issue in Vista - but I haven't found a solution yet.. Anyone else seen this - or more importantly - solved it? Thanks John

SOLVED - silly me - I forgot to change the name of NTUSER.DAT to NTUSER.MAN

Hi - We are testing our Windows 7 environment now in preparation for rollout.. I have created a Mandatory Profile for our students - which seems to load when I logon as a student, but on logoff we get a message: "your roaming user profile was not completely synchronized.." I've googled this - but haven't found the answer yet - any advice welcome.. Thanks John

I've looked at the demo for this: Bromcom Computers Plc | Management Information Systems for Schools & Colleges about one third the price of SIMS Learning Gateway - if you only want to give teachers access to SIMS in a web browser this does it.. From Sept. SchoolAnywhere are going to have two-way moodle/SIMS integration - they promise it will be SIMS in a web interface..

Ref. my earlier posts - I decided to trial Specops Deploy to see how easy it really is and how much time it would save us over our home brewed solutions.. A simple cost-benefit analysis shows that it will save me more in time than the cost of the software (esp. as I can put off employing another technician).. I have placed an order! I am happy enough to show it to anyone interested - I am in Oxford..

Looks like you have done what I've seen suggested: Group Policies: User Configuration - Administrative Templates - Windows Components - Attachment Manager Add "*.exe" to the "Inclusion list for **moderate** risk file types" setting. I've also seen this suggested: [HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Associations] "LowRiskFileTypes"=".exe

Hi Richard This file was built for XP - it should be deployable via logon script Download flash 10.1 install created with Prism Deploy Packager alternatively execute it on running machines with PSexec Test it to make sure it does fix your problem - when I run this on an XP machine here - that machine has Flash 10.1 installed after this has run - no matter what state flash was in before I run it.. of course your OS build may differ from mine - which why I say test it.. Hope it helps John

One note of caution - I've seen Anti-Virus apps give 'false-positives' to Thinapped packages and stick the entire library in a virus vault..

I've used Thinapp - it is very good and the latest version will create 'packaged' applications that will often run on Windows 7, though they were created on XP and visa-versa. It is really most useful for small applications: e.g. I've thinapped MS Office 2007 - though it works, it is hellish slow to load and move around some of the menus.. but some of those 'Nelson Thornes' titles that need the right versions of flash and java work a treat - flash and java can be built into the package negating the need to mess around with a compromise on the OS build to get those picky apps to run.. Using Thinapp is simple - run 'Setup Capture' - to create a baseline - then install the application and any dependancies it may need - run setup capture again to create the changes files - then 'build' the application package.. There is no need to install any client - but applications can be registered with 'thinreg' so your computer knows about file associations etc.. VMware do offer some education discount - Ingenyx are the people we use for our VMWare - they seem quite good at getting educational pricing that some of the bigger box shifters struggle with.. Thinapp includes VMWare workstation (or used to?) - as the recommended method for creating packages is on a clean machine - and reverting to a clean snapshot to clean up the build PC after each install is easiest this way..

going back to the original post - here's a thought! ..as an alternative to publishing the whole terminal server desktop and requiring teachers to login to the PC on the desktop - then via RDS.. why not use App-V (or Citrix XenApp, or 2X application Server) to just publish SIMS as an application on the teacher's desktop? You will still need a beefy terminal server or two - but will be so much more seemless for the user..

If you want to go 2008r2: The SIMS client will run on 64bit - (it certainly runs on Windows 7 64bit - search the forums - SIMS 64bit) - but probably won't be officially supported for some time - and some modules such as Nova-T 4 - no chance.. If you can put up with this - you can address more RAM and get away with one server for 50 users.. Try it in a lab - and use something like "The Remote Desktop Load Simulation toolset ".. Set RDS to 'time-out' idle users after a suitable period of inactivity - this will free resources for those who genuinely want to work..