Laphan

Hi All I might be having a CRAFT moment with this one, but am I right in saying there used to be an option in the My Docs redirect part of Win2K3 server's GPO editor whereby you could set that everything in My Docs will be set for offline access or you can disable this so that the user specifies which files and folders are set to offline access. Am I right in saying this used to exist? Has it been moved? How do I configure this facility again? The reason I ask is that I've got a number of users who have huge My Docs folders and 75% of it bears to relation to their backward and forwards work, eg iTunes. I'd like to give the selective approach a try, but I don't know where it is. Thanks

Hi All Real quick question, why is it that when I add machines to the domain/server for the first time some will be automatically set to Enable Offline Files (in Tools > Folder Options) and some won't? I untick for 'fixed position' PCs and leave on for laptops so its just a case of logging in as admin and making sure the right setting is set, but I just don't get why some will be set after adding and some won't. Thanks

Hi All Many, many thanks for your feedback. DNS and DHCP settings on the new server appear to be OK now and if I ping the domain name and server.domain name from a client I get the new server's details as response. If I delete the local user profile (??) folders from a client PC's document & settings folder (not the local admin ones, but the server created ones) and re-login to make the network re-create a folder in this area then the GPO **appears** to all come through as expected. We use batch login scripts to map drives, printers, etc and if I could put something in here to auto-zap the existing doc & settings folders (with exceptions) then I would, but my colleague needs the exp and has the time so he's going to go through the client PCs and bin the old folders to let the new ones come through. What I don't understand is that it sounds like people are suggesting the new server's DHCP and/or DNS servers weren't set up correctly and if they were and we continued to do the plan that we had, ie copy data across, drop old server, put new one in and put old one in with a new name and IP then this is OK. Am I right? Old server def has no AD stuff on it, new ip, new name, DHCP server service stopped and DNS server service stopped, but then added back to the domain so that it's connected to the same network so that users don't have to enter a username and password to access files and folders that are on it. Does anybody have any issues with this? We only wanted it as a glorified file server and local backup location. I know this is also a bit of trivial thing in comparison to everything else, but I can never get the desktop wallpaper to appear 100% on every login there is always the occasion when you have to press the F5 key to bring it up. Is there a belt and braces approach to make this work every time? Thanks agian.

Hi I know this might sound medieval, but I was warned off ever having two DCs on the same network/domain for fear of conflict. That's why I thought you copy stuff across, get the old one off, put the new one on. I'd put myself down as a manager (lite) of a primary school server rather than a proper network manager. I know the basics and that's all we've got/can afford. Willing, but probably not able :0) We have been fine other than this new process of moving from an old one to a new one.

Hi All Thanks for your response. Please, please, please don't think I'm doing this for effect or a loose cannon. I've only done a few and as you might have experienced ICT techies are sometimes very isolated creatures. I only found this site by chance, I'd never heard of it before, as company B offered me very vague suggestions to the problem and I suddenly knew something was really wrong. Hence the reason I started looking for solutions on the net and found this site. I just thought this was the way because company B never once mentioned any big deal about it. I just thought copy stuff across, drop old server, put new one on. Job done. In an ideal world isn't this what it should be like :0) Any pointers you can give me would be very much appreciated. I'm going to look through the DNS today.

Hi Thanks for replying. This is the thing. Am I causing problems by doing this? What do I gain/lose doing it this way over sysprep? Rgds

Hi All We fell foul of the LA provided Symantec 9 being pants and we can't go to Endpoint 10 as it will make of our PCs run like a pig (1GB min I believe) We used Microsoft SE for a bit til we found that we couldn't update it through our proxy and that they'd slipped the line that we couldn't use it in schools anymore so we've had a good look at Panda's free cloud anti-virus offering. Works through a proxy, nice and simple, appears to have a small footprint, etc. Anybody bitten the bullet with this one? Thanks

Hi All When I setup PCs for use in a basic Windows 2003 server R2 setup using AD/GPO, I have this thing in my head that if my client machines are pre-set with as much settings as I want already then this is faster than doing it all through GPO. Just to put to bed a few myths could you please let me know if and where the problems are in the below method: 1) I get a virgin XP Pro SP3 (don't use Vista or 7) machine, say a Dell, with their base image on it. 2) I install the software that needs to go on it. 3) I remove the flaff software that they put on it, eg McAfee, Office 2007 trial, etc. 4) I create a user local user account, which gives me 1 x admin account and 1 x user account. 5) I log on as the user account. 6) I set a plain colour background, XP classic theme, desktops icons in the place that I want them, set auto-arrange on, set energy saver/screen saver settings, taskbar settings, control panel settings and so on. 7) I restart and log on as admin. 8) I 'show' hidden files and via C:/Docs & Settings I go into the Default User folder. 9) I delete anything in useless out of the start menu, Favs, My Docs and Desktop. 10) I copy the NTUser.Dat file from the 'user' folder and overwrite the default user's ntuser.dat file. 11) I hide the hidden files setting. Note: the machine is still in Workgroup mode. 12) I image this master PC onto other machines. 13) As I start the machines up I change the computer name to make it unique and then add the machines to the domain of the server. This is all done through the My Computer > Properties window. I also do the above My Computer tasks on the master PC if this is also used as a client PC in the school. Issues? Better method? Does this perform faster than having to be pulled down from GPO each time a user logs in? PLEASE NOTE: that we only redirect the My Docs to a User folder on the server. There is no roaming profile or redirected desktop, etc.

Hi All OK, OK this could be classed as my fault, but I'm really a newbie when it comes to servers, AD, etc. I can manage the process OK, but I'm not what I'd call an edugeek :0) In a nutshell I look after two schools and we had a Windows 2003 Server R2 machine in both so that we could utilise AD to manage users, lockdown the PCs with GPO, shares for teachers, shares for pupils, etc. Nice and basic. After 3 years or so we thought it best to buy new servers with better specs, new warranty, etc and put them in. This is where we got caught out. Originally, one school bought a server from say company A and the other school bought their server from company B. This time we bought both servers from company B. The first installation that had a company A server and then a company B server seemed to move over fine. My plan was that after transferring all of the profile/My Docs and 'shares' data from the old server to the new server, I would 'downgrade/demote' the old server to basically a file server so that this could store the bulk of the multimedia crap (ie video, music and pics) that they produce and the new/main server would only hold the profile/My docs data and leaner shares data. To get the client PCs to 'see/use' the new PC my idea was to 'undomain' them (ie put them on workgroup of FRED), restart, add them to the domain, restart and then we'd be up-and-running. I just thought that would be the process. Nice and simple. I then used the built in feature of W2k3 server to remove the AD stuff from the old server (this automatically put it onto workgroup), stopped the DNS and DHCP services permanently, changed its IP and computer name to not conflict with the new server, restarted, added it back to the domain of the new server. All of the above seemed to work fine and the reason it seems to have is because the domain name of the old server was/is different to the one used on the new server. Unaware of this I proceeded to do the above at the 2nd school and hit a crapstorm of issues. Logging on existing machines with the above in place resulted in completely intermittent GPO stuff coming through (eg desktop shortcuts sometime coming, sometimes not; map drives appearing not appearing; My Docs redirection working/not working) and laptops with offline files enabled going completely gaga such as saying they aren't connected then saying they are and so on. Having thought about it the only thing diff was that the domain name of the old is exactly the same as the new and it **appears** that the existing PCs are logging on and then looking at the old settings (I'm guessing the foolders in C:/Docs&Settings) and losing the plot. To try and remedy the situation I put the PCs back on workgroup, zapped the Offline cache (Ctrl+Shift+Del??) and deleted all of the profile (?) folders that are in a PC's C:/Docs & Settings folder. I've got loads of PCs to do and I just feel like I'm botching something as I go. Before I continue with this task I just wanted to check with the gurus that: a) Am I right in saying because the domain name is the same on both this has caused the issue? b) What should I have really done when going from old server to new? c) Is the approach I'm taking correct? d) Is there a better way or is my cumbersome method the only fix? e) Am I OK leaving the old server on the network in it's demoted state or is this the root of the problem? Thanks for any advice you can give. Rgds Laphan