gshaw

Create the Gold image in VMWare, install all software and back up with Veeam each night (in case of any oopsies along the way) Snapshot \ duplicate before capturing to SCCM Deploy via SCCM with WMI-based driver packs for each machine type Revert snapshot \ use duplicate VM, run sysprep with copyprofile to get mandatory profile Manually copy profile to share and test By using the VM I can run capture \ profile changes as many times as I want and not care about the image going wobbly from too many attempts at sysprep. SCCM does all the legwork pushing out the image

Hehe I recognise that pic, nice to know someone's reading the blog and the transparent background worked To address your point about double standards... nice try but fail because the difference being I had the choice to try it out. There's not much else that will fit on the 2GB SSD of a 4-year old netbook and run at a decent speed so thought "what the hell I'll give it a try". Chromium OS would've been the best bet but it didn't fit on the SSD. It's not something I'd use every day (hence the point about scrolling being a bit awkward) but kinda cool to see what I could shovel on there and make a legacy device usable again. If this same OS was forced onto my i5 desktop I'd be saying exactly the same as what I've said about 8... have to say though it looks a lot nicer than Metro despite being kludged together by some geeks on the Internet Funny enough after using the Android distro for a bit I was wondering if I could get one of these to work on it... http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/7-inch-USB-Touch-Screen-Kit-Set-for-Asus-EEE-PC-700-P701-2G-4G-8G-Surf-GQLT031-/150854779424?pt=Computer_Monitors&hash=item231fa54220 I think the drivers are Windows only though, touchscreen netbook for 15 quid would be a great way to bring the eeePC back into more regular use at home. Windows 8 gives me no choice, it's Metro way or no way regardless of what device I use it on, that's what I get narked by. I've got the Release Preview on my x100e and I'm so irritated by the UI I barely use it and when I do the only click I make is to get into Google Chrome (quite ironic that). All comes round to the circular argument that 8 is great for tablets but not for desktops \ laptops... I'd say he'd need to play a few days of L4D first to get practice at fending off hordes of angry staff and surviving long enough to escape...

2012 looks like closing the gap but I wouldn't want to run it in production until someone else has had the pleasure of finding the initial gotchas (and there will always be some!) How much have MS managed to strip down the install for Hyper-V with 2012? Until it can fit on an SD card like VMWare I'm staying put

Surprised at the lack of love for 2010, the new screen clipping tools impress most people

I'm looking at 13" sub-notebook form factor for something that's a bit more portable for students to move around the classroom, Lenovo Thinkpad Edge E330 i3, 2 \ 4GB RAM

App-V is something that on one hand I want but on the other seems a bit pointless as the apps I need to be portable (Photoshop, Lightroom etc) don't work well with it... haven't even got as far as checking whether it causes issues on a licensing front. We put a lot of open-source software on the image these days, mainly for multimedia and accessibility then it's Office and exams software

Sorry never saw you post until now, the fix is a matter of replacing the file auth_ldap.inc with the fixed one from the download link. Glad it's helped you out

Thanks all, will get an A record done today and give it a twirl

Yup I'm pretty sure I put that on there when I did it. Did you use an A record, SRV record or both?

Just setting up a couple of Android devices for email sync and notice they never get the Exchange server address right, I'm guessing this is down to autodiscover (or lack of) Our external DNS is hosted by our ISP and I don't think we have a record set up there, am I right in thinking I just need the SRV record added as per the link below and point it to the external domain of our Exchange server? A new feature is available that enables Outlook 2007 to use DNS Service Location (SRV) records to locate the Exchange Autodiscover service Also seen articles that mention an A record instead set as exchangeserver.domain.com > external IP of Exchange server instead of the SRV record

Well for those who have had enough of life I'm sure this would be an innovative way to end your days... death by a thousand biro stabs would certainly be original Wouldn't put 8 nor Server 2012 near a production network until there's a good 6-12 months of updates, fixes and documentation behind it.

Run Windirstat on your initial mandatory profile and you'll see where it gets loaded up with crud from MS Office etc. Make a copy and remove various elements to get the size down; most are created automatically on first logon anyway so don't need to be bogging down the profile. I'd also stick with the sysprep method if you can, better to stick with the supported method imo (use a VM and it becomes a lot less painful as you can revert snapshots before sysprepping)

You'll only know what disks you need once you've run a capacity planner and got some IOPS stats from your existing server. Once you've done that then spec up a SAN to match. Personally I wouldn't do the local disks, you lose pretty much the main benefit of virtualisation i.e. reduce the reliance on the physical hardware. A Veeam restore, although comparatively quick in backup terms is still slow when you look at it against VMWare HA (reboot VM automatically and carry on regardless) For recovery look at a decent spec server filled with disks running Veeam. If your SAN goes down it can run critical services from the backups until you get back online. Alternatively if you have deep pockets replicated SAN is the ultimate option. Can you add extra shelves to the MD3200i? iSCSI should be OK if set up right I reckon...

I've been told I'll get the cheque on the 30th February 2013

You're now famous How to… get a perfect Windows 7 managed Start Menu and Taskbar « gshaw0

Might add this to the blog post and credit you on it if you don't mind? Very useful info there

Looks like option a) is the winner, had a feeling it might be but it's one of those you always wonder if there's a better way... evidently not I've never liked Offline Files so wanted to avoid it as much as possible so prefer the no sleep option. Quite amusing though that Microsoft were using the Power Management improvements in 7 as one of their key selling points but as soon as you turn them on other stuff breaks... typical eh. Have set screen off after about 10 minutes and the rest to 0 aka never. Need to find a new auto shutdown utility now Shutdownertron seems to be a dead product, I think a University somewhere was working on one but it hasn't been released yet...

What model are the Smartboards? 580 or 680?

Yup most of ours are that kind of age as well, the only thing we go through is pickup rollers but once you get the part number they're easy to self-replace. I'm staying firmly put!

Have noticed in my testing that when Windows 7 goes into Sleep mode it takes about 10 seconds when waking up for the NIC to come back online, during which time Windows inevitably loses connection redirected folders. Am I right in thinking I have two options here... turn off sleep completely via GPO turn on Offline Files for redirected folders The Desktop and Start Menu are the two I'm most concerned about as it seems once the connection is dropped the quick search feature doesn't work after reconnection e.g. try searching for something like mstsc (bad example I know!) and you get an error

User Policy\Admin Templates\Start Menu and Taskbar – Clear the recent programs list for new users Is that the one you're thinking of? It's on the post just above the piccy of the finished Start Menu The only thing with the scripts is that I'm not sure what happens with roaming profiles if it runs every time, I'm only using it with mandatory profiles at the moment where we want everything reset on each login. For staff we just show them how to do it and let them choose their own apps... maybe there's a way to write some check logic into the scripts so it avoids the multiple items scenario?

This is exactly the kind of feedback I was after, thanks all I think we'll be sticking with our HP's in that case. I've got a good compatible toner \ servicing deal that's reduced printing costs and keeps them alive when needing TLC so I think best to stick with what we know...

You have to wonder why HP are going so cheap on their SAN kit atm... is it the competition from the likes of the EMC VNXe eating into their market or are they trying to shift old stock before bringing out something newer in the near future? Guess that's the "joy" of IT... when do you jump

Doesn't happen to me on my test machines? If you Google HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Active Setup\Installed Components\{44BBA840-CC51-11CF-AAFA-00AA00B6015C the reg keys refers to Outlook Express in the dim and distant past which suggests it is actually Windows Mail. Seems to work OK for this guy... https://wss.psu.edu/CLM/Lists/Windows%207%20Issues/DispForm.aspx?ID=121

£30k will give you all you need with money to spare, even more so if you don't mind Hyper-V. RAM is fairly cheap these days so you can add room for expansion without breaking the bank. The price shoots up when you add a 2nd replicated SAN, in an ideal world cloud hosted replication \ backups would cover this role but it's an area that really hasn't sorted itself out cost-wise as yet. For us Veeam provides an acceptable compromise. One thing you will need to do is play the game with manufacturers and suppliers, make the most of educational bid pricing, special offers and the competitive market to drive your quotes down... amazing how much margin there is in this stuff once you get going!