gshaw

Ye pretty sure as I've got verbose messages turned on during logon, the longest part is setting Printers Policy, accompanied by a flurry of HDD activity so initial thoughts suggest it would be, unless Windows is lying to me and it's a previous stage doing it. Might need to dig through whatever logs I can find to prove it conclusively though... HP UPD was the latest version last time I tried it unless there's been something in the last 2 weeks or so. Printers are on Create as they get deleted on each logoff (mandatory profile) It may well be perfectly normal speed but I like to try to eek every last bit of performance out of boot times, going from a powered off machine to usable desktop in under 1 minute with HDDs would be fantastic, if I can cut the printer section down a bit I reckon we can do it Edit: I've been guilty of "Microsoft minutes" syndrome on this, the GPP Printers are actually taking around 10 seconds to run (map 2 printers, set one as default, HP UPD)

A quick qu, does anyone know how GPP handles print drivers when running as a Logon script? Reason being I'm trying to speed up the mapping at logon, takes around 20-30 seconds which isn't hideous but I think could be better. Have noticed that it's slower over wireless so I'm wondering if part of the process is downloading the drivers each time, regardless of whether the machine needs them or not. I've noticed that when we've updated drivers machines get them straight away so I'm guessing GPP does reinstall them, question is whether it does it each time or only when it detects a newer version available. If it is reinstalling each time is there a way to change this behaviour so it only reinstalls the driver if a) machine doesn't have it or b) server driver is newer than the client's driver?

Use the scripts referenced from my blog page on logon... How to… get a perfect Windows 7 managed Start Menu and Taskbar « gshaw0

Can you order from there for private use though i.e. if you're not coming from an education organisation?

Also tier1online.com, if you can add a little bit more the Lenovo T61 \ R61 are built like tanks and a Core2Duo is still plenty enough for Windows 7 etc

Our HP fleet are getting on a bit now (P3005s and 2420s mainly) so before we continue the status quo I'm checking out the other options to see what's available. Had a look at some Kyoceras the other day, FS-3920DN model. Just wondering what they're like on... reliability drivers noise energy efficiency If you believe the blurb they're faster, more energy efficient and less bits to service \ go wrong than the equivalent HP but I'd rather hear some real life experiences than something from the sales sheet

I've got a few different ones for mine... Room-by-room, mainly used for imaging and specific software deployments, based on System > Name Machine type, used for driver updates and reporting, think that's based on System Enclosure Also software-based ones done by version of the software installed, again for upgrades that need to be targetted or reported on. For Unknown Computers this tip from Technet will sort you out... Ref: SCCM R2 Unknown Computer Support and changing computer name during Task Sequence

ADFS is a total of 5 roles for complete (redundant) SSO, 2 x ADFS proxy (DMZ), 2 x ADFS and 1 x DirSync server... not a trivial installation but OK Google Apps seems to be a "lighter" product to get integrated than 365 but the cost is the reduced compatibility \ integration with Office docs. Some might say this is compensated by the collaboration features in GDocs, which although you can do in 365 I find the Sharepoint interface isn't the friendliest of things to work with (YMMV) Google does have some extra hidden gems that can be accessed with the Google account but I'd be a bit wary of long-term planning around them given Google's history of discontinuing services on a whim. The other point for me is VLE integration; I want the ability to seamlessly pull documents into the VLE to hand in as assignments etc... can do this with Google right now but MS don't seem to want to get involved here, rather trying to push SharePoint as a VLE (something I'm not keen on in the slightest) As it stands we're Microsoft due to the familiarity with Office but on most other levels Google looks easier and more open. Licensing is interesting as well, need commitment on how long the service will stay free now it's added onto your EES agreement; don't want to build on a system that someone can they around 6 months later and start charging for...

Unknown Computers aren't an issue in 2007 R2, also if you set a variable called OSDComputerName you can specify the machine name at the start of the image so it gets domained with the name you want rather than the auto-generated MININT-blahblahblah name OSD gives out by default Also if your collections are built by query you don't need to manually move machines around, get SCCM to do the legwork for you

Paid a bit less than that for 3 x DL380 and an EMC SAN last year, funny enough one of the other options was the Modular Server but I don't like everything in one box and I also don't like OEM kit. If an SP packs up on our SAN an engineer is there NBD (if not sooner) with the replacement, can you get the same levels of service from whitebox kit? Would also be a bit worried by the self build route, lots of scope for suppliers blaming each other if something goes wrong. Might sound a bit on the paranoid side but with servers \ SANs I think it's a good thing

Max isn't the problem... how far your wallet can stretch to buy the disks to fill that capacity is another matter It's ~80 random IOPS for a SATA disk, sequential can hit more but all depends on the workload being thrown at them (well that's how I've always understood it anyway)

Btw what are you aiming to run from the SAN? Have you done a capacity planner to check what level of IOPS you'll need first?

Non-mature software and SAN aren't two phrases I'd want next to each other personally. Whatever you buy is going to determine the reliability and long-term stability of your servers \ data so I'd stick with something well known and supported.

I'll need to check on my Win8 machine at home but what does it have in the registry here... HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\WinLogon\Shell Back in the days of Windows 95 you used to be able to set custom shells by changing that key, I wonder if it now says metro (or something similar) instead of explorer.exe? If it is different then a very quick change would flick it back the other way...

You can There's a nifty script that controls Start Menu pinning that you can run as a Logon script, I'm doing it as part of the UI settings when moving over to 7 so the most used apps in each area are pre-pinned to the Start Menu (Word etc generally and then Photoshop etc in photography suite etc) Link to script is on my blog post here The feature I'm really irritated about losing in 8 is pinning recently used documents to the Start Menu as there's no equivalent on Metro. For example I have order forms I need all the time as well as reports I'm working on etc. As it stands it's one swish of a mouse and they're at the top of the list for easy access. The best you can do in 8 is have shedloads of tiles on the Start screen... progress eh...

MS will have to up the 500MB as it looks very lame compared to the Google offering. Is anyone buying the MS line that the Sharepoint feature can replace the VLE Personally I see 365 / GApps as a supplementary service, a productivity tool but not a complete learning system in its own right.

Does this have the same effect as the reg hack? Common sense would suggest it should stop the auto database creation but with MS these days I'm not that trusting If I could speed up the HP UPD when mapping via GPP that would help as well, takes about 20 seconds which judging by the disk activity seems to be the driver copying \ installing every time (?) but would need to dig deeper to see the exact behaviour of it For machines with guest accounts that we set to auto logon I have a requirement from powered off > usable desktop in 1min 30sec and I'm hitting it at the moment although 1min would be great

Having said that some people are now using Google Apps as an e-portfolio, tough to match that with 500MB particularly if you're using it with creative arts students...

It's not really Microsoft's strategy to kill the desktop apps completely as desktop Office is still a lot more powerful than the web app... the ability to seamlessly move between the two is what I'm after

Great stuff, the downside for me is how much MS have reduced the storage in 365... 500MB free per student is nothing these days and there's no way we can be paying for additional storage... This is the other concern I have, not keen on the Sharepoint interface for file management nor the 365 initial landing page tbh ... might be able to disguise it somewhat with custom links from Moodle but not ideal

I was told that our 365 licenses go onto our EES as a monthly agreement, don't like the sound of month-to-month so does the "contract" confirm plan A2 will stay free for say 2 years as it was with Live@Edu?

Had some issues with DVD playback using 2.01 the other day on a home laptop... video was very slow and blocky but VLC 1.x and MPCHD both worked fine... just a little buglet to watch out for I think...

5400rpm hard drives are awful, just upgraded a 5-year old Core2Duo laptop with a Crucial M4 and knocked 30 seconds off the cold boot > desktop time, plus apps spring up instantly. Get the SSDs installed as part of the spec as some of the netbook size computers don't have easily accessible HDD covers and you don't want to be opening up cases on brand new kit Personally I'd go for the extra grunt of an i3 sub-laptop (11" - 13") with SSD, will cost a bit more but will last you longer performance wise and the extra screen space will prove useful.

If you want to control traffic at app-level and have the £££ Palo Alto is well worth looking at... not cheap but it's very powerful. Content filtering might not be up to your standards though but seems Smoothwall is the only well-known one that really covers education primarily.

Quick update, SCCM doesn't like me running XP diskpart from within its own WinPE boot environment (not surprising really!) After messing about with BartPE trying to do auto diskpart sequences and finding that doesn't like diskpart very much either I'll stick with gparted and create the partition manually, doesn't take too long in the grand scheme of things. Have put a WMI filter on the SCCM partition step to do any model that's not the Stone one (or NOTCHA as the real model name appears to be ) The BIOS links are useful though as I need AHCI on to get the best out of the Crucial M4 SSD I've put in one of the laptops to extend their life a bit further. CPU speed and memory are fine but 5400rpm hard drives are painful Question is which BIOS is "better"... D from one of the earlier links or the special V link posted on the previous page...