AngryTechnician

Staff get 1GB by default and rarely go over it. So far I've not had to raise anyone's quota; the few who've had emails from the storage server telling them they are maxed out soon found something to get rid of. I also encourage staff to store things on the shared drives instead, which are not quota'd. In general this isn't abused as staff are remarklably reluctant to expose the unnecessary junk they store to their colleagues. Pupils get 100MB. Astonishingly, no student has ever filled their 100MB in the time I've been here. We only go up to Year 8 though. Also, AppData doesn't count towards their limit. Backup for the entire server infrastructure (including full OS backups) is on a 3TB iSCSI NAS. It's about half full at the moment. The user data backups on their own (all staff, pupils, and shared areas) use just under 700GB.

I haven't actually gotten around to trying it yet, but even the free version of OffiSync for Google Apps is better than this (and integrates with the ribbon instead of that ugly abomination shown in the screenshots). Slightly tragic that Google's own offering is inferior.

This is the x86 version onto an x86 client. There is no service pack for Office 2010 yet. Also, a manual install of the same files works fine on SP1; it's only when it is pulled from my SCE server the problem occurs. I've narrowed it down to an alleged file signature problem on one of the .cab files in the package - this is from the %windir%\WindowsUpdate.log file: 2011-02-23 18:47:27:378 956 370 Misc Validating signature for C:\Windows\SoftwareDistribution\Download\6289c9a097282d35d784377ec24ef813\eda2be140a7d24d5885df8d87c0cc68cc6d704a2: 2011-02-23 18:47:27:378 956 370 Misc WARNING: Digital Signatures on file C:\Windows\SoftwareDistribution\Download\6289c9a097282d35d784377ec24ef813\eda2be140a7d24d5885df8d87c0cc68cc6d704a2 are not trusted: Error 0x80070570 2011-02-23 18:47:27:674 956 370 DnldMgr WARNING: File failed postprocessing, error = 80070570 This seems spurious for three reasons. First, the package works fine pre-SP1. Second, I've downloaded that .cab file manually and the signature reports "This digital signature is OK" when I check it in file properties. Third, every package on the server is signed with the same certificate, and they all work fine apart from this one.

OK, a Windows 7 RTM machine that installed the package fine fails to install the same package after being upgraded to SP1. This is not good.

OK, just confirmed that the package still works fine on Windows 7 RTM machines, so it's definitely something to do with the client. Next step: a Windows 7 RTM machine that has been updated with SP1 using the standalone installer.

OK, so I haven't had time yet to fully diagnose this but wanted to get some info up now in case anyone else spots something similar. After updating my System Center Essentials 2010 server to Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1, and then adding the Windows 7 SP1 ISO to my WDS server, I decided to test a full rebuild over PXE. Everything worked apart from one thing: my package for Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2010 will not install - Windows Update reports error 0x80070570 every time. This error corresponds to "The file or directory is corrupted and unreadable". So far I've tried resetting the SoftwareDistribution folder, running the OS rebuild again, publishing a new package of the same Office setup files on SCE, and publishing a slightly modified version. This package has been working since I deployed it back in August. Every other package on SCE I've tried so far (more than 40 of them) works fine, it's just this one that is a problem. I haven't yet tried the deployment on another machine, since they currently all have Office already. That will be my next test, but probably won't happen until Friday as I'll be at Microsoft tomorrow. Any other suggestions or wisdom in the meantime gratefully received!

Vonage have very good service when it works, but the hardware they supply has had a fatal firmware flaw for over a year that can cause severe performance issues unless you reboot the VOIP gateway every few days. There appears to be no effort being made to fix it as it only affects a small proportion of customers, but unless you use different hardware I just can't recommend it. Real shame because otherwise their offering is very good.

Have you tried UDP multicast video on your wireless bridge? We currently have a wireless bridge to our Nursery and while we have plenty of bandwidth the video performance is so bad it's practically unwatchable a lot of the time.

If uptime is your deciding factor, it really comes down to deciding which is likely to have a better uptime, your Internet connection or your internal mail server. If you have a flaky connection, don't go to the cloud. If your connection almost never goes down, it may be a better option than keeping mail onsite - unless your SMT are the sort who care less about uptime stats and more about being able blame someone nearby and shout at them when things don't work. For us, staff email is staying onsite for now. My Exchange server has so far been very reliable, and the vast majority of our staff email use in internal. I don't have any burning need to throw all of those 10MB+ attachments out to an external server and then have 100 copies downloaded back again.

OK, turns out I had forgotten that on HP kit, FACTORY RESET actually just means 'reset options to defaults'. Finally remembered where the COLD RESET option is (in the boot-up menu you get by holding down the go button at power-on) and that did an proper factory reset, which seems to have sorted it, at least for now.

In a continuation of a long-running tradition of me despising any computer peripheral beginning with P (printers, projectors, Promethean boards... OK, I cheated slightly on that last one), one of my wretched HP LaserJet 3600 printers has been annoying me today as it has started printing specific shades of colours completely incorrectly. In printouts of photos, this shows up as blotches of an odd colour where it shouldn't be, usually a magenta blotch. in the middle of some green or blue. I've ruled out any driver or software problem, as the colour sample prints that you get from the print menu itself are also showing up problems. Here's the swatches from overview page: (Click to enlarge) And here's the detail from page 15 of the detailed swatches. All of these should be a shade of blue: The fact that is is very specific shades leads me to believe it is not a consumable problem either. Have tried cold reboot, factory reset, and reseating the formatter board. Anyone seen anything like this before or have any idea how to fix it (other than my preferred HP hardware fix of defenestration)?

We have a couple of LiDE 30 scanners which use the same driver, no problems under Windows 7. Are you using the TWAIN or WIA driver? We're using the WIA driver and I seem to recall having a tough time finding it. Can send it to you if you want.

As incompetent as BT Internet can be sometimes, I think they've got the email address wrong, personally. Had a quick check on our MIS; we have nearly 1,500 contact email addresses, and absolutely no-one with an @btinternet.co.uk address. We do have 131 with an @btinternet.com address.

No idea, I've only ever promoted using the command line. You can find out what it should be by opening up ADSIEdit, connecting to the Configuration context, and looking in the Sites container. Your site will be listed as CN=whatever with the class site. Take whatever and that's what you put as your SiteName=.

Google are compliant with US Safe Harbor regulations on data protection, which is a legal framework between the US and EU allowing companies to store data in the US while still complying with EU data protection laws. Therefore, neither they nor you are breaking the Data Protection Act by storing data on Google's servers, even if they are not in the EU. Source: Google Apps

This is what I used (anonymised, obviously) [DCINSTALL] UserName=DOMAIN\AdminAT UserDomain=domain.internal Password=mypassword SiteName=DOM ReplicaOrNewDomain=replica ReplicaDomainDNSName=domain.internal DatabasePath="C:\NTDS" LogPath="C:\Logs" SYSVOLPath="C:\Sysvol" InstallDNS=yes ConfirmGC=yes SafeModeAdminPassword=mypassword RebootOnCompletion=no

Wouldn't fill 45 mins, but maybe worth talking about DreamSpark 'High School' enrolment for secondaries. It's a lot less onerous than it is for universities and well worth it.

Yes, that's correct. Until you change your MX record, all incoming mail will continue to be delivered to your existing mail system.

Where would we submit this feedback?

Anything that needs a data connection (Google Navigation does) will cost you an arm and a leg in roaming charges, and 3G GSM coverage is not very good in the US - most US 3G coverage is CDMA, which your EU model Galaxy probably doesn't support. Swot up on the Florida Drivers Handbook, especially chapter 4. The most obvious thing I can think of that will be different is that at most junctions ("intersections") you are permitted to turn right on a red light if it is safe to do so. There should be a sign if this is not permitted at any given junction. You also MUST turn on dipped headlights if it is raining, no matter the perceived visibility. You already know to drive on the right, but also be aware that in the US, vehicles drive on the "pavement", not the road, and pedestrians are on the "sidewalk". There are almost zero roundabouts ("traffic circles"). If you do come across one, remember to go round it the opposite way to in the UK - obvious in retrospect, but a harder habit to break than driving on the left. Absolutely nobody else there will know what the hell they are doing at a roundabout, so be cautious of people not giving way. I've never driven in Florida, but in Maryland and Virginia, practically nobody obeys the speed limits. Hold your nerve and stick to them, because local police will destroy you if they catch you as a tourist. They are also a lot sneakier than UK police are allowed to be - they will literally hide in blind spots, even going as far as parking up with a speed gun and raising the bonnet so you can't see it's a police car until you pass it.

SkyDrive creates Office documents by default, and Google Docs can save into Office formats with ease. Both have plugins available to integrate open/save in the Office desktop applications (in 2010, open/save to SkyDrive is built in).

You are correct. That's why RM can't just distribute the finished package instead of their 'blueprint'.

Won't do it in zero gravity either. In zero gravity, with no other force acting on it, any liquid will form a sphere - it won't hold any shape it had from a container once the container is removed. Cool video though.

PM sent.

Look under the Software Assurance category. For some insane reason it's not listed in the Windows category. I made the same mistake at first.