Thursday 30 June 2011

Terminal Server user profile troubleshooting

Users calls in to report they are logged into the system with a temporary
profile - as the user's actual profile may be damaged.

On a Terminal Server the users registry hives are still locked by the
system even after logging off. This will prevent you from renaming the
user's profile directory due to file locks. The solution is to restart the
server to free all the locks on the folder - this is obviously not really
an option on a production system. There is an alternative - use regedit to
unload the user's registry hive under

HKEY_USERS\S-1-5-21-...

To identify the relevant hive - first browse to

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\ProfileList\

and browse through the entries there looking at the ProfileImagePath value
until you spot the right SID then select the correct SID under
HKEY_USERS\
and click File > Unload Hive
this should release the file locks on the profile folder and allow you to
repair the corrupt profile.

Another thing is that the system may have merely locked the profile - go
back to the
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\ProfileList\

and if the profile key ends with .bak we should be able to rename the key
and remove the .bak extension. Then make sure you modify the State value
to 0x10(16). Now try logging on as the user again and if the profile is
not corrupted, it should logon without any further problems.

Note: This was performed on a Server 2003 based system and may be slightly
different with other versions.

Monday 27 June 2011

Apple Mac: Outlook 2011

Outlook 2011 for Mac is only compatible with Exchange 2007 or higher -
Exchange 2003 is only supported using IMAP.

http://www.mactalk.com.au/56/93913-outlook-2011-mac-not-supporting-exchange-server-2003-a.html

Thursday 23 June 2011

Outlook 2010 hangs when importing PST file

"Connecting to pst-files located on a network share is not supported by
Microsoft as it can lead to poor performance, data corruption and even
data loss. As indexing is an I/O intensive process, the fact that Outlook
gets unresponsive for network connected pst-files is to be expected; keep
your pst-files on your local hard disk when you want to work with them in
Outlook "

http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/office/forum/office_2010-outlook/outlook-2010-hangs-when-importing-a-large-e-mail/552bd4db-5255-4ef9-a351-d1ff9bef95a2?page=4

If you are working with a PST on a network share - expect problems. Rather
copy the file to the local HDD and import the data from there into Exchange.

Wednesday 22 June 2011

Force Printer Properties - Konica Minolta

Customer has a AD network with a server that manages the printer queues for the network.

I setup different printer queues for each basic setting they require. e.g. Monochrome, Color, Letterhead(different tray).

This particular printer driver stores its setting configs in the registry in the USER profile(HKCU). This complicates things as each user profile has its own set of settings for each printer queue and these settings overide the server defaults. In addition when the printer is mapped on the workstation - it has the default config that ignores the settings configured on the server.

So trick in the end was to re-map the printers and replace the HKCU registry settings for the printer queues at logon.

The relevant keys are:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\KONICA MINOLTA\KONICA MINOLTA C360SeriesPCL\SERVERNAME\
and
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Printers\Connections\,,SERVERNAME,PRINTER SHARE

Once you have configured the settings appropriately - export the keys to a file on the server in a location that is accesible from any domain workstation on the network (e.g. NETLOGON) and call a script at logon that replaces these keys at logon. This way we can ensure a consistent printer configuration.

Recreate User Profile - Windows 7

http://windows7forums.com/windows-7-support/40444-recreate-users-profile.html

Monday 20 June 2011

SBS 2003 to SBS 2008 Migration - Part 1

In most cases - with smaller SBS environments it is generally easier and quicker to just replace the existing SBS 2003 domain with a new SBS 2008 and then integrate all the workstations and devices and data into the new network.

This customer was in a situation where due to the size of the network and the complexity of the application & database servers on the network (third party vendor installation and configuration, etc) switching to a new network was not the most cost effective option and we opted to attempt a migration using the Microsoft published SBS 2003 to SBS 2008 migration plan.

This was successful, but not without its challenges - the main stumbling blocks I encountered was to do with the preparation of the existing server.

The old server was deployed with ISA 2004 and was configured as a web-proxy and firewall for the network and the server had already been through a P2V conversion. So the actual migration took place within a Citrix XenServer hypervisor.

These are the steps I followed to get the migration done:

  1. Uninstalled ISA
  2. Removed any Anti-Virus and Spam filtering software.
  3. Removed any Disk optimising programs. e.g. Diskeeper.
  4. Removed any remote access or monitoring applications.
  5. Next we needed to manually remove the existing network configurations from the registry. http://garclak-kb.blogspot.com/2011/06/nic-configurations-in-registry_14.html
  6. Run the Connect to the Internet SBS wizard.
  7. Run CHKDSK on the system volume - if this results in the system repairing zillions of SID errors - you may need to adjust permissions in the System32 folder as some services will not start properly due to access denied errors.
  8. Applied the NTFRS registry fix to allow the system to repair the Journal Wrap condition.
  9. Ran DCDIAG and fixed any problems encountered.
  10. Ran the SBS 2003 BPA and resolved any problems
  11. Raised Domain and Forest functional levels
  12. Set Exchange to run in Native 2003 Mode.
  13. Checked the Administrator accounts - there should be a second account setup to replace the Administrator account post-migration. Check group memberships and set primary group to Domain Users.
  14. Apply any Windows Updates.
  15. Take a backup of the system once system is clean as a whistle.
  16. Install the Migration Preparation Wizard.
  17. Install the Migration Preparation Wizard Update. http://support.microsoft.com/KB/981802
  18. Run the Migration Preparation Tool and the server may need to be restarted to apply any changes, etc.
  19. Start the destination server in Migration Mode using the Answer file. You may need to copy this file manually into place if migration mode does not start automatically. Once complete check for any Installation issues - there should be no Red Crosses that indicate a critical problem with the migration process has been encountered. Assess the relevant migration logs and you may need restore the source server back to the last backup and resolve any additional issues before attempting the migration again.

Tuesday 14 June 2011

NIC configurations in registry

NIC configs are found under this key

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class\{4D36E972-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318}

Remove all subkeys to allow the removal of ghost NIC configurations - Windows will then rebuild the keys. After this you will need to go into Device Manager and select "Show Hidden Devices" then remove all the adapters. Reboot the system to re-install the current active NIC.

Wednesday 8 June 2011