As you may have seen, there has been an update to the extended support lifecycle for WSUS 3.0 SP2 (WSUS 3.2). We received feedback that ending this product’s life in July 2017 would cause a significant disruption for those Windows Server 2008/R2 deployments that planned to rely upon it until January 2020. As such, the end of life for this product is now January 2020.
ADREPLSTATUS has a nice Office-like GUI with a ribbon and can replace RepMon or RepAdmin of the Windows 2000 support tools.
Source : 4sysops.com
Download : www.microsoft.com
This breakdown of Kerberos settings and how they correspond to AD provides much-needed clarity
This ongoing need to clarify how Kerberos works and how it fails is a result of the fact that—although Kerberos remains the same—the services that use it and the ways they use it are often unique. The aspects that remain the same in each scenario, however, are what the settings in Active Directory (AD) are intended to address, and the difficult-to-interpret messages you’ll see when things fail.
Source : www.windowsitpro.com
Today I tried to do a sysprep of a Windows Server 2008 R2 x64 computer before capturing an image of it via imagex.
sysprep.exe /generalize /oobe /shutdown /unattend:unattend.xml
Everything went fine and the computer shutdown.
Then I rebooted the server and had a blue screen (BSOD) :
STOP: c000021a {Fatal System Error}
The session manager initialization system process terminated unexpectedly with a status of 0xc000003a (0x00000000 0x00000000).
The system has been shut down.
I found out that SYSPREP had made some changes to my Boot Configuration Data (BCD). Here’s an extract of my setupact.log file :
LaunchDll:Found 'C:\Windows\System32\spbcd.dll,Sysprep_Generalize_Bcd'; executing it
Sysprep_Generalize_Bcd: Located BCD store on system drive. Generalizing it...
GeneralizeBcdStore: Found the memory tester object.
GeneralizeBcdStore: Found the Windows OS Loader object {bb3f7e5d-3afe-11e1-908d-0010184c4562} for the currently running OS.
GeneralizeBcdStore: Found the resume object {bb3f7e5c-3afe-11e1-908d-0010184c4562} for the OS loader.
GeneralizeBcdStore: System drive backed by VHD = 0
GeneralizeBcdStore: Generalizing object {9dea862c-5cdd-4e70-acc1-f32b344d4795}
GeneralizeBcdStore: Successfully generalized application device. Status = [0x0]
GeneralizeBcdStore: Generalizing object {b2721d73-1db4-4c62-bf78-c548a880142d}
GeneralizeBcdStore: Successfully generalized application device. Status = [0x0]
GeneralizeBcdStore: Generalizing object {bb3f7e5d-3afe-11e1-908d-0010184c4562}
GeneralizeBcdStore: Successfully generalized application device. Status = [0x0]
GeneralizeBcdStore: Successfully generalized OS device. Status = [0x0]
GeneralizeBcdStore: Generalizing object {bb3f7e5c-3afe-11e1-908d-0010184c4562}
GeneralizeBcdStore: Successfully generalized application device. Status = [0x0]
GeneralizeBcdStore: Successfully generalized hiberfile device. Status = [0x0]
Sysprep_Generalize_Bcd: Successfully generalized the bcd store. Status=[0x0]
LaunchDll:Successfully executed 'C:\Windows\System32\spbcd.dll,Sysprep_Generalize_Bcd' without error
So, after running sysprep /generalize my BCD looked like this :
Windows Boot Loader
-------------------
identifier {default}
device locate=\windows\system32\winload.efi
path \windows\system32\winload.efi
description Windows Server 2008 R2
locale en-us
inherit {bootloadersettings}
osdevice locate=\windows
systemroot \windows
resumeobject {bb3f7e5c-3afe-11e1-908d-0010184c4562}
nx OptOut
detecthal Yes
Did you noticed the locate=… value for the device and osdevice entries ? Well it seems that those new values were causing my blue screen.
I restored the previous values (before Sysprep) with the following commands :
bcdedit /set {default} device partition=C:
bcdedit /set [default} osdevice partition=C:
After that, my computer was able to boot again.
I’m not sure, but i suspect that this little mixed up with the BCD Store maybe related to how I partitioned my disk :
| WinPE Size 900Mb, boot WinPE to capture or apply an image from imagex |
| ESP Size 100Mb, EFI System Partition, Active Partition |
| Microsoft Reserved Size 128Mb |
| Windows Size 120Gb, C: drive |
| Data Size 400Gb, E: drive |
My disk is initialize as a GPT disk and this is an EFI Computer.
Always make a backup of the BCD store before running SYSPREP :
bcdedit /export backupbcd.bcd
This article introduces Group Policy Preferences, explains how they differ from Group Policy settings, compares Preferences to logon scripts, and covers a few Group Policy Preferences gotchas.
The introduction of Group Policy Preferences into Group Policy seems to have quite a few people confused. I think that confusion has been compounded by all of the people who skipped Windows Vista, stayed with Windows XP, and are just now starting to implement Windows 7 on the desktop.
Source : 4sysops
Here’s the situation: You are called into consult for a client, and in examining their IT infrastructure you observe no organization as to how service accounts are deployed. For instance, some line-of-business (LOB) applications are using the domain Administrator as their service account identity, while others use the Local Service or Network Service identity.
Recently, the client began associating application services with dedicated domain user service accounts. However, because domain password policy forces password changes every 60 days, the manual reassignment of service account passwords created organizational headaches for the IT support staff.
How can you resolve this mess of a real-world situation?
Source : 4sysops.com
Excellent post from Robert McMurray :
I've mentioned in previous blog posts that I use the Windows WebDAV Redirector a lot. (And believe me, I use it a lot.) Having said that, there are a lot of registry settings that control how the Windows WebDAV Redirector operates, and I tend to tweak those settings fairly often.
I documented all of those registry settings in my Using the WebDAV Redirector walkthrough, but unfortunately there isn't a built-in interface for managing the settings. With that in mind, I decided to write my own user interface.
Source : blogs.iis.net/robert_mcmurray
Related : using-the-webdav-redirector
I just wanted to make you all aware of a new KB article myself and a couple of teammates put together around component store growth and remediation. I wanted to have something short and to the point and I think a lot of you might find this more useful than sifting through the blog trying to piecemeal together the same information. I'll probably try to put together something a little more verbose here that goes more into the internals of some of this but I am busy working on a new project and dont have tons of time. If you have any questions or comments about the material please ask them here.
How to Alleviate Disk Space Pressure Caused By a Large Windows Component Store (WinSxS) Directory
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=2592038
Source : The Windows Servicing Guy
Hi guys, Joji Oshima here again. Today I want to talk about configuring Kerberos authentication to work in a load-balanced environment. This is a more advanced topic that requires a basic understanding of how Kerberos works. If you want an overview of Kerberos, I would suggest Rob’s excellent post, Kerberos for the Busy Admin. In this post, I will be using a load balanced IIS web farm as the example, but the principal applies for other applications.
Read the complete article : blogs.technet.com/b/askds
AD uses a multi-master replication mechanism, meaning that updates can originate on any RWDC. For all kinds of services AD is highly redundant assuming you have more than one RWDC. Within AD some operations cannot operate using the multi-master principle, but rather use the single-master principle to ensure consistency. The roles for those operations are the so called Flexible Single Masters of Operations (FSMO). From a forest perspective two forest wide FSMO roles exist and from a domain perspective three domain wide FSMO roles exist. Below you will find which one is which.
Complete article : blogs.dirteam.com/blogs/jorge
For the last few years, I’ve been blogging about the Microsoft iSCSI Software Target and its many uses related to Windows Server Failover Clustering, Hyper-V and other server scenarios. Today, Microsoft has made this software publicly available to all users of Windows Server 2008 R2.
Source : Jose Barreto's Blog
Hello, my name is Emmers Presson. I am a Support Escalation Engineer for Microsoft in the Windows Core team.
The purpose of this blog is to give you the steps to install a hotfix (or any other “package”) on the currently running operating system using the Deployment Image Servicing and Management (DISM) command.
Source : Ask the Core Team blog
This article describes the System Update Readiness Tool for Windows Vista-based computers, for Windows Server 2008-based computers, for Windows Server 2008 R2-based computers, and for Windows 7-based computers. Microsoft released the System Update Readiness Tool to resolve certain conditions that could cause installing updates and other software not to work. You do not have to manually run this tool. This tool is offered automatically through Windows Update to computers that have a condition that the tool could resolve.
After you download the System Update Readiness Tool, it runs a onetime scan for inconsistencies that might prevent future servicing operations. This scan typically takes less than 15 minutes to run. However, the tool might take significantly longer on some computers. The Windows Update progress bar is not updated during the scan, and progress seems to stop at 60% complete for some time. This behavior is expected. The scan is still running and you should not cancel the update.
Source : support.microsoft.com
You may receive the following error when installing Service Pack 1 for Windows 7 or Windows 2008 R2:Source : The Windows Servicing Guy
0xC0000022 (STATUS_ACCESS_DENIED)
This can be due to McAfee Host Intrusion Protection being installed on the system. To workaround this problem, disable the following option in McAfee: Startup IPS Protection Enabled
More information is available on this thread: https://community.mcafee.com/message/177267#177267
Some of you probably noticed a new download showed up today:
The Windows® Automated Installation Kit (AIK) for Windows® 7 SP1
Be sure to read the “readme” that goes along with this at:
Windows Automated Installation Kit for Windows 7 Readme
A quick Q&A that I assembled from information in this readme and our own MDT testing ...
Il you have exprienced an error with SP1 for Windows 7 / Windows 2008 R2 installation you should take a look at the Ramblings of a Support Engineer blog from a Microsoft Engineer.
Source : www.zdnet.com/blog/bott
Blackbird auditor express is a free and easy-to-use version of Blackbird auditor. This community version offers real-time change monitoring for organizations with basic Active Directory (AD) auditing needs.
Source : 4sysops
Windows Server 2008 R2 will be the last version of Windows Server to support the Intel Itanium architecture. SQL Server 2008 R2 and Visual Studio 2010 are also the last versions to support Itanium.
Source : blogs.technet.com/windowsserver
« Where is the Powershell 2.0 download ? »
Don’t ask me why, but the official release of PowerShell 2.0 is not available in a standalone download. It is now part of the «Window Management Framework».
The framework includes :
It is available for Windows XP, Windows 2003, Windows Vista and Windows 2008 (already included with Windows 7 and 2008 R2).
You will find all the download links and infos at http://support.microsoft.com/kb/968929/en-us
Note : Don’t forget, PowerShell shortcuts are in Programs/Accessories/Windows PowerShell
