If you are a Microsoft Partner, there will be a 5W/50 webinar entitled “Business Opportunities with Windows Home Server – Updated with PowerPack 2 Content” today at noon (EDT) given by Grey Lancaster and Kevin Royalty. If you think WHS is only for homes, then you're still thinking within the box! WHS is a perfect fit with SBS 2003/2008.
Blain Barton, Microsoft's Southeast IT Pro Evangelist, will be bringing his Spring Tiki Tour to the Tampa area on June 4th, 2009 (6p-9p) at the Polk Community College in Lakeland. Topics include: Moving to the Modern OS Roadmap, Windows Security, and Windows 7. I will be doing the Windows 7 presentation. (Yes, food is included!)
Space is limited. As of Tuesday 5/26, we already have 165 registered. Click here to register and for more information.
Hope to see you there!
Talk about a deal too good to refuse! Acer recently came out with their WHS server, that competes straight up with the HP MediaSmart Server. For the rest of this post, I will refer to it as the 'easyStore'. A week ago I stumbled on a deal through NCIX (USA) that was offering the easyStore for $399, with a 1TB drive and 2GB memory, and for a limited time was throwing in a second 1TB drive. I jumped at the chance. And it arrived by FedEx this afternoon.
Within 30 minutes I had it unboxed, powered up, installed the WHS connector to my Win7 laptop and now running a full backup. A few random thoughts:
- It comes with a real honest-to-goodness printed manual (in 6 languages)!
- Astethics of the external box is very nice. Black color, USB port in front, 4 more in the back along with an Ethernet port
- System started up and was up and running without a hitch or issue. I like that!
- WHS PowerPack 1 is already installed on it. Be sure to get Power Pack 2 installed on it!
What's new or different with the easyStore versus HP?
- The easyStore comes with an IP Configuration tool to adjust the server's IP settings. Since this works from the rmeote WHS console, you no longer need to access the server via Remote Desktop to make such changes.
- Acer has implemented a one-touch USB backup. What you may say? Simply put, plug in a USB drive that contains various media files and press the USB button. The easyStore will automatically copy all the files on that USB drive to the Public shared folder on the server, and automatically place each file in it's appropriate sub folder (Music, Photo, Video)! How cool is that. You no longer have to logon to the WHS console in order to access the USB drive and copy files.
- The easyStore comes with a 6 month subscription to McAfee's Total Protection software pre-installed
- The easyStore also comes with the WHS Lights Out addon that allow you to suspend or wake up the server at specific times, such as when its time to backup workstations.
- The easyStore also comes with Digital Media Server (DMS) and an iTunes Server.
For a more in-depth review, along with pscreenshots, check out Andrew Edney's blog post on the Acer easyStore.
Once my first backup is completed, I'll test adding the second drive to this server and report on my findings!
I previously blogged on April 1st about the new entry level Windows Server that Microsoft just released -- Windows Server 2008 Foundation (WSF). Microsoft has now published a new paper called Introduction to Windows Server 2008 Foundation.
WSF is NOT intended to be a "baby" version of SBS. Rather, it is a Windows 2008 Server limited to 15 users. It's designed to be sold into an existing very small business that is currently running a peer-to-peer (workgroup) network. There's no Exchange on it.
Enjoy!
Microsoft announced today (April 1, 2009) a new entry level version of Windows 2008 Server - called Foundations. And this ain't no April Fool's joke. It will support a maximum of 15 users. Read more in their press release.
Microsoft released Power Pack 2 for Windows Home Server today (KB 956587). This is a free update that offers several new features. It does require you to already have Power Pack 1 installed.
I've blogged previously about Exchange 2003 IMF (Intelligent Message Filter). One of the somewhat hidden features of Exchange 2003 and IMF is the ability to implement a custom weighting feature via an XML file. This feature first came out in IMF v2. MsExchange.org has a good article on how to implement the custom weighting feature of IMF.
However, there has always been a small issue with using the custom weighting feature -- the custom XML file that you create has to be put inside a specific subfolder. The problem is that when Microsoft releases an update to IMF, the installation process creates a new sub folder automatically. However, the XML file is NOT autoimatically copied to the new folder.
What to do? Until recently, one had to remember to manually copy your XML file from the old folder to the new folder.
But now, Oliver Sommer (SBS/EBS MVP from Germany) has developed a free utility (Exchange Custom Weighting Feature XML Updater) that installs on your your server (works great with SBS 2003) and automatically copies your custom XML file to the new folder whenever a new IMF update has been installed. I've been personally running various beta and early versions of this utility successfully for more than a year.
Give it a try.
And if you like it, even though Oliver is offering the utiity for free, you may want to give him a small donation via PayPal. And while you are at his site, check out his Wake on Lan for SBS 2003 RWW utility!
Cheers!
One of my mottos has always been: "You cannot have enough backup!". So, I am always investigating and testing backup software. When Microsoft first releasd Windows Home Server (WHS), I knew that this was a product I would be testing. Well, tonight, it saved my bacon!
My own SBS 2003 server that has been running for years experienced a serious hard drive failure. Fortunately I do use Raid-5 disk configuration. So I shut down the server, replaced the drive, fired up the server to rebuild the Raid, and then rebooted. But apparently something else was amiss, as Windows would not boot up properly, reporting a failure or corruption with Active Directory. After trying a couple of other options unsuccessfully, I decided to see if WHS would get me back online.
Yes, I use WHS as my backup software of choice for backing up my SBS 2003 server! (P.S. The WHS Team has an informative article here).
So, I pulled out my WHS Restore CD and booted my server off the CD. However, it did not load a driver for my NIC card. No problem, as I knew the drill: go to another workstation, fire up the WHS Console, view the backup directory for the computer in question (my SBS server), and copy the contents of the WHS Drivers for Recovery folder to a USB thumb drive, and rename the folder to DRIVERS. I then took the thumb drive back to the server, where the WHS restore screen has a convenient button to install additional drivers. An hour later my server was back online and operational!
Lessons learned? There are lots of vendors offering backup software solutions for the Windows marketplace. I have used Acronis, ShadowProtect, and others. These are all good products. But WHS is a real winner for me, and for many of my small business customers. I have WHS installed and backing up both SBS 2003 and SBS 2008 servers, plus serveral peer-to-peer networks. It just works! It has even recovered a Windows 7 Beta laptop for me!
Now, someone may say that offsite (or remote online) backups are required, and I would not argue that point at all. Remember: I believe in multiple levels of backup solutions. But for the small business and home environments, WHS is an excellent backup software solution.
Cheers!
Microsoft has published a list of errors that you may encounter when installing SBS2008. They also include suggested resolution(s) and follow-up tasks for each error.
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc546065.aspx
Frank McCallister passed away this week. Frank was an SBS MVP. He loved to say he was the oldest MVP. But more importantly he was a real friend. His stories would hold your attention, but the real story was Frank. He called himself "the Old Fart". But that name does not describe all that he did and would do for people. Frank, we will miss you.
In tribute to Frank, I've reworked the lyrics of the song "The Gambler", made famous by Kenny Rogers (YouTube video).
The Old Fart (aka The Gambler)
Dedicated to Frank McCallister
On a warm summer's evenin' on a train bound for ‘Bama,
I met up with the old fart; we were both too tired to sleep.
So we took turns a starin' out the window at the darkness
'Til boredom overtook us, and he began to speak.
He said, "Son, I've made a life out of readin' people's emails,
And knowin' what their logs showed, by the way they signed their names.
And if you don't mind my sayin', I can see you’re out of disk space.
For a taste of your whiskey I'll give you some advice."
So I handed him my bottle and he drank down my last swallow.
Then he bummed a cigarette and asked me for a light.
And the night got deathly quiet, and his face lost all expression.
Said, "If you're gonna play the game, boy, ya gotta learn to play it right.
You got to know when to defrag, know when to format,
Know when to reinstall, ‘cause I’m the old fart.
You never say you’re thirsty when you're sittin' at the console.
There'll be time enough for drinkin' when the (MVP) party starts
Ev'ry old fart knows that the secret to survivin'
Is knowin' emails to throw away and knowing what to keep.
'Cause ev'ry email's a winner and ev'ry email's a loser,
And the best that you can hope for is to die in your sleep."
And when he'd finished speakin', he turned back towards the window,
Crushed out his cigarette and faded off to sleep.
And somewhere in the darkness the old fart, he broke even.
But in his final words I found an ace that I could keep.
You got to know when to defrag, know when to format,
Know when to reinstall, ‘cause I’m the old fart.
You never say you’re thirsty when you're sittin' at the console.
There'll be time enough for drinkin' when the (MVP) party starts
-kw
For those using Outlook2007, two new hotfixes are now available that address specific speed and performance issues as well as a variety of other issues. Hotfixes, by nature, come with some warnings on their use. Hot fix 961752 and Hot fix 967688
Note #1: If you have never requested a hot fix from Microsoft, or it has been years since you have, you will be pleased to find that the process is quite fast and efficient. No longer do you need to even call Microsoft to request a hot fix!
Simply click on the links above to open up a new window with information on the hot fix. In the upper left of the window will be a clickable link" 'View and request hotfix downloads'. Click on the link, enter your email address twice plus a security code and within five minutes you will receive an email containing a link to download the hotfix and a required password. The password is only good for a certain number of days (7 days maximum), so it is best that you download the hotfix as soon as you receive the email from Microsoft.
Those who have worked with SBS 2000 and SBS 2003 will find that many things are not where you expect them to be in SBS 2008! For example, let's say you want Sally to receive all email addressed to sales@yourdomain.com (in addition to receiving email as sally@yourdomain.com). In prior versions of SBS, you would go to the SBS console, drill down to Users, go to properies for that user and make the change under the Email Addresses tab.
So, how do you do it with SBS 2008? Glad you asked!
Start up the Exchange 2007 management console, and click on Recipient Configuration > Mailbox. Double click on the desired user, click on the E-Mail Addresses tab, and then click on the green plus (+) tab and enter the additionla email address. Voila! Wasn't that easy?
The SBS offical blog site has an excellent post on how to modify SBS 2008 so that a Windows 7 (Beta) workstation can be joined via http://connect. I have just a couple of observations and suggestions on my part:
- If you are joining a laptop, be sure to disable your wireless port(s) and join the server using a wired connection!
- When modifying the XML files, I found it best to copy the XML file over to the 'My Documents' folder on the server, edit the file there, and then copy/replace it back to the original directory. Obviosuly you would want to make sure you first make a backup copy of the original file (just in case!)
I've been testing out the Windows 7 beta on one of my laptops this week. And following my own best practices, I made sure I installed the WHS connector on it and made several backups during my testing. So, yesterday I tried (unsuccessfully) to join the Win7 laptop to a SBS2008 domain. (Yes, I'm aware of my changes required on SBS 2008 to allow Windows 7 to join the domain via http://connect). But still, it failed.
So, when I got home I wanted to restore my laptop to its state before my attempt to join it to a domain. Talk about wasting valuable time!
First, I couldn't find my Restore CD. So, I downloaded the WHS Restore CD (PPK1 version) from Microsoft's web site. But, in trying to burn the ISO image, I encountered two bad CD's in a row. Fortunately, the third CD worked. Once I got the CD created, I booted my laptop from it only to find that it could not find my WHS server. Think, Kevin ... I told myself ... it has to be an issue with the NIC driver. Sure enough, a quick Google (errr, Live Search), and I found instructions on how to grab the drivers from the WHS Backup directory, put them onto a USB stick, and then at the appropriate time request the WHS Restore CD to scan for additional drivers.
No good. Still could not see the server. More searches and I discover that other people had encountered the same issue. Common denominator? A Realtek NIC was involved! I went to the Realtek support site, and download the drivers, and put them onto the USB stick. Still no good! More searches all indicated that grabbing the drivers from the Realtek web site should do the trick. So I went back one more time, and for some reason, the files I download this time from the Realtek site were different than the drivers I had downloaded 20 minutes before. (I later discovered that my original search for Realtek drivers had taken me to an outdated web page on their support site).
I dumped the drivers onto the USB stick and voila! --- the WHS Restore CD found my server, and six minutes later I had my laptop restored.
Hope this helps!
-kw
OK … so I just installed Windows 7 Beta for the first time on Friday, but I already like what I see! The new installation on my Vostro 1510 laptop went smoothly. And already I have discovered several new things that caught my attention, such as:
-
Certainly initial boot up is faster, and Win 7 "seems" more responsive than Vista
-
What used to be called ‘Shared Computer Toolkit’ is now built into Win 7, and called PC Safeguard. This allows you to define a user account for perhaps a training room environment. User logs on, does stuff (creates files, make changes, etc,). But once the user logs off, all changes are discarded and you are back to your pre-established environment for that user!
-
Directly mount Virtual PC VHD files
-
Burn ISO images without relying on a 3rd party tool
-
Press Win+P to switch to an external video output, like a projector
-
I've already tested versions of Kaspersky A/V and LogMeIn for Win7
I think I'm going to have fun with Windows 7. This may make me change my mind and encourage people to buy Vista now, so that they can upgrade to Windows 7 once it is release. Cool!
Enabling SBS 2008 to allow remote users to use their email clients (Outlook, Outlook Express, etc.) or phones to pull down email from the SBS2008 server via POP3 or IMAP4 is just slightly more involved than on SBS 2003. For all the step-by-step details and screen shots, visit the Official SBS Blog site which details these steps in two parts (part 1, part 2).
However, you may find it helpful to view the big picture in 5 easy steps, and I will also highligh several GOTCHAS to watch out for!
Step 1: Enabling the appropriate Microsoft Exchange IMAP4 or POP3 services on the server (Start > Run > Services.msc) should be easy enough. GOTCHA #1: Be sure that you change the startup type to Automatic, and then be sure to actually Start the service!
Step 2: Enabling the required ports again should be easy enough. Port 110-POP3, 995=POP3/SSL, 143=IMAP4, 993=IMAP4/SSL. GOTCHA #2: Remember that you also need to forward port 587 as this is the listener port for SMTP/TLS mail (instead of port 25!).
Step3: From ESM (click Server Configuration > Client Access > POP3 and IMAP4), and modify the X509 certificate under the Authentication tab to point to the proper exterNal FQDN of your server (eg., remote.servername.com).
Step 4: While in ESM, move down to Server Configuration > Hub Transport, and add a new Receive Connector. Name the connector 'Client' (short and simple). GOTCHA #3: Be sure to click on the drop down box and change the intended use of the Receive connector form Custom to Client! You can default through the rest of the prompts.
Step 5: Finally we are done with the server setup. The only thing left is to configure your email client and test things out. GOTCHA #4: When setting up your mail client for POP3 or IMAP4, be sure that you specifcy that the outgoing SMTP connection is to be encrypted, and set the port to 587.
Cheers!
After installing SBS 2008, you may begin to see DCOM 10016 event errors being reported in your SBS Monitoring reports as soon as users begin to use Sharepoint/Companyweb. This error is also identified if you run the SBS 2008 Best Practices Analyzer. There have been several posts on how to fix this error, but the instruction always were vague in one specific step.
First, here is the DCOM error as reported in the event log and within the SBS Monitoring report:
Event Source: DCOM Event Id: 10016
Event Details: The application-specific permission settings do not grant Local Activation permission for the COM Server application with CLSID {61738644-F196-11D0-9953-00C04FD919C1} to the user NT AUTHORITY\NETWORK SERVICE SID (S-1-5-20) from address LocalHost (Using LRPC). This security permission can be modified using the Component Services administrative tool.
And here is the error as reported in the SBS BPA report:
Local activation permission to the IIS WAMREG Admin Service required
To fix this issue, perform the following steps:
* From the SBS console, click Administrative Tools > Component Services
(or, if you prefer: click Run > comexp.msc)
* Expand down Component Services > Computers > My Computer > DCOM Config
* Right click on IIS WAMREG Admin Service, then click Properties
* Click on the Security tab
* Click the Edit... button within the Launch and Activation Permissions section
* Click Add and add the user named: 'Network Service'
(NB: this is the step that confuses people. Most instructions simply tell you to add the appropriate user, but do not make it clear which user to add!)
* Click on the checkbox to Allow (enable) the Local Activation rights option for this user
* Click OK twice, and close Component Services
* Finally reboot the server for good measure and to ensure the change takes effect
Hope this helps!
I can't believe it's 2009 and we still have issues with DST and calendar items! Several of us just discovered (here on Feb-10-2009) that an event we are entering for August 2009 in Outlook 2007 is showing up an hour earlier on our WM6.1 phones. I've downloaded the latest WM/DST patch and installed it on my WM6.1 phone, but appointments are still showing up an hour earlier. I tried rebooting the phone, but no change. AFAIK, Outlook and my Exchange/SBS 2003 box are up to snuff with patches.
Very frustrating ...
I've been install Calyptix AccessEnforcer units recently in several SBS shops, both SBS 2003 and SBS 2008. The AE is a fully featured network security appliance, and comes in various models to fit different size organizations. What I like about Calyptix is its single price --- no extra costs for end user licenses or to enable various features. It interfaces nicely with Active Directory for user level filtering and email quarantine. I plan to do more posts in the future on implementing SBS and Calyptix together.
As most of you know, last week there were widespread reports of Seagate Barracuda SATA 7200.11 drives failing. Initially only the 1TB disk drives were thought to be the issie. But later it was determined that the problem also existed in some of their other 7200.11 drives.
I know, as I got hit with an SBS 2008 server that had four 750GB Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 drives!
Seagate has since come out with a free firmware upgrade and utility. The download is in an ISO format as you must create a bootable CD to run it. However, please note that this firmware utility will not run on systems utilizing SATA Raid controllers. Instead you will need to remove the drives from your server and connect them one at a time to a desktop station that is running a standard SATA drive controller.
To determine if your drive is amongst those with the bad firmware, and download the appropriate firmware, click here.
Good luck!
More Posts
Next page »