David Overton's Blog : Tips

Getting my Nokia Lumia 800 to work with Virgin Mobile UK MMS settings (and trimming the SIM too)

David Overton — Sat, 02 Jun 2012 10:35:28 GMT

I recently fell of the back of a boat which resulted in my faithful Samsung Omnia being written off. Since this was a personal phone, I decided to upgrade to a Nokia Lumia 800 as it looked like a fab phone. I have so far not been disappointed, however I hit two problems. The first was that my SIM was not a micro-sim. I contacted Virgin who told me they were very soon to launch a micro-sim, but not yet. I bought a 30-day sim from Vodafone in the short term, but then discovered that I could trim the current SIM to fit by following the detailed instructions at http://www.solutios.com/simcutting/ . All has been happy until my wife asked about sending MMS pictures from her phone. When I tried to do it from mine, I discovered that it kept on failing with an error and asking me to try again. This has been the second challenge that I have had with the phone! Searching the web found many frustrated people, some who had resorted to resetting their phones to factory defaults to get things...(read more)

Turn off Ctrl-Alt-Del in Windows 8

David Overton — Sat, 03 Mar 2012 17:56:50 GMT

This is a very quick one. I saw the videos and saw that Ctrl-Alt-Del was turned off in Windows 8. While this can be done by setting the local security policy, it can also be done via command prompt. This is no different to other versions of Windows. If you search for cmd and then right click it to select Run as Administrator Then once cmd is running, use this command (it is all one line) to turn off C-A-D as a requirement: REG ADD HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System /v DisableCAD /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f To turn it back on, use this command: REG ADD HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System /v DisableCAD /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f That is it. ttfn David...(read more)

My Top Tips for Windows 8 so far–closing windows, dual booting, using the keyboard and mouse

David Overton — Thu, 01 Mar 2012 12:06:27 GMT

Hi, I loaded Windows 8 Consumer Preview with some concerns about how the new interface would impact me. As a keyboard user, the Developer Preview just didn’t do enough for me, however Windows 8 is now my primary home OS and I’m loving it. What is more, my daughter is once again asking to have it (as she wants “Snap”) for her applications. So my top tips are: How to close a Metro Application There are two ways to do this – dragging the open application from the top of the screen to the bottom – you will see something like the screen below (top half is once it is grabbed and the bottom half is as it is dragged to the bottom of the screen). The second way to do this is to hover in the top left corner and one Metro application will show. However if we now scroll down the left edge the other open applications will show. We can now right click on one of those and select close. It is also worth noting that we can also snap the application to the left or right hand side of the screen too. Of course...(read more)

Loading SP1 beta onto a Hyper-V R2 system

David Overton — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 16:57:28 GMT

I was keen to play with the Hyper-V R2 Service Pack 1 features, so I decided to download and install it, however I could not find anything that was not for Windows 7 or Windows Server (as opposed to Hyper-V Server). After asking internally I was pointed to what I needed. The process was fairly simple:

Download the SP1 beta from the Microsoft site and ensure you answer the questions correctly as an IT Pro to ensure you get the opportunity to download. You will need to update both your Windows 7 / Windows Server client to manage the system as well as the Hyper-V Server, so you might need to download both the x86 and x64 versions as Hyper-V Server is x64 only.
Remove the language packs that are not supported by the beta from the Hyper-V Server. To do this you will need to log into the console and run the LPKSETUP.exe program and remove anything that is not as part of the download package (English, French, German, Japanese, and Spanish)
Run the SP1 update on the Hyper-V Server
Run the SP1 update on the Windows 7 Client
Open the properties page in your Hyper-V Manager on Windows 7 SP1 and you can now edit the new properties
Remember that Remote FX requires a Windows 7 SP1 (beta 1) guest and that Dynamic Memory requires (for the beta only) a Windows Enterprise or Datacenter guest with Standard and Web being supported when it is out of beta. See http://blogs.msdn.com/b/virtual_pc_guy/archive/2010/07/12/dynamic-memory-beta-supported-guest-operating-systems.aspx for some more details on dynamic memory support in the beta.

thanks

David

Technorati Tags: Hyper-V,Hyper-V R2,SP1,Service Pack 1,Dynamic Memory

How to put Windows 7 (either purchased ISO or DVD) onto a USB stick for faster installation or installation onto a Netbook without a DVD drive

David Overton — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 10:25:34 GMT

I've had to tell a few people about this recently, so I thought I should actually write a blog post on this. The options are very simple and easy.

Buy Windows 7 on DVD and use or buy a 4GB (or larger) USB Stick and then make a USB stick bootable and copy the files to the stick. Details on how to make it bootable can be found here - http://www.techmixer.com/install-windows-vista-from-bootable-usb-flash-memory-drive/. You literally copy all the files from the DVD to the USB stick for this to work. To do this, enter this command into the run box (press Windows-Key + R) or a command prompt window - robocopy d:\ e:\ /s - this assumes that the DVD drive is D: and that the USB stick is E: - change them as required.
Buy Windows 7 as an ISO from the Microsoft store (http://emea.microsoftstore.com/uk/) and use the Microsoft tool from http://store.microsoft.com/Help/ISO-Tool to copy this to a USB stick (as mentioned above)
buy a USB DVD Drive (not my preferred option)

I hope this helps.

David

Technorati Tags: Windows 7,Windows,ISO,Microsoft,Tips and Tricks

What are the legal options for Licensing Windows 7 or Windows Vista? Or how to avoid mis-licensing

David Overton — Thu, 24 Dec 2009 16:08:00 GMT

I’m often told that Microsoft licensing is complex, but what I actually find are that this either translates to “I have too many choices - ahhhh!” or “I can’t license in the way I want to” or “I can’t find the information I want to”. Option 1 is always going to happen – the more choice, the more complexity in making the right choice. Option 2 is often “I don’t want to buy lose licenses, why do I have to..” and Option 3 is poor communications on the part of Microsoft.

To help with the Option 3 situation there is a new guide on the Microsoft Partner portal that explains one of the areas I’m often asked about – i.e. Windows client licensing. It is really simple. Here are the rules in summary (non-legally binding and please read the guide for full details):

A PC has to licensed with a Full retail product (FPP, bought from a shop) or supplied with an OEM license (the OEM option can’t be used after the PC has been bought and supplied to the end user)
Volume Licenses for Windows client is only available as an upgrade to the FPP / OEM eligible license
Volume Licenses upgrade only apply to business versions, not Home editions, unless you are a qualifed academic customer and there is more information in the guide.

I don’t think that is complex. To “Get Legal” there are various options too.

For more details, have a look at this “Windows Licensing Fact Sheet” - download from here.

Thanks

David

Technorati Tags: Windows 7,Windows Client,Windows,Licensing,Microsoft,Partners,MSPP,Microsoft Partner Network

How to get SBS 2008 to "fix" managing WSUS after you have manually upset it

David Overton — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 08:08:06 GMT

Today's post covers what to do when SBS says it no longer can change the WSUS settings from the console. The exact message is "Windows Small Business Server Update Service is not running because it automatically turns off if you customize Windows Server Update Services (WSUS)".

One way round this problem is to manually change all the settings in the WSUS console (from Administrator Tools, select Microsoft Windows Update Services 3.0 SP1) and change the settings as per instructions found at http://blogs.technet.com/sbs/archive/2006/07/13/441594.aspx. I'm a sort of "quick fix" kind of guy, so the easier way is to go to the same tool, but then run the wizard. The steps are:

Start the Wizard

Click through the first two screens and set the updates to come from Microsoft Update

Configure the proxy if required and press next. Then press Start Connecting. When done, press Next again.

Select the language(s) you want to download

Make sure "All Products" has been ticked

Tick all the classifications - you can optionally leave out "Drivers" if desired

Set the schedule - for me, 5am is a good quiet time on my server

Tick to begin sync and press Finish. Now SBS Console will be back on the case for you.

Ttfn

David

Technorati Tags: SBS 2008,Small Business Server 2008,Microsoft,SBSC

How to copy or archive files by year using the command line and robocopy

David Overton — Wed, 06 May 2009 10:26:00 GMT

I got this question via e-mail and decided I would post the answer here in a blog. (Updated 16th Feb 2017 with a typo correction)

I want transfer all files created in Office Word 2003 by year (annual batchs - ex: 2005, 2006, etc.) to external HD. How can to do this?

I will appreciate your answer.

Edgar

To do this via the command line you can use Robocopy which is present in Windows Vista and Windows 7. If you have Windows XP download the Server 2003 Resource Toolkit and install it. Robocopy will be part of the install and found in the install directory.

The actual command would look like this and would need to be entered into a command prompt:

for /L %x in (2009,-1,2000) do robocopy source destination\%x *.doc? /maxage:%x0101 /minage:%x1231 /s

To break it down a bit..

for /L %x in (2009,-1,2000) do

This creates a counter from 2009 up in steps of -1 (or down in steps of 1) until 2000 is reached. Each time the counter changes it is set into %x, so %x will become 2009, 2008 and so on. It then executes the command after to "do".

robocopy source destination\%x *.doc? /minage:%x0101 /maxage:%x1231 /s

The robocopy command is very flexible. Details of it can be found on the wiki page here.

The first two parameters are the sounce and destination locations. so it might be c:\users\david\documents and F:\document_backup. Note the \%x on the end. This means it will put the files inside a folder on the destination location that matches the year you are archiving.
*.doc? is a limiter to the files to be copied - if you want all files, simply remove it. This will copy all Office 2003 and 2007 document files - if you only want Office 2003, use *.doc and don't include the question mark.
The minage and maxage state how old the file is. It can either be in days or a date in the form of yyyymmdd. So with the %x set to 2009, the command will have /minage:20090101 /maxage:20091231 which equates to everything in 2009 and so on.
The /s copies all subdirectories too
You can optionally put the /MOV (to move the files) or /MOVE (to move all files and empty directories) command on the end.

I hope that helps

David

Technorati Tags: Windows,Microsoft,Robocopy,Command Line,Archiving,Office 2007,Word

Migrating SBS 2000 to Windows SBS 2008 - download document now available

David Overton — Fri, 01 May 2009 23:29:00 GMT

Should you have a SBS 2000 system that you wish to move to SBS 2008 there is now a documented process on how to do this.

Migrating Microsoft Small Business Server 2000 to Windows Small Business Server 2008

Outlines the steps necessary to migrate settings and data from an existing server running Microsoft Small Business Server 2000 to a new computer running Windows SBS 2008.

File Name: Migrating_SBS2000_to_SBS2008.doc

Date Published: 5/1/2009

Download Size:96 KB

Download details: Migrating SBS 2000 to Windows SBS 2008

Note that Exchange is not migrated in itself, so PST backups of all mail folders is required using the process documented in the KB article http://support.microsoft.com/kb/196492.

Thanks

David

Technorati Tags: SBS 2008,SBS 2000,Migration,Microsoft

SBS 2008, Installing, migrating and configuring BOOK now available to pre-order

David Overton — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 10:22:00 GMT

[updated 2nd May 2009]

Hi everyone. My SBS 2008 book is in now available to order. Details below. If you want to ask questions once you have the book, go to http://davidoverton.com/r.ashx?13. To order the book click http://davidoverton.com/r.ashx?1M

Small Business Server 2008 – Installation, Migration, and Configuration

David Overton

Set up and run your small business server making it deliver big business impact

· Step-by-step guidance through the installation and configuration process with numerous pictures

· Successfully install SBS 2008 into your business, either as a new installation or by migrating from SBS 2003

· Configure hosted web sites for public and secure information exchange using Office Live for Small Business and Office Live Workspaces

· An illustrative book for people with basic technical skills and no SBS background

In More Detail

Available April 2009. Order now!

Cover price	£24.99
Packt Special Offer	£22.49 save 10%
Multi-buy Discount	£20.49 save 18%

Hurray

David

Technorati Tags: SBS 2008,Small Business Server 2008,Book,Personal,If you only read one blog today,SBSC,Microsoft

SBS 2008 Migrations from SBS 2003 – Keys to Success from the Official SBS Blog

David Overton — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 02:05:00 GMT

I started to write about this at SBS 2003 to SBS 2008 migration thoughts and issues and Active Directory Health Checks, but after some discussion with the SBS team at Microsoft we now have much more:

The Official SBS Blog : SBS 2008 Migrations from SBS 2003 – Keys to Success

The purpose of this post is to help you complete your SBS 2003 migrations to SBS 2008 successfully on the first attempt.

……………… much, much more

Use this information if you have a non-standard implementation or are concerned about the success of a migration.

ttfn

David

Technorati Tags: Microsoft,SBS 2003,SBS 2008,Migration,SBSC,Small Business Server 2008

The PowerPoint Team Blog : A Picture + 1000 Words…

David Overton — Sat, 24 Jan 2009 11:14:00 GMT

Want to know how to create amazing work in PowerPoint – look at the PowerPoint team blog!

The PowerPoint Team Blog : A Picture + 1000 Words…

We learn best by examples. And the better the example, the better the results.

That’s why its a pleasure to point you to a new group of PowerPoint examples that are stunning, inventive, evocative… simply beautiful. Nice enough if it stops there, but each and every one of these examples includes very detailed instructions on how you can reconstruct the design, and learn how to apply the technique to your own work. Animation for graphics and text, static text effects, photographic effects, new background techniques, Smart Art and transition effects… this is a holiday present come early for PowerPoint users.

And they’re free! Get them here.

Here’s a small sample, which of course does not include the amazing animated designs.

And in case you’re wondering, this is the work of PowerPoint MVP Julie Terberg of Terberg Design. Julie has done some amazing work for all you PowerPoint customers to benefit from and enjoy. Do let us know what you think!

Amazing!

ttfn

David

Technorati Tags: Microsoft,PowerPoint,Tips,Office System,Office 2007

How to create a VPN on Windows Vista to connect to a Windows Server, such as SBS 2008

David Overton — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 06:33:00 GMT

I was going to include this in the book, but decided it was not quite the right subject matter, so I've decided to post it on the blog. SBS 2003 had a pre-defined tool for VPNs. The tool exists in SBS 2008 to produce the same tool, but you have to configure it by hand. This is covered in this blog entry here.

If you are on a client machine and you need create a VPN connection, or you are a user and want to create a VPN on Windows Vista, follow this guide.

	Start at the Start menu. Press the Connect To button to start the process.
	You will be told that you are already connected to a network, but you will need to create a new connection. Do this by selecting the Set up a connection or Network option and press Connect.
	In the Choose a connection option screen, select the Connect to a workplace option and press Next.
	Now select Use my Internet connection (VPN).
	The Internet address is that for your remote server. If you are using Small Business Server 2008 (SBS 2008) this will likely be "remote." and your e-mail domain, so for example if your e-mail was david@davidoverton.com then it would be remote.davidoverton.com. In the Internet address box type your address. Now type a description. For me, I would also suggest ticking the box Don't connect now; just set it up so I can connect later. Press Next to continue
	Type in your User name and Password. While you can tick the box Remember this password it is a security risk as anyone using your computer can then connect to your work domain without knowing your password. You will also need to know your domain name. If you do not know this right click on Computer in the Start menu and select properties. When the screen appears your domain name will be shown. Enter this information into the Domain (optional) box.
	You are now ready to connect. Press Connect Now to start a connection.
	Next time you press Connect To from the Start menu you will see your VPN in the list. Select it and press Connect.
	If your User name or password are not present (if you followed my guidance your password wil lalways be blank) type them in. Now press Connect to start the connection.
	Assuming all the details are correct you will see confirmation that you are connected to your corporate network. Press Close to remove the window.

I hope this helps for those who were unsure.

ttfn

David

Technorati Tags: Create a VPN,Vista,SBS 2008,Windows Client,Windows Server 2008,Microsoft,Tips and Tricks

vLite detail screenshots for producing a Lite install of Vista – For Windows Vista Magazine

David Overton — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 10:07:00 GMT

I recently built a Lite version of Vista using vLite. While most of the settings are simple enough to understand I’ve put up the screen shots that I used to build my slimed down Vista.

First you need to select the compatibility options

Then you need to step through the settings. Items ticked are REMOVED from the install of Vista.

The rest is up for you to choose again.

Have fun

David

Active Directory Health Check - Make sure your AD is healthy before you migrate SBS 2003 to SBS 2008

David Overton — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 23:30:00 GMT

[updated 29/9/12 with new link]

Given the recent comments about AD validation I thought I would share this excellent document on verifying your AD before you begin a migration (or at any other time)

Active Directory Health Check - Active Directory

This document outlines a basic procedure for validating the health of your domain and is a good practice for iterative maintenance and an excellent pre-check before doing any potentially dangerous domain operations

I would add a couple of extra tests to the list in this document, which would be placed after the 1st DCDIAG test, also perform:

DCDIAG /test:DNS /DNSALL /e /v

DCDIAG /test:DcPromo /e /v

DCDIAG /test:RegisterInDNS

If you system passes these tests then it is a good indication of health.

ttfn

David

Technorati Tags: SBS 2003,Windows Server 2008,Active Directory,migration,Microsoft,SBSC,Partners

How to upgrade (migrate) from SBS 2003 to SBS 2008 on the same system without using a swing migration

David Overton — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 17:33:00 GMT

Someone posted this question on a discussion group at work and it got me thinking. If you bought a nice new system over the last 2 or so years in preparation for SBS 2008 (Cougar as was or even SBS v.Next) and had it installed with SBS 2003 you've probably heard that SBS 2003 to SBS 2008 is a 2 box migration and needs the Swing technique to do an on box migration.

I've come up with a much simpler solution, but your hardware might need some additions to make it work. So here is what you need:

Box with 6GB of RAM minimum (4GB for SBS 2008, 1GB for SBS 2003 and 1GB for Hyper-V server).
1 new disk for SBS 2008 system disk and 1 disk to hold Hyper-V (which could be small if desired or temporary)
System that meets the minimum system requirements of Hyper-V (http://www.microsoft.com/servers/hyper-v-server/system-requirements.mspx)
You need to ensure your hardware is really up to spec and is fit enough that you want your new SBS 2008 system to run on it for the next 2+ years, otherwise this may well be a false economy.

The process in outline is below. If you need more detailed information, let me know and I'll knock something up (as well as this may possibly end up in the book)

Take a full system backup before starting
Take existing system and add RAM and 2 disks
Install Hyper-V Server onto 1 disk
Install Hyper-V manager onto a client PC (see here for details)
Configure the network to all nodes can connect to a real physical network that has your internet router and firewall on it
Configure a virtual machine with pass-through disks that point to each of your SBS 2003 disks. To make a disk visible in Hyper-V console as a pass-through see here. Only configure approx 1GB of memory as you only need it to run well enough to perform a migration.
Start and boot the SBS 2003 VM. Check that all services start (or can be started if there is a timing issue) and that all data is available.
Install the integration Services Setup disk, run the setup and reboot when asked
Create another virtual machine with 4GB of RAM that points to the other new disk, again as a pass-through volume. This will be the SBS 2008 boot disk and can be booted with or without Hyper-V later
Perform the Migration as per my book (not yet published) or Whitepaper
Start migration process, including creating the answer file.
Create a VFD with the answer file on it and boot SBS 2008 to start the migration
Finish the migration to the point where the SBS 2003 box is downgraded
Turn off SBS 2003 VM and store, recycle or dispose of disks
Choose to either make the machine book natively boot to the SBS 2008 partition (in the bios) or continue to use Hyper-V

That is it. Much simpler than a swing if your box is good enough to run Hyper-V server. If you intend on keeping SBS 2008 running under Hyper-V, have a look at this Technet article.

ttfn

David

Technorati Tags: SBS 2003,SBS 2008,Microsoft,Migration,SBSC,David Overton

Hyper-V Management console stops working after a month or so with error “Cannot connect to the RPC service on Computer ‘xxx’. Make sure your RPC service is running.

David Overton — Sun, 21 Dec 2008 21:47:00 GMT

[updated with net accounts command 20/2/2009]

This can help diagnose and resolve the issue if like me, it was running fine and then it suddenly stops about 4-5 weeks after it all got started. My initial thought was that some update had changed things as the blog post here documented the initial setup where the same error was seen. The error once again looked like this:

However checking all the same firewall and other settings revealed nothing. Finally I discovered that the user I had created had a password setting that meant the password had expired. Simple, yet checking from the command line is a right royal pain. To fix, these were the commands I used:

net user <username> “<new or existing passsword>” /active:yes /expires:never /passwordchg:no

net accounts /maxpwage:unlimited

Simple, yet the cause of so much time trying to fix.

Hopefully this will solve it for you too.

Thanks

David

Technorati Tags: Microsoft, Hyper-V, Error, User, Password

How to size the hardware required for SBS 2008

David Overton — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 22:50:00 GMT

This question has been asked many times and was once again asked today on an internal forum. It is hard to come up with an explicit answer, but I feel I can give you some (personal, non-binding, your mileage may vary, please take with a pinch of salt and don’t sue me) opinions. For SBS 2003 the non-scientific sizing appeared to go like this:

“between 2 & 4GB of RAM, depending on number of users”. I often saw a machine for around 25 users with 4GB of RAM and there was headroom.
Disk – don’t buy 1.5TB disks, but don’t by 30GB either. Buy largish and try to size data before you make the decision
1 CPU or 2, or perhaps more importantly, a box that can take 1 CPU or 2?

The the time SBS 2008 arrived the difference in cost of a 2GB or 4GB box was trivial. Now SBS 2008, if you want to be scientific about it would look something like this:

Minimum specs are found at http://www.microsoft.com/sbs/en/us/system-requirements.aspx
Think Windows Server 2008 for x users, plus Exchange sizing for x users plus some wiggle for all the SBS 2008 bits, including WSS, Backup.

Since working all the above out, I tend to use the following guides:

4GB of RAM for 1 User, 8GB for more than 30 or so, however this is MY opinion and not tested
Disk as above, mirrored in h/w (yes, mirrored, not raid 5)
Dual core for a starter system going to multi-cpu & multi core for a very busy system
The Premium node is sized as any other Windows Server 2008 system SQL or Terminal Services or ISA… etc

Now while this might sound very sketchy, I’ve never benchmarked any SBS systems and this is my rule of thumb. I’ve seen some 5-person businesses that stressed a 4GB 2-cpu Xeon SBS 2003 system and I’ve seen 40 people lightly load a 1 cpu, 2GB RAM system. Sizing is not a science and you should always put in more than you need as it is easier for something to be sat idle than to be “in need”.

Finally, on the sizing, consider your own system. Put in SBS 2008 for yourself and can use yourself as a reference story to your customers about anything from sizing to how you use it and how it makes a difference to your business.

If you think the system that is running this blog is a 32-bit Windows Server 2008 system with 2GB of RAM. It serves about 150,000 hits a day (excluding all the pictures that are on some pages), has two monitoring databases and one reporting engine. The databases are around 30GB in total. It uses approximately 5% of the 2 cores from a quad core processor system and that system is running Hyper-V. The other VMs are running a HomeServer and my SBS 2008 system. My SBS 2008 system has 4GB or memory for 1 user and is using 2.9GBs. The processor can be a bit spikey, but is often around the 5%, 45 or 80% range, which is why you need more memory, but it is doing things in the background, like mail etc.

The Hyper-V load on my quad core system:

I hope that has given you a bit more confidence and enables you to move your sales forward :-). This is one that I’d love to hear your opinion on too!

ttfn

David

Technorati Tags: SBS 2008, Hyper-V, Sizing, Performance

Two more SQL 2005 to SQL 2008 issues fixed - Provider=SQLNCLI – Provider cannot be found error and Property Owner is not available for database

David Overton — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 08:24:00 GMT

So these are really quick snippets. I hit an error where my Gateway monitoring software could not connect to the database. All the errors were along the lines of “Provider cannot be found” and when I looked in the Connection String it stated “Provider=SQLNCLI” which is the SQL Native Client connector software.

The fix that worked for me was very simple, to change the “Provider=SQLNCLI …..” to “Provider=SQLNCLI10 …..”.

The second issue was nothing that came about from the SQL 2005 to SQL 2008 conversion, but became an issue when I could not see the properties for the database. The error I would see was that “Property Owner is not available for database”. The fix can be found here - http://blog.dampee.be/post/2008/06/22/MSSQL-2005-error-message-quot3bProperty-Owner-is-not-available-for-Database-databaseNamequot3b.aspx.

ttfn

David

Technorati Tags: Microsoft, SQL Server, SQL Server 2008, Tips

SQL 2005 to SQL 2008 forklift upgrade resulted in 50% cpu utilisation (& resolution) – aka SBS 2003 to SBS 2008 SQL Application Move

David Overton — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 09:26:00 GMT

I’ve recently moved the database behind DavidOverton.com (also uksbsguy.com) from a Windows Server 2003 system with SQL 2005 to Windows Server 2008 with SQL 2008. This would be the same process if you were potentially performing a migration from SBS 2003 with SQL 2005 to SBS 2008 Premium with SQL 2008 (or SQL 2005, but the performance issue only happens with SQL 2008). The process was amazingly simple:

Stop the database on the Windows 2003 system
Copy the datafiles, errorlogs, logs etc to the new system
Install SQL 2008 on the new system, creating an instance by the same name
Modify the registry to point to my new files (details here)
Start SQL 2008

Obviously I had to do some IIS stuff (create a new site) and install and redirect my logging software (WhosOn), but overall it went very well.

Or so I thought until I noticed that my normally nominal CPU utilisation had gone bananas. One of the SQL 2008 new and improved features is the Server Activity History which makes it very easy to pinpoint problems, along with the Activity Monitor. To get the monitor you need to configure the SQL Data Collector (run it twice, once to configure the data warehouse and once to configure the collection process itself). Then right click on the data collection and chose one of the reports.

Notice the Activity History above shows 50% cpu utilisation when less than 50 people are hitting the website. This should be a snooze for the system. I ended up disconnection the web site, my monitoring software and everything else and running a trace with every box ticked. This gave me a trace output like this:

I got around 200,000 lines like this when every process on the system that could access the system was stopped. Wow! A quick search of the internet talked about corrupt msdb files and then it hit me. I had lifted all the database files from my SQL 2005 system, including the MSDB files to the SQL 2008 system. A quick checked showed that the SQL 2008 files were still intact and that SQL Server itself was referencing my SQL 2005 files.

By entering the two commands below I changed back to the default SQL 2008 datafiles and after I restarted SQL, my cpu was back where it should be. Note that the directory may be different for you and may well contain and instance name, which is used to replace <instance> in the commands.

alter database msdb modify file (NAME= MSDBData, FILENAME=’C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL10.<instance>\MSSQL\datamsdb.mdf’);

alter database msdb modify file (NAME= MSDBLog, FILENAME=’C:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL10.<instance>\MSSQL\data_log.mdf’);

So, what impact did it have?

I mentioned earlier the Activity monitor which gives you a realtime status of the system, but did not show the msdb issues’ root cause. A great tool that looks like resource monitor:

ttfn

David

Technorati Tags: SQL Server 2008, SQL, Microsoft SQL Server, Microsoft, Tips, Performance

How to get an existing disk to be available inside Hyper-V, how to install RAID Management tools and how to shrink a non-Dynamic VHD

David Overton — Sun, 07 Dec 2008 22:14:58 GMT

Once I had built my Hyper-V Server I still had a few to resolve. I thought I had better document the solutions I found to my 3 disk related problems from this entry.

So the 3 issues covered are:

How to get an existing disk to be available inside Hyper-V
How to install RAID Management tools
How to shrink a non-Dynamic VHD

How to get an existing disk to be available inside Hyper-V (called a pass-through disk)

Just to give you some background, I was moving a non-VM OS inside a Hyper-V system. I had created the VM, but I could not get it to just “boot” from the old boot disk – the disk was not showing. I’d read that this type of disk was a pass-through (or pass-thru) disk, but I could not find out how to configure it easily. The solution turned out to be very simple. Run DISKPART on the Hyper-V server, identify the disk and mark it offline. It would then appear in the list of disks that could be installed. What is more, if I ran out of disks I could install a SCSI controller and continue to add disks there too.

So, the commands for DiskPart:

List Disk
Select disk n – pick the disk you want, replace n with the disk number from the List Disk output
Offline Disk

You then need to add the disk inside Hyper-V -

How to install RAID Management tools

I don’t have pictures for this, but you should get the idea. I put in the CD for the RAID software and I found some EXE and MSI files (DIR /s /a *.exe *.msi from a command prompt will do that). I ran these (using common sense to work out which ones to try first) until the drivers were installed and also the raid configuration software. I then looked in the C:\Program Files and C:\Program Files (x86) folders for exe’s, cpl and jar files (DIR /s /a *.exe *.cpl *.jar). The exe’s can be services or tools to run, the cpl are control panel files and the jar files are Java modules. It turns out that the configuration tools are Java based on my e-sata card.

How to shrink a non-Dynamic VHD

Finally I had my disks and I created some large VHD disk, but now I wanted to change the size of the 500GB disk to a 100GB disk. It was not empty, but had about 50GB of data on it and I had created a Fixed sized disk to make things run smoother. Easy I thought, boot up Windows Server 2008 or Vista setup routines, select repair, get to a command prompt, start DISKPART again and shrink the volumes in there. Alas that did work, but it did not help as the fixed disks were still fixed and large. I then found a great VHD shrinking tool - http://vmtoolkit.com/files/folders/converters/entry87.aspx, however it required .Net, which is NOT on Hyper-V.

The solution would have been to copy the 500GB file across the network or onto a USB drive, adjust it and put it back again. The solution turned out to convert the disk type to Dynamic, which produced a much smaller VHD file that I could then move around. This is done by choosing Edit Disk within Hyper-V Manager.

ttfn

David

Technorati Tags: Microsoft, Tips, Hyper-V, Microsoft Hyper-V Server, Virtualisation, Windows Server 2008

How to change where SQL Server looks for it’s master datafiles (master.mdf)

David Overton — Sun, 07 Dec 2008 20:17:24 GMT

I’ve found myself moving datafiles around or backing up to new locations before enough that I need to change SQL to point to the new locations before it will start for me to do further work. The process to get it up and running is to find the SQL instance in the registry and change 3 values.

The magical location is: “HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL10.<instance>\MSSQLServer\Parameters”

Under here you will file 3 arguments. Notice the double backslashes “\\” which is required for each single backslash you want. For example, for my site, I have changed them from the default instance pointers to:

"SQLArg0"="-dD:\\databases\\Community Server\\master.mdf"
"SQLArg1"="-eD:\\databases\\Community Server\\ERRORLOG"
"SQLArg2"="-lD:\\database_logs\\Community Server\\mastlog.ldf"

Change these to the location of your datafiles. The “-d” is for the master database datafile, “–e” for the Error Log and finally “-l” for the log for the master database.

ttfn

David

Technorati Tags: SQL 2008, SQL, Microsoft, Microsoft SQL Server, Tips

Invalid certificate issued to localhost.localdomain when remotely access SBS 2008 from a Windows PC

David Overton — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 02:03:00 GMT

This is another question I was recently asked. One particular user noticed that the certificate they saw when accessing their server from the internet did not match that when accessing from the LAN. The certificate looked something like this:

This was a little strange as when the system was accessed from the intranet, all things appeared fine. The culprit for them was the SBS 2003 self signed certificate on the same machine. By removing the certificate and then installing the correct new one things got better.

To remove the old certificate, start MMC.exe and accept the UAC prompt. Now press Ctrl+M to add a new snap-in and select Certificates and when asked, add for the user account .

The do the same again, but select Certificates and Computer Account and hit OK to accept the current computer. Now expand out Personal Certificates and remove any SBS 2003 self signed certificates.

To load the new certificates open a browser inside your SBS 2008 network and point to http://companyweb/Lists/Announcements/DispForm.aspx?ID=3 which should give you instructions and the URL.

I hope that makes sense.

ttfn

David

Technorati Tags: localhost.localdomain, SBS 2008, Certificates, Tips

How to resolve errors like "Cannot connect to the RPC service, make sure your RPC service is running" with Hyper-V Server and Hyper-V Manager

David Overton — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 01:04:21 GMT

In my last post on installing Hyper-V for my home setup I said I had a number of issues. One was that the Hyper-V Manager kept on showing the error "Cannot connect to the RPC service, make sure your RPC service is running". This turned out to be several issues.

To start with my Hyper-V box is in a workgroup, so security is manually configured. Then there is the connection ID security - by hand and finally there is the client setup too. I spent a long time with John Howard's blog which got me the following commands for the Hyper-V server:

netsh advfirewall set currentprofile settings remotemanagement enable

netsh advfirewall firewall set rule group="Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI)" new enable=yes

netsh advfirewall firewall set rule name="Remote Administration (RPC-EPMAP)" new enable=yes profile=domain

netsh advfirewall firewall set rule name="Remote Administration (NP-In)" new enable=yes profile=domain

netsh advfirewall firewall set rule name="Remote Administration (RPC)" new enable=yes profile=domain

netsh advfirewall firewall set rule name="remote desktop (tcp-in)" new enable=Yes profile=domain

net localgroup “Distributed COM Users” /add David

There was then a few things to do on the client PC where it would not connect. Again the postings at http://blogs.technet.com/jhoward/archive/2008/03/28/part-2-hyper-v-remote-management-you-do-not-have-the-requested-permission-to-complete-this-task-contact-the-administrator-of-the-authorization-policy-for-the-computer-computername.aspx helped me solve the problems.

I've put all this here as a reference really, because John has been a busy boy and now has a tool that does this for you called HVRemote.

So, learn from my pain and use John's tool. You should be able to add a user and set the permissions very quickly.

One thing I will say is that I use OneCare on my OC client and I had to add some rules in the OneCare firewall:

- Port 135 for RPC

- \windows\System32\wbem\unsecapp.exe

- \program files\hyper-v\vmconnect.exe

- Possibly (can't remember) - \windows\system32\WUDPhost.exe

I hope that helps. You should see a screen like this once it is installed, with no error message where my VM's are showing:

thanks

David

Technorati Tags: Hyper-V, Microsoft Hyper-V Server, Virtualisation, Virtualization, OneCare, Hyper-V Manager

Connect Manager for VPNs into SBS 2008 …er, not really, with CMAK information too

David Overton — Wed, 03 Dec 2008 01:00:00 GMT

[updated with “roll your own” information and how to make a 32-bit version of the exe file]

I love it when people challenge me to solve a question and today’s prize goes to Simon (thank-you for the questions Simon) who asked me where Connection Manager was on SBS 2008? You remember Connection Manager right, to auto configure the VPNs…

Well, the instructions in SBS 2008 are a little less simple. Rather than downloading a pre-configured tool you now need to roll your own. The reasoning, which is quite sound, is that you can access almost everything via the Remote Web Workplace, but for some things, you want a VPN and the way to get it can be found here - http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc513974.aspx

If you want to create a Connection Manager Install for SBS 2008 you need to add the CMAK to the SBS 2008 install. Go to Server Manager and click to add a feature.

Install the CMAK by pressing Next. To start the kit, go to the Start Menu, Administrator Tools and then select Connection Manager Administration Kit. Click next until you need to select the target OS.

Select to create a new profile and provide the name and filename (8 characters max)

Provide the domain or realm name and include the “separator” character – eg “mydomain\” without the quotes.

Select no profiles to merge and press Next

Embed the VPN Connection name (eg remote.myserver.com as that is what the SSL certificate will say) into the file and then accept the VPN entry

Remove the automatically update phonebook options and leave blank

Accept the default entries for VPN, Routing tables, IE Proxy, Custom Actions

Now accept the default graphics or add your own logo

Accept the default information on help files, support information, User EULA screen, additional files

Finally accept the answer and build the file:

You can now chose to put the EXE file somewhere your users can access and then they can download it.

One problem solved, more to come.

IF YOU ARE DEPLOYING TO A 32-BIT WINDOWS SYSTEM, YOU WILL NEED TO DO THIS:

Open an elevated command prompt (find in menu, right click and select run as administrator)
enter the command "CD \Program Files\CMAK\Profiles" (without quotes)
If this is a Vista build "CD Vista" otherwise "CD Downlevel"
Then move to the profile directory - "CD <profile name" - if unsure, type "dir" first
Find the .SED file - "Dir *.sed"
Type "\windows\syswow64\iexpress /N<SED File>.SED"
The built .exe file will work on 32-bit systems

ttfn

David

Technorati Tags: SBS 2008, VPN, Connection Manager, Microsoft, Tips, Partners, SBSC, Community