Can’t upgrade Windows 2008 R2 Dc to Windows 8 Server DC

If You want to upgrade Your Domain Controller from Windows server 2008 R2 to Windows 8 server on a single machine this is not possible

I was trying to upgrade my Domain Controller for test from Windows server 2008 R2 to Windows 8 server using full installation but I receive error

This is not compatibility issue, this is not supported.

In next few days I will try to add Windows 8 server as additional domain controller, and then move FSMO roles to Windows 8 DC.

I will describe all of this on my blog

Currently I’m pretty confused with this. Why Microsoft is not supported old fashion way of upgrade? Because of DP version or something else is not compatible?

How to delete EISA recovery partition from Windows

 

I had problem with deleting EISA partition on several old disks from IBM/LENOVO computers. Usually solutions was to contact manufacturer for some tools but I found this solution on www.mydigitallife.info

Solution is for Windows Vista but it also works on Windows XP.

Here is quotation of solution:

Here’s the trick to delete and remove the EISA recovery or diagnostic partition in Vista. Before proceeding with the deletion action, make sure that at least a set of Recovery Disc Media has been created. Else, you won’t be able to restore your computer to working and factory default condition when any problem on PC requires reinstallation.

1. Open a command prompt as administrator.  (On Windows XP just open Command Prompt)
2. Run Diskpart application by typing Diskpart in the command prompt.
3. In the “Diskpart” prompt, enter rescan command and press Enter key to re-scan all partitions, volumes and drives available.
4. Then type in list disk and press Enter key to show all hard disk drive available.
5. Select the disk that contains the partition you want to remove. Normally, with just 1 hard disk, it will be disk 0. So the command will be:

   select disk 0

   Finish by Enter key.

6. Type list partition and press Enter key to show all available and created partition in the disk selected.
7. Select the partition that wanted to be deleted by using the following command, followed by Enter key:

   select partition x

   where x is the number of the EISA based recovery partition to be removed and unlocked its space. Be careful with the number of this partition, as wrong number may get data wipes off.

8. Finally, type in delete partition override and press Enter key.

Once the partition has been deleted, exit from Diskpart, and now users can use the much familiar and much easier Disk Management tool in Windows (diskmgmt.msc) to manipulate the freed unallocated partition. Users can create a new volume (partition) with this space, or simply merge it to existing partition by extending the size of the existing partition.

 

And here is picture of diskpart

SCCM Client won’t show device is server console

Usually when You install SCCM 2012 client after few minutes device appear in console view. But what if device wont show after couple restarts? (couple days)

I don’t know why this error occurred but, this is steps for resolving problem.

At first, you must check connectivity to SCCM 2012 server. If connectivity is ok and you can reach server by its name do this.go to tab SITE

go to tab SITE

Write number of assigned site and press Find Site

You will receive notification that Configuration Manager has successfully find site to manage this client

Check General tab again now it looks like this

Notify that you still don’t have “Client certificate” and “Connection Type”

But after few minutes everything is fine

Your client is now visible in your SCCM console and you can manage it.

Installing Hyper-V 2008 R2 SP1 on IBM X346 with ADAPTEC SCSI u320 controller

It could be pretty tricky to install Hyper-V 2008 R2 SP1 on IBM x346 with Adaptec controller. If didn’t want to throw away my old server so I decided to install Hyper-V on it to create testing environment.

I do this with colleague of mine, and we faced with problem. Hyper-V wont install on IBM x346. Why? Server asked for driver….

I think that driver is so old that Hyper-V don’t have it in its drivers database, and You can’t install it using ServerGuide CD.

What were we do.

After spending hours trying to install Hyper-V on IBM x346 with Adaptec u320 SCSI controller, finally we have solution.

My colleague Luka Gros spend finds x64 driver for Adaptec SCSI controller. He found it on this link.

After downloading, you must extract this driver and burn it on CD

Steps what we are do after that is:

booting from Hyper-V 2008 R2 SP1 and starting installation

when asked for driver change CD to one with driver and click Browse

find driver on CD and click Next

change CD to installation CD again and finish your installation

Hyper-V is installed and running fine now

P.S.

If You need to manipulate with physical HDD on your Hyper-V, MMC console will return error “RPC server unavailable”.

To avoid this run this command with elevated privileges:

netsh advfirewall firewall set rule group=”Remote Volume Management” new enable=yes

Thanks to Luka Gros

Managed Service Accounts in Active Directory

We all heard that one of many features in Windows server 2008 R2 is Managed Service Account.

Prerequisites for that is domain functionality raised to Windows Server 2008 R2

Most common mistake is that you will create managed service account using Active Directory Users And Computers snap-in. You will not.

Either if you are created account in Managed Service Accounts container it is still user account. To make it work you must give user rights “logon as a service” and “logon as a bat job”.

To create Managed Service Account you must use Power Shell. Creating service accounts is not so complicated. You can create it using simple script

New-ADServiceAccount –name (desired name of account).

Of course before you must “tell” powershell to use Active Directory module. Syntax for this is:

Import-module ActiveDirectory

And before that you must have installed feature:

Active Directory module for Power Shell

I’ve described this reversed with reason.

Most common is that you first load module to Power Shell and then start wit Your managed service accounts.

When you are created service account you need to install it on server where You want to use it. Syntax is:

install-ADServiceAccount –identity “(name of service account)”

To install account you must “run as administrator” Power Shell or you will receive error.

REMEMBER: You must have ONE managed service account per server. This is the big difference between managed service account and former virtual account.

Now you are ready to use managed service account with specific services

 

 

For more on this topic you can contact this link

Too much switch could kill you

If You want to implement Dot.NET framework 4.0 using SCCM 2012 you have whole workaround on MSDN site. But something can go wrong. Where is catch?

Here we go.

First of all you must create package in SCCM 2012. When you creating package for deployment, you will be prompted to create a program. During program creation You are asked for command line . Of course You want to install Dot.NET framework without user interference. So switches is needed.

When I Google it i find this syntax on MSDN site:

dotNetFx40_Full_x86_x64.exe /q /norestart /ChainingPackage ADMINDEPLOYMENT

But installation ended up with error. Trying to troubleshoot is not giving any result.

So I just change syntax to:

dotNetFx40_Full_x86_x64.exe /q

and after that deployment ended successfully.

My conclusion is: Use just needed switches, Try not to COPY/PASTE from other solutions

Querying Computers in Active Directory

If you need to do some reports in active directory best tool for use is DSQUERY which is part of Remote Server Administrative Tools

First common query is how to list all computers spreaded in different Ous

And here it is:

dsquery computer

As dsquery shows first 100 results option for showing more is:

dsquery computer –limit 1000

This will show first 1000 computers in your active directory. If You have more than 1000 computers just change number.

If You need this for some reports You can put results in a text file and later on import it to excel

Syntax for this is:

dsquery computer –limit 1000 >computers.txt

If You need to know which computer is running which OS syntax will be:

dsquery * domainroot -filter "(&(objectCategory=computer)(operatingSystem=Windows XP*))"

OR

dsquery * domainroot -filter "(&(objectCategory=computer)(operatingSystem=Windows Server*))"

For those who wants to know what service pack is on those OS:

dsquery * -scope subtree -attr "cn" "operatingSystem" "operatingSystemServicePack"  -filter "(&(objectclass=computer)(objectcategory=computer)(operatingSystem=Windows XP*))" -limit 100000

Last two syntax is announced on sheenaustin.com