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Archive for SBS – Page 9

Install Exchange 2010 SP2 Update Rollup 4-v2

by KW · Comments (0)
Oct 24 2012

Some things never make sense to me, and one of them is the way one finds out the build number of Exchange that is installed on a server – the method is different depending on which version is installed!

First, here is the link to a list of all the build numbers for the various versions of Exchange:

Exchange Server and Update Rollups Build Numbers

I’m running SBS 2011 Standard in my office, with Exchange 2010 SP2, and I’m preparing to install Update Rollup 4-v2 for Exchange 2010 SP2. I will presume that you have a recent backup of your server!

Step 1: Let’s find out what version of Exchange 2010 I am running.

You do this by opening up the Exchange Management Shell, and then entering this command:

GCM exsetup |%{$_.Fileversioninfo}

Here’s the result on my server:

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Step 2: Install UR4-v2 from the SBS/WSUS console

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Step 3: Reboot your server and confirm version of Exchange

Surprisingly, the UR4-v2 did not require a reboot of the server, but I certainly would suggest doing so!

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Finally, open up Services (services.msc) and do a quick check and verify that all the Exchange-related services that have a startup type-Automatic are indeed running.

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Categories : Exchange, SBS
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Use psconfig to to resolve SharePoint warnings in SBS 2011 BPA

by KW · Comments (0)
Oct 23 2012

After installing a SharePoint update to your SBS 2011 server, you may see one (or both) of the following warnings the next time you run the SBS Best Practices Analyzer (BPA) utility:

Use psconfig.exe to upgrade one or more SharePoint databases (Source: 348)
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Use psconfig.exe to upgrade SharePoint (Source: 349)
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  To resolve these warnings, it will be necessary for you to manually run the psconfig command, as it is not run automatically after an update has been applied.

  1. Open an Administrative command prompt
  2. Change directory to C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Web Server Extensions\14\BIN
  3. Run PSConfig.exe -cmd upgrade -inplace b2b -force -cmd applicationcontent -install -cmd installfeatures

Please note: it may take some time for the psconfig command to complete. And, in some cases, if you get any errors, it is recommended to run the above psconfig command again.

       image   image

After this, please check that your SharePoint sites are working properly, and rerun BPA to confirm that the warning messages have been cleared.

For more information on this, please check out the following two posts from the Official blog for Windows Server Essentials and Small Business Server support:

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Categories : SBS, Sharepoint, WSUS
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Microsoft to change CAL Pricing

by KW · Comments (0)
Oct 17 2012

Client Access Licenses (CALs) are usually purchased as User CALs or Device CALs. Up until now, the pricing for these have been the same. But on December 1, 2012 Microsoft will be increasing the price of User CALs by 15%. And it makes sense, I suppose.

 

Device CALs are primarily useful, in my view, for shift work scenarios, where multiple people will use the same computer. E.g. John uses it from 6a-3pm, Sally uses it from 3pm-11pm, and Dave uses it from 11pm-6am. In these environment, one device CAL is the better (price) choice.

User CALs allow the same user to connect to a server from multiple workstations/devices. The price increase is in response to the “increasing value of user based licensing over the single device licensing model”.

For more information, check out:
http://www.softcat.com/news/industry-news/microsoft-client-access-licensing-rules-to-change

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Categories : Exchange, SBS, Servers
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SBS 2008 Issues with Latest Updates

by KW · Comments (0)
Oct 12 2012

There have been several reports about recent updates taking an extremely long time (4-6 hours) to completely install on SBS 2008 servers. For example, some report that after rebooting the server and it starts to apply updates, it may sit at 0% for more than an hour.

The reaction is to think that something is wrong and to force a reboot.

These issues are being investigated, but the best advice is that if you have already started updating your server, just let it run and do not force a reboot. And expect that it may be down for several hours.

If you have not yet started applying updates, my typical procedure is as follows:

Reboot the server BEFORE installing any updates

Install updates in groups – all security patches first, then .Net patches, then each rollup or service pack individually

After the updates have been applied, some things may still not work, such as some services not starting or Companyweb not available. In these cases, first try rebooting the server again, and checking things out. for companyweb, please remember that you generally need to manually run the psconfig command after installing SharePoint updates.

finally, it is always advisable to make sure you have a full, validated backup of your server before installing any patches, rollups or service packs,

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Categories : Exchange, SBS, WSUS
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Creating a Shared Email Alias in Office 365

by KW · Comments (0)
Oct 11 2012

Most businesses, large or small, use alias emails, such at sales@contoso.com or support@contoso.com. If some cases, the alias is only managed by a single person (e.g. sally@contoso.com).

But what if you want to assign the alias email address to a group of users, that is, a distribution group?

The simple answer is ‘Yes, it can be done’. However, there is no wizard to do this from the Office 365 Admin portal page. So, you will be required to define the shared mailbox using PowerShell commands.

There are three basic steps required:

  1. Create a distribution group, and assign users
  2. Create a shared mailbox using PowerShell commands
  3. Have each user add the shared mailbox to their Outlook 2010/OWA app

Rather than describing each of these steps, Microsoft provides a very clear, step by step, set of instructional videos for each of these steps:

Create a public email alias in Office 365

E-mail messages

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Categories : Exchange, Office 365, SBS, Windows
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Windows Server 2012 Essentials RTM and Trial!

by KW · Comments (0)
Oct 09 2012

Today Windows Server 2012 Essentials has been released to manufacturing (RTM).

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A trial copy of Windows Server 2012 Essentials is immediately available for download:
http://blogs.technet.com/b/sbs/archive/2012/10/09/windows-server-2012-essentials-released-to-manufacturing-available-for-evaluation-today.aspx

Windows Server 2012 Essentials will be available for purchase on November 1, 2012.

It was just a few months ago (July) that the beta version of this product was announced. Then just a month ago we had the announcement of the Release Candidate (RC) version of 2012 Essentials.

The news that caught everyone’s attention (both good and bad) was that the name “Small Business Server” (SBS) would not be used by Microsoft as it moved forward with the 2012 era of Microsoft servers.

However, that does not mean that Windows Server 2012 Essentials isn’t jammed packed with features for the small or medium sized business. Here are just a few of those features:

  • Supports a maximum of 25 user (50 devices) with client CALS built in!
  • Enhanced Remote Web Access features, extending to Windows 8 clients
  • Wizards to setup, configure and manage Office 365 from the server
  • Support for Storage Spaces, allowing for  creation of resilient storage using a mix of different size disk drives
  • Supports backing up of workstations (maximum of 25) on a daily scheduled basis)
  • New health monitoring reports
  • Supports implementation as a Hyper-V guest
  • Supports third party add-ins
  • Supports Mac OS X clients (version 10.5 and up)

So, what’s changed? I’ll list what I consider are three two of the more important changes:

  • Windows Vista and XP workstations will not be supported
  • Exchange and Sharepoint have been removed from the product, but can be purchased and installed as separate packages
  • No Premium Add-On (PAO) packages, so no specific SQL package, although SQL can be purchased and installed as a separate package
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Categories : Hyper-V, SBS, Servers, SMB
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How to install KernelPro USB-over-Ethernet for Hyper-V SBS 2011

by KW · Comments (0)
Oct 09 2012

Hyper-V is a great environment, for both testing and production purposes. I run my SBS 2011 production server as a  virtual (guest) to my windows 2008 R2 Hyper-V physical environment.

I may be wrong, but it sure seems as if SBS 2011 starts up faster virtually rather than if it was installed normally, on a physic platform.

One often-asked question with Hyper-V and SBS is “how do I access a USB external drive to run my daily SBS backups?”

The solution comes from KernelPro and their USB over Ethernet solution. This allows you to either connect to a USB drive on a different computer in the network, or in the case of Hyper-V, allows a guest partition to access the USB drive on the parent partition. But don’t be confused by the name “USB over Ethernet’ – this is exactly what you want. The program has both a Server (Full) and a Client module program that will be used.

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From the Parent partition:

  • Connect the removable USB drive (to be used for your SBS backup)
  • Right click Computer, then click Manage –> Storage –> Disk Management, reformat the drive (if necessary), and then select to take the drive Offline
  • Download and install the full (server) version of the KernelPro ‘USB over Ethernet’
  • Start up the Kernel Pro utility and it should display all your USB devices (drives, keyboards, mice, etc.)

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From the Guest partition:

  • Download and install the client version of KernelPro ‘USB over Ethernet’
  • Start up the utility, click on the Add new USB server icon, and enter the LAN IP address of your Hyper-V server
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  • Then click on your USB drive to use, and under Properties, set the option to ‘connect automatically when it is available on the server’
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  • KernelPro will use a random port number, which you may need to open in the client firewall configuration
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Configure and schedule your SBS Backup, and you are all done!

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Categories : Hyper-V, SBS, Servers
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Joining MultiPoint Server to SBS 2011

by KW · Comments (0)
Oct 08 2012

One of the hidden gems of the Microsoft Server family is MultiPoint.

Think of it as a Term Server with wizards and a console dashboard (similar to SBS or WHS) that makes implementation and management of the server a breeze. But it’s so much more. It’s perfect for classroom scenarios, or for a training room, or as a solution in a business environment.

So, the question is: how does one join a MultiPoint server to an SBS 2011 domain?

Fortunately, Marina Roos (SBS MVP ) has written an excellent set of instructions (click here) with screenshots on exactly what to do .

Her article addresses three primary steps:

  • Add a registry key on SBS 2011
  • Create the RDP file for users
  • Create a GPO that will push the RDP file to the user’s desktop

Be sure to check out Windows MultiPoint Server 2011 on Microsoft’s website.

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Categories : Multipoint, SBS, Servers
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Disable SBS Console from Starting Up Automatically

by KW · Comments (0)
Oct 06 2012

I keep running into SBS 2008 and SBS 2011 installations and being asked how to disable the SBS console from starting up automatically when logging into the server. It’s quite simple, but it’s not under Start –> All Programs –> Startup, as you would expect.

  1. Go to Start –> Administrative Tools –> Task Scheduler
  2. In the left frame, drill down Task Scheduler Library –> Microsoft –> Windows –> Windows Small Business Server 2008 (or 2011)
  3. In the middle frame, you will find the Console task. Click on it to select it.
  4. In the right hand frame, click Disable

There you go — all done!

P.S. If you are having issues where the SBS 2008 Console is crashing or taking a long time to display alerts and statuses, check out this blog post from the Official Windows Small Business Server blog web site.

SBS 2008 Screenshots:

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SBS 2011 Screenshot:

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Categories : SBS
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SBS 2011 No DNS Name Server Records

by KW · Comments (0)
Oct 04 2012

If you run the SBS 2011 Best Practices Analyzer (BPA), you may see the following warning:

No DNS name server records.
Source: 74
Issue: There are no DNS name server (NS) resource records for the delegated _msdcs forward lookup zone.

Well, that’s nice. But you may ask yourself: What does this mean? Why did it happen? and Do I need to fix it?

The short answer is that this often occurs as a result of doing a migration to SBS 2011. If your SBS 2011 server is a standalone server (not in a multi DC environment), then it’s not a big concern. You could probably just click on “Exclude this Result” to hide/ignore the warning from appearing when you run future BPA reports.

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But if you’re like me, you want to resolve the issue, if possible, instead of just ignoring it.

The warning is caused by the fact that BPA is looking for a _msdcs sub zone under your domain.local zone in DNS. Here’s an example where it is missing:

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An excellent tutorial on resolving this issue in detail is available on the Official Windows Server Essentials and Small Business Server Blog site. It also covers the situation where the _msdcs.domain.local zone is missing.

In my case, I already have a separate _msdcs.domain.local zone. So all that  I need to do is to manually create the _msdcs zone and restart the Netlogon service. So, let’s get to work:

  • Right click on your domain.local zone and select New Delegation, then click Next
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  • Type in _msdcs for the delegated domain name, and click Next
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  • Click Add, and then enter either the FQDN of your server (sbs1.kwsupport.local in my case) and click Resolve, or you can just enter your server’s IP address.
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  • In either case, once you have created the new zone, and finished, you will see the new _msdcs zone listed
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  • Finally, open up Services.msc and click to restart the Netlogon service, and you’re done.
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Rerun the BPA and you will see that this warning message no longer appears!

Hope this helps you!

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Categories : SBS, Servers
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