Archive for December, 2009

Training – Updating Your Technology Knowledge of Microsoft Windows XP to Windows 7

 

Activity description: 44CO135 – Updating Your Technology Knowledge of Microsoft Windows XP to Windows 7 (M6291)

Summary:

This two-day instructor-led course provides students with the knowledge and skills to work with the new technologies in Windows Vista and Windows 7. This course is intended for individuals who already have experience with Windows XP to upgrade their skills to Windows 7.

Objectives:

After completing this course, students will be able to:

•Manage the desktop settings that personalize the computing experience.
•Describe how Windows 7 Beta Search enhancements improve productivity.
•Implement Search Federation to search remote data sources within the enterprise infrastructure.
•Describe the new Group Policy Preferences and Administrative Templates that are available to IT professionals who manage Group Policy Objects.
•Describe how IT professionals use the Group Policy Management Console to create scripts that manage Group Policy Objects.
•Identify and use the improvements made to the latest version of PowerShell.
•Describe how DirectAccess enables IT professionals to remotely manage and update user PCs.
•Describe the platform and network requirements necessary to implement DirectAccess.
•Describe the VPN reconnection features and the platform and network requirements.
•Illustrate how to use Group Policy to prevent specific types of files from being synchronized to the server.
•Describe how BranchCache improves user productivity in branch offices by caching content from remote file and Web servers in branch locations.
•Administer new User Account Control security settings to improve the end-user computing experience.
•Describe how AppLocker enables IT Professionals to specify the programs that are allowed to run on user desktops.
•Describe how Windows 7 Beta improves upon the firewall policy by allowing IT professionals to identify multiple active firewall profiles.
•Describe new Windows 7 Beta features as they relate to Windows Deployment Services and virtualization.
•Explain how the Problem Steps Recorder can be used to reproduce and record experiences with an application failure.
•Summarize key components of the Windows Troubleshooting Platform and run the troubleshooting wizard from the Start menu for a specific problem.
•Identify how unified tracing provides IT professionals with a single tool for troubleshooting issues in the Windows 7 Beta networking stack.
•Describe how Windows Management Instrumentation provides IT professionals with programmatic access to reliability data, enabling them to check stability status and review recent events remotely.
•Describe how to use the Device Manager and Devices and Printers to manage devices

Top tips & resources picked up during the course…

- Windows 7 is the last O/S from Microsoft available in a 32-bit sku, the reason still available on x86/32-bit is due to global economic conditions, to extend the life of older hardware (and not limiting the deployment of 7).

- Group Policy Preferences brought in with Server 2008 and allows user changes after the policy has been deployed.
Group Policy Audit Tool – auditpol.exe
AD DS Auditing Step-by-Step Guide – http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc731607(WS.10).aspx

- Deployment accelerators at www.microsoft.com/springboard (‘Quickly access resources designed to ease the deployment and management of your Windows client infrastructure’), also check Stephen Rose at http://blogs.technet.com/stephenrose/

- DirectAccess & SBS… wait for SBS 2008 R2

- Windows 7 & Windows Server 2008 R2 is DoD Suite B compliant
Use BitLocker and BitLocker to go on all your mobile devices

- Google hacking… Andy showed us the interesting stuff that can be done with Google Hacking e.g. goto www.google.com and type in the search bar site:mil filetype:pdf “top secret”
also the use of the ‘similar’ button to get around site logon

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Training – Updating Your Windows Server 2008 Technology Specialist Skills to R2

This week I have another couple of days out of the office (or our clients office) for yet more Microsoft Partner training - 2 days of updating your Technology Specialist skills Windows Server 2008 R2.

Updating Your Windows Server 2008 Technology Specialist Skills to R2

This course is so hot off the press that the materials were only delivered last Thursday… e.g. buggy labs – fun to fix! ;-) , no course DVD cut as yet, and a speaker that doesn’t know the materials, and fortunately doesn’t need too… as it’s being delivered by  Andy Mallone (www.quality-training.co.uk/blog/ & http://www.divedeeperevents.com/)

Andy is an MVP in Windows Server, has been an MCT for 15 years (had a 4-digit MCP id), is a speaker at various events inc. just back from TechEd delivering , and will be in Redmond in 2 months time as an external member of the Windows 8 product team… likely to be the first x64 only client OS from Microsoft.

Global Knowledge use the strap line ‘Experts teaching Experts’ – they have nailed it on this one. :-)

Anyway, on to the course (Top tips as usual at the end..):

Activity name: 44CO149 – Updating Your Windows Server 2008 Technology Specialist Skills to R2

Facility: Global Knowledge, London, 83 Baker Street, W1U 6AG

Who: Andy Mallone (www.quality-training.co.uk/blog/)
MVP Windows Server, MCT for 15 years, speaker at various events inc. just back from TechEd, and will be in Redmond in 2 months time as an external member of the Windows 8 product team!

Andy Malone has a deep and broad understanding so far beyond the subject (and that your average instructor) that allowed him to easily fill in the gaps in the somewhat lacking and already outdated course materials.  The result was ‘quality training’ that has made a real difference to our long term understanding and ability to work with Windows 7 and the supporting technologies.

Activity Link (URL): https://training.partner.microsoft.com/learning/app/SYS_Login.aspx?lang=en-gb&RU=https%3A//training.partner.microsoft.com/learning/app/management/LMS_ActDetails.aspx%3FActivityId%3D549434%26UserMode%3D0

Activity description: 44CO149 – Updating Your Windows Server 2008 Technology Specialist Skills to R2

Summary:

This two day intensive course is aimed at fast tracking Windows Server Technical Specialists and IT professionals onto the new technology of Windows Server 2008 R2. This course will also provide enough knowledge and skills for Partners to pass the new WS08R2 exam, due out later this year.

Prerequisites:

Students who attend this 2-day ILT should have the following prerequisite knowledge:
• Possess core Windows Server 2008 Technology Specialist skills.

• Familiarity and experience with batch scripting or another scripting language.

• Experience with Windows deployment technologies and implementation.

• Experience with Windows networking technologies and implementation.

• Experience with Active Directory technologies and implementation.

• Experience with Windows Server 2008 server virtualization technologies and implementation.

• Experience with Windows Server 2008 Web application server technologies and implementation.

Objectives:

Students who attend this 2-day ILT should have the following prerequisite knowledge:
• Possess core Windows Server 2008 Technology Specialist skills.

• Familiarity and experience with batch scripting or another scripting language.

• Experience with Windows deployment technologies and implementation.

• Experience with Windows networking technologies and implementation.

• Experience with Active Directory technologies and implementation.

• Experience with Windows Server 2008 server virtualization technologies and implementation.

• Experience with Windows Server 2008 Web application server technologies and implementation.

Top tips & links picked up during the course…

- Using VHD’s created in disk management for storage whatever you need, whereever you need it, appearing as local storage (disk, volume, etc.) - helping towards the goal of ’elastic enterprise solutions’ & cloud computing

Demo on how to use a VHD to support native OS boot for Windows 7 or Windows Server 2008 R2 – more at Keith Combes excellent blahg at http://blogs.technet.com/keithcombs/archive/2009/05/22/dual-boot-from-vhd-using-windows-7-and-windows-server-2008-r2.aspx

- AD Administration Center… the shape of AD admin to come..?
(an R2 RSAT feature..)

- Technologies you need to embrace to succeed in this industry in the next few years… Virtualisation, Cloud, IPv6

- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MinWin

- http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc730985.aspx

- Encryption types, data at rest (e.g. encrypting on the disk with bitlocker) vs. data in transit (e.g. encryption on the network with IPsec)

- MSAT (Microsoft Security Assessment Toolkit) – is gold!

-

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Hyper-V Server R2 build on ProLiant hardware step-by-step

This is a step-by-step guide to installing Windows Hyper-V Server 2008 R2 on HP ProLiant hardware and is written with reference to my server core commands post back in April 2008 – in fact this should have been written at least 6 months ago so apologies if you’ve only just found this now.

Before you start, go to your vendor’s (in this case HP) support site to check for latest downloads), namely firmware, drivers, and system management software.

For my development box, the cheap and cherful HP ProLiant ML110 (not really a ProLiant as in 3xx series upwards that take SmartStart) this means going to:

http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/SoftwareIndex.jsp?lang=en&cc=us&prodNameId=3577715&prodTypeId=15351&prodSeriesId=3577708&swLang=8&taskId=135&swEnvOID=4064
(at last R2 drivers! :-) , but also suppliemented by Windows Server 2008 x64 drivers at:

http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/SoftwareIndex.jsp?lang=en&cc=us&prodNameId=3577715&prodTypeId=15351&prodSeriesId=3577708&swLang=8&taskId=135&swEnvOID=4024

Matrox Video Driver for HP ProLiant 100-series Servers 5.96.6.6
10 Apr 2008
HP Embedded G5 SATA RAID Controller Driver for Microsoft Windows Server 2008 x64 Editions 1.5.17020.0
11 Aug 2008
HP NC-Series Broadcom 1Gb Driver for Windows Server 2008 x64 Editions 12.2.2.1
10 Nov 2009
HP NC-Series Intel E1E Driver for Windows Server 2008 R2 9.13.12.0
18 Aug 2009

 

  1. H/W config – unplug all but onboard NIC
  2. Boot from Hyper-V Server R2 installation media
  3. Language selection
  4. Regional Settings (Language, Time & Currency, Keyboard)
  5. Accept license terms
  6. Chose Custom installation
  7. Where do you want to install Windows?
    Select Load Driver to load h/w specific raid/disk drivers
    (For ML110 G5 PoC this is ‘G5 SATA RAID Driver 1.5.17’ from a USB key)
  8. Where do you want to install Windows?
    Delete any existing partitions so the target disk is all ‘Unallocated Space’
    Drive options (advance), New, Size is 32768 + 100 (32868 MB)
    (WS2008 R2 will create a partition called ‘System Reserved of 100MB), the remainder will become your target/intended size partition (32GB)
    Create a partition in the unallocated space and format it so the disk drives are contiguous
    Select the 32GB partition and select Next to start installation (Copying Windows files, etc.)
  9. The system will restart during installation (approximately 20mins from copying), and after c.30 mins the console screen will report ‘preparing the system for first time use’ before prompting ‘The user’s password must be changed before logging on the first time.’
  10. Install vendor specific hardware drivers
    1. Video drivers (ML110 G5 – Matrox G200e v.5.96.006)
    2. Network drivers (HP NC-Series Broadcom 1Gb Driver for Windows Server 2008 x64 Editions v12.2.2.1, HP NC-Series Intel E1E Driver for Windows Server 2008 R2)
  11. Hyper-V Configuration (sconfig.exe, formerly hvconfig.exe)
    1. Domain/Workgroup
      Workgroup: leave as WORKGROUP as domain join later
    2. Computer Name: HVNODEnn
      (DO NOT restart, resume Initial Configuration tasks)
    3. Add Local Administrator
      (add any local service accounts, etc.)
    4. Add Features
      Use script (sc-enableSNMP.cmd, sc-enableBackup.cmd) to add:
      SNMP Services (pre-req for most vendor systems management  tools)
      Windows Server Backup Features
    5. Configure Networking:
      Use script (sc-renameNICs.cmd) to rename adapters per:
      Local Area Connection – Onboard
      Local Area Connection – DualPort #1
      Local Area Connection – DualPort #2Assign static addresses per local site IP addressing allocation / standards
      Plug in any additional NICs e.g. iSCSI SAN, additional switches, etc.
    6. Configure Remote Management
      Enable all features (MMC RM, PS)
      (DO NOT restart, resume Initial Configuration tasks – Network Settings)
    7. Remote Desktop
      (E)nable with option 2) Allow clients running any version of Remote Desktop
      (needs review in production)
    8. Windows Update Settings (leave as manual)
    9. Download and install updates
      Search for (A)ll updates, select (A)ll updates
      (DO NOT restart, resume Configuration tasks – domain join)
    10. Change Domain/Workgroup membership
      Join (D)omain – yourdomain.local
      (domain\administrative account)
      RESTART THE COMPUTER
    11. Logon as domain administrator and resume configuration
    12. Complete ‘Configure Remote Management’ (enable SM RM)
    13. Failover Clustering Feature – Enable
    14. Configure Microsoft iSCSI (start iscsicpl.exe)
      Agree to starting iSCSI services automatically
      Quick Connect (IP address of iSCSI Target)
      Connect the Quorum volume first, then configure Volumes and Devices (auto-configure)
      Configure as drive letter Q: in Disk Management then make offline
      Connect other Shared Storage volumes
  12. Server Manager (Connect to another computer…)  – configuration task
    1. SNMP Service Configuration (Configuration, Services, SNMP Service)
      Agent Contact: IT sysadmin – sysadmin@fqdn.com
      Agent Location: Test Lab, Rack, Site, Country
      Agent Service: enable all services
      Security: Add community names
        READ ONLY: snmp_read
        READ WRITE:  snmp_read_write
      Restart the service
    2. Disk Management
      Change CD-ROM 0 to drive letter F
      Create ‘New Simple Volume’ for D: Data, 64K Allocation unit size
      (Convert to Dynamic Disk..?)
  13. Hyper-V Configuration
    1. Hyper-V Server Settings (set paths to D:\Hyper-V\)
    2. Hyper-V Network Manager – add External ‘Virtual Network – External’

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