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[	3440	]	Windows Server 2008/2003/2000/XP/NT Administrator Knowledge Base	Last updated: Mar 09, 2010
[	748	]	Windows 2000	Last updated: Feb 18, 2010
[	489	]	Admin Tips	Last updated: Feb 18, 2010
[	123	]	Registry Tips	Last updated: Feb 18, 2010
[	136	]	User Tips	Last updated: Jan 27, 2010
[	523	]	Windows 2003	Last updated: Feb 18, 2010
[	510	]	Admin Tips	Last updated: Feb 18, 2010
[	6	]	Registry Tips	Last updated: Sep 08, 2009
[	5	]	User Tips	Last updated: Apr 01, 2009
[	1155	]	Windows NT	Last updated: Jul 22, 2009
[	590	]	Admin Tips	Last updated: Jul 22, 2009
[	419	]	Registry Tips	Last updated: Dec 10, 2008
[	146	]	User Tips	Last updated: Apr 01, 2009
[	197	]	Windows Server 2008	Last updated: Mar 09, 2010
[	193	]	Admin Tips	Last updated: Mar 09, 2010
[	4	]	Registry Tips	Last updated: Sep 08, 2009
[	188	]	Windows Vista	Last updated: Mar 03, 2010
[	158	]	Admin Tips	Last updated: Jan 14, 2010
[	5	]	Registry Tips	Last updated: Jan 07, 2010
[	4	]	Registry Hacks	Last updated: Jan 07, 2010
[	25	]	User Tips	Last updated: Mar 03, 2010
[	628	]	Windows XP	Last updated: Jan 14, 2010

Miscellaneous Tips

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A Quick Tip to configure Group Policy settings in Workgroup Security Model.: Date - Aug 20, 2008; Rating - 4.8; Author - Nirmal Sharma; This article will show how you can quickly configure Group Policy in Workgroup Security Model. This article applies to Windows 2000, Windows XP and Windows 2003.
Automatic Updates for Servers?: Date - Sep 27, 2005; Rating - 2; Author - Mitch Tulloch; Should the Automatic Updates (AU) feature be used to keep your servers patched?
Automating Disk Defragmentation: Date - Jun 22, 2006; Rating - 4.3; Author - Chris Sanders; Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 both include a new way to invoke the Windows defragmenter via the command line. This allows for easy automation of this task.
Back Up Printer Configurations: Date - May 18, 2005; Rating - 2.7; Author - Mitch Tulloch; Protect your print servers by backing up their printer configurations.
Change Management During Deployment: Date - Apr 20, 2004; Rating - Not Rated; Author - Wayne Maples; 206 KB Microsoft Word file - This white paper outlines some of the many ways Windows Server 2003 and the .NET Framework make it easy for administrators to deploy updates to managed applications securely and efficiently. It describes the sophisticated change management, versioning, and deployment features that offer increased efficiency, reliability, and time savings.
Clearing the ARP Cache: Date - Sep 13, 2007; Rating - 3.5; Author - Chris Sanders; Knowing how to clear the ARP cache on a workstation or server can often be a good step in troubleshooting connectivity problems.
Coexistence of Windows Server 2003 and Windows NT 4.0: Date - Aug 23, 2004; Rating - 2.2; Author - Wayne Maples; 136 KB Microsoft Word file - This paper describes coexistence of Windows Server 2003 with Windows NT 4.0 in Windows NT 4.0 domains.
Configuring Windows Update via GPO: Date - Jan 24, 2007; Rating - 3.8; Author - Chris Sanders; Much to the appeal of network administrators everywhere, windows update settings for individual computers can be set via group policy. Here is how to do it.
Consolidating Print Servers: Date - May 17, 2005; Rating - 2.5; Author - Mitch Tulloch; Save money by consolidating your print servers.
Copying Profiles Using Sysprep: Date - Aug 10, 2006; Rating - 3.1; Author - Chris Sanders; There is a feature that is recently new to Sysprep that can speed up your time and get rid of one of the larger headaches of using the tool.
Correcting Corrupted Performance Counters: Date - Feb 05, 2008; Rating - 4; Author - Chris Sanders; The performance log can sometimes become corrupted on a Windows Server. This is how you correct it.
Defragmentation and Shadow Copies: Date - Apr 04, 2006; Rating - 2.7; Author - Mitch Tulloch; How to make defragmentation work properly with shadow copies enabled.
Detecting RAID controller cards during Setup: Date - Jun 06, 2007; Rating - 5; Author - Mitch Tulloch; Troubleshooting USB floppy drive issues that cause text mode Setup to fail.
Determining Processor Architecture: Date - Jun 13, 2007; Rating - Not Rated; Author - Mitch Tulloch; How to determine your processor architecture from Windows.
Determining system up time: Date - Jun 06, 2006; Rating - 4.1; Author - Mitch Tulloch; How to find the up time for a system.
Dumping group memberships: Date - Oct 09, 2007; Rating - Not Rated; Author - Mitch Tulloch; A useful tool for dumping groups and membership info.
Enable Network Support for the Recycle Bin: Date - Jul 22, 2009; Rating - 3.2; Author - Eric Geier; Using a Recycle Bin replacement to protect network shares.
Enhance Performance by Moving the Pagefile: Date - Apr 12, 2005; Rating - 4.4; Author - Mitch Tulloch; Boost performance by moving your pagefile to a separate volume.
Exporting DNS zone information: Date - Jul 10, 2007; Rating - 3; Author - Mitch Tulloch; How to expert your DNS zone info.
Extending basic disks: Date - Sep 19, 2007; Rating - 1; Author - Mitch Tulloch; How to extend a basic disk if you have hardware RAID that supports it
Find It Fast With Desktop Search Tools: Date - Mar 10, 2005; Rating - 4.3; Author - Tony Bradley; Hard drive space has gotten cheaper and the size of the drives has grown to enormous proportions. That is great for saving data, but makes it increasingly difficult to find what you're looking for when you need it. Enter the desktop search tools to help solve that problem.
Finding and deleting zero sized files: Date - Oct 23, 2007; Rating - 1; Author - Mitch Tulloch; Cool command-line trick for finding and deleting bogus files.
Forcing Group Policy Updates Locally: Date - Apr 05, 2006; Rating - 4.3; Author - Chris Sanders; When testing Group Policy settings, being able to force a policy update can be very convenient. This can be done with the gpupdate command.
Forcing SUS and WSUS Updates: Date - Jan 18, 2007; Rating - 3.6; Author - Chris Sanders; A look at how to force SUS and WSUS updates.
Getting low-level disk info: Date - Sep 18, 2007; Rating - Not Rated; Author - Mitch Tulloch; How to get low-level disk info using WMIC.
Group Membership in Multi-Forest Scenarios: Date - May 30, 2007; Rating - Not Rated; Author - Mitch Tulloch; Clearing up uncertainty around some Microsoft documentation on how groups can be nested.
How To Delete System Blocked Files: Date - Sep 24, 2008; Rating - 3.3; Author - Nirmal Sharma; How to delete Files/Folders which are being blocked by the processes running in the background.
How To Forcefully Close A File On Remote Computer Using Command Line?: Date - Aug 24, 2008; Rating - 5; Author - Nirmal Sharma; This article explains the steps you can use to close a file forcefully on a remote computer.
Improving Availability and Reliability with Microsoft Reliability Service: Date - Apr 20, 2004; Rating - Not Rated; Author - Wayne Maples; 135 KB Microsoft Word file - This white paper introduces the Microsoft® Reliability Service (MRS), a Web–based service that gives customers the ability to track and improve the availability of their operating system and major applications. With MRS, customers can identify causes for unplanned downtime and take preemptive actions to decrease downtime in the future. This paper describes how MRS gathers information about servers to create reliability reports that customers can use to determine whether they are meeting their availability objectives.
Inside IIS 6.0 and Windows Server 2003: Date - Apr 20, 2004; Rating - 4; Author - Wayne Maples; 78 minutes - you will learn how to fully leverage the new reliability and management features in IIS 6.0. We’ll also explore IIS 5.0 compatibility mode and configure a poorly behaved unmanaged C++ ISAPI web application to automatically recycle to maintain availability while it is rewritten in managed code. We’ll learn how to programmatically modify the XML Metabase or recover the Metabase, in the event that it becomes corrupted. Finally, you’ll see how you can increase the reliability and uptime of your web server by replacing complex ISAPIs with much more maintainable ASP.NET Web applications. We’ll rewrite an application as a managed ASP.NET application and obsolete the unreliable program.
Installing Windows into a different folder: Date - Jun 28, 2007; Rating - 4; Author - Mitch Tulloch; How to install Windows in a folder other than \Windows.
Introduction to Shadow Copies of Shared Folders: Date - Apr 20, 2004; Rating - 2; Author - Wayne Maples; 243 K Word doc - Shadow Copies of Shared Folders helps alleviate data loss by creating shadow copies of files or folders that are stored on network file shares at predetermined time intervals. A shadow copy is essentially a previous version of the file or folder at a specific point in time.
List of services: Date - May 09, 2006; Rating - 3.9; Author - Mitch Tulloch; Generating a quick list of services running on a machine.
Managing Multiple Virtual Servers in One Place: Date - Aug 17, 2006; Rating - 4.2; Author - Chris Sanders; A lot of people are under the impression that to manage multiple virtual servers you need to log onto them all interactively. This tip debunks that myth.
Maximizing Availability on the Windows Server 2003 Platform: Date - Apr 20, 2004; Rating - Not Rated; Author - Wayne Maples; 207 KB Microsoft Word file - This article examines the five components of the Microsoft strategy for helping customers maximize solution availability with Windows Server 2003. The strategy encompasses verifying operating system reliability during the Windows engineering process, understanding the causes of downtime, deploying new features and product enhancements that reduce downtime, providing mission-critical capabilities and services, and delivering prescriptive guidance and best practices.
Microsoft's Technical Resources for Windows Server 2003: Date - Aug 03, 2004; Rating - Not Rated; Author - Wayne Maples
Modifying ACLs from the command line: Date - Jun 05, 2007; Rating - Not Rated; Author - Mitch Tulloch; Using a script to modify permissions.
Moving the Default Spooling Directory: Date - Mar 11, 2008; Rating - 5; Author - Chris Sanders; In some scenarios, you may need to move the default spooling location for printers on a system. Here is a quick tutorial on how to do that.
MSDN Webcast: Building Reliable Web Applications on Windows Server 2003: Date - Apr 20, 2004; Rating - Not Rated; Author - Wayne Maples; 106 minutes - you will learn how to fully leverage the new reliability and management features in IIS 6.0. We’ll also explore IIS 5.0 compatibility mode and configure a poorly behaved unmanaged C++ ISAPI web application to automatically recycle to maintain availability while it is rewritten in managed code. We’ll learn how to programmatically modify the XML Metabase or recover the Metabase, in the event that it becomes corrupted. Finally, you’ll see how you can increase the reliability and uptime of your web server by replacing complex ISAPIs with much more maintainable ASP.NET Web applications. We’ll rewrite an application as a managed ASP.NET application and obsolete the unreliable program.
MSDN Webcast: UDDI on Windows Server 2003: Date - Apr 20, 2004; Rating - 1; Author - Wayne Maples; 86 minutes - In this intermediate session, you will learn how UDDI is used as a directory and discovery service for XML Web Services. We’ll dig into how XML web services can be published and located through both the UDDI Web interface, and through the UDDI API in Windows Server 2003. We’ll explore some more advanced features of UDDI by registering multiple physical access points for a single logical web service. This session will teach you how to write a managed WinForms client application and programmatically query UDDI for a list of registered services. When the primary web service fails, our client will automatically recover and select a backup service with UDDI.
MSDN Webcast: What's in Windows Server 2003 for Developers: Date - Apr 20, 2004; Rating - Not Rated; Author - Wayne Maples; 92 minutes - This overview session will introduce you to the new developer features of the server and provide you with an overview of what they can do for you and your organization. Topics covered include UDDI, COM+ 1.5, MSMQ 3.0, enhancements in IIS 6.0, and Active Directory Application Mode (ADAM). We will also touch on the Windows Server 2003 architecture, including increased performance and scalability, along with a glimpse of the new security enhancements.
Patching without downtime: Date - Sep 29, 2005; Rating - 1; Author - Mitch Tulloch; Load balancing and clustering can be used to prevent downtime caused by patching systems.
Planning a Distributed WSUS Deployment: Date - Jan 11, 2007; Rating - 2.7; Author - Chris Sanders; When you our managing a LAN/WAN that is veritably spread out, you may want to consider a distributed approach to SUS/WSUS deployment.
Preventing Users from Creating Local User Accounts: Date - Dec 14, 2006; Rating - 3.9; Author - Chris Sanders; By default, any user on computer can create a local user account. Let’s fix that.
Recovering from a lost domain controller: Date - Jul 04, 2007; Rating - 2.6; Author - Mitch Tulloch; How NOT to replace a dead domain controller.
Redirecting Command Line Output to the Clipboard: Date - Aug 24, 2006; Rating - 4.1; Author - Chris Sanders; Windows Server 2003 has a great feature which allows you to pipe output from the command line to the clipboard. Here is how to use it.
Remove IE Supervisor Password: Date - Aug 01, 2007; Rating - 3.8; Author - Chris Sanders; Pesky users can do all sorts of things to mess with a workstation. One of these things is to set a supervisor password on Internet Explorer. Here we look at how to remove one.
Remove Patch Uninstall Folders To Clean Hard Drive: Date - May 04, 2005; Rating - 3.4; Author - Tony Bradley; Hard drives are cheap and people typically have more space than they know what to do with these days. But, that is no reason to just waste it. When you install Windows patches, hidden folders are created which contain the uninstall data. Viewing the hidden data on my computer, I found 50 or so patch uninstall folders taking up over 500 Mb of space on my drive.
Running chkdsk on very large volumes: Date - Jun 13, 2006; Rating - 4.5; Author - Mitch Tulloch; Using DFS to get around long wait times checking very large volumes.
Scripting Printer Installation with PrintUI.dll: Date - Apr 27, 2006; Rating - 2.4; Author - Chris Sanders; Printer installation can be made into a scripting process very easily by use of the PrintUI DLL. Here is how to do it.
TechNet Webcast: Introduction to Windows Server 2003: Date - Apr 20, 2004; Rating - 1; Author - Wayne Maples; 72 mins - introduces the new features of Microsoft® Windows Server™ 2003 and shows how they can be used to streamline administration, speed deployment, and resolve issues with past Windows network deployments. The broad range of topics includes Active Directory®, IIS 6.0, and scalability.
TechNet Webcast: Managing the .NET Framework on Windows Server 2003: Date - Apr 20, 2004; Rating - Not Rated; Author - Wayne Maples; 90:35 mins - This session addresses management of the .NET Framework, especially management of various versions within an organization. It looks at differences between releases 1.0 and 1.1 and considers how to manage applications that use 1.0 or require 1.1. The session reviews the tools available to manage the Framework, covers basics and best practices for configuration files, and looks at the methods for monitoring the Framework and ASP.NET applications.
TechNet Webcast: Microsoft Certified Professional Program Overview for Windows Server 2003: Date - Apr 20, 2004; Rating - Not Rated; Author - Wayne Maples; 79 mins - the Microsoft certification track for Windows Server 2003. We'll cover the upcoming tracks, classes and exams that are available.
TechNet Webcast: Microsoft Windows Storage Server 2003: Date - Apr 20, 2004; Rating - Not Rated; Author - Wayne Maples; 73:27 minutes - This webcast will describe how the new features are deployed and how they relate to the architecture of the operating system. See how solutions based on the new Windows Storage Server integrate better into existing infrastructures and heterogeneous environments by leveraging the improvements in Windows Server 2003. Storage devices running Windows Storage Server 2003 can consolidate multiple file servers into a single device that reduces storage costs and policy-based management. Different usage scenarios will be highlighted including how NAS-SAN fusion can consolidate file servers and messaging servers in the same storage infrastructure.
TechNet Webcast: What’s New in Scripting for Windows 2003?: Date - Apr 20, 2004; Rating - 4; Author - Wayne Maples; 77 mins - the Microsoft Scripting Guys provide a preview of coming scripting attractions, including such things as: new WMI classes, methods, and properties; the ability to monitor performance; the ability to manage Terminal Server; and the ability to set security on anything and everything from files to folders to registry keys.
TechNet Webcast: Windows 2000/2003 Performance Timing and Optimization: Date - Apr 20, 2004; Rating - 1; Author - Wayne Maples; 101:33 minutes - Rand Morimoto, on configuration best practices, network tuning techniques, and suggested daily / weekly / monthly maintenance routines that will help you keep your Windows networking environment in peak performance
TechNet Webcast: Windows Server 2003 Delta: What's New and What's Changed?: Date - Apr 20, 2004; Rating - Not Rated; Author - Wayne Maples; 81 minutes - Don Jones, co-author of "Windows Server 2003 Delta Guide" and creator of the "Delta Guide" series explores the most significant and oft-overlooked new and changed features in Microsoft's latest server OS. Come find out what's new, and how it will affect your IT environment!
TechNet Webcast: Windows Server 2003 Maintenance Best Practices: Date - Apr 20, 2004; Rating - 5; Author - Wayne Maples; 70 mins - This session will uncover ways to make maintenance best practices become common place in an environment and alleviate many of the common firefighting pitfalls.
TechNet Webcast: Windows System Resource Manager (WSRM): Managing processing resources with Windows Server 2003: Date - Apr 20, 2004; Rating - 5; Author - Wayne Maples; 86 minutes - Microsoft Windows System Resource Manager (WSRM) provides resource management and enables the allocation of resources, including processor and memory resources, among multiple applications based on business priorities with Windows Server 2003.
Technical Overview of Windows Server 2003 File Services: Date - Apr 20, 2004; Rating - Not Rated; Author - Wayne Maples; 1.1M Word doc - discusses improvements in Windows Server 2003 File Services, with an emphasis on core infrastructure file service innovations.
Transferring Ownership of Files: Good or Bad?: Date - May 11, 2005; Rating - 2.2; Author - Mitch Tulloch; Windows Server 2003 lets you easily transfer ownership of files, but should you?
Troubleshooting Windows Updates: Date - Jan 04, 2007; Rating - 2.3; Author - Chris Sanders; Unfortunately updating Windows doesn’t always go as planned. This may help you troubleshoot your Windows update woes.
Uninstall applications in Safe Mode: Date - Feb 19, 2009; Rating - 4; Author - Mitch Tulloch; How can you uninstall Windows Installer-based applications in Safe Mode if you need to?
Usage of Fast Reconnect in IAS Implementations: Date - Aug 23, 2007; Rating - Not Rated; Author - Chris Sanders; The IAS Fast Reconnect feature can greatly increase the efficiency of your wireless client roaming in your wireless network.
Use a Larger Pagefile for Better Performance: Date - Mar 24, 2005; Rating - 3.2; Author - Mitch Tulloch; The default pagefile size isn't always enough for best performance, especially when you're running memory-hungry server apps.
Use Shortcuts To Navigate Explorer Folders: Date - Apr 26, 2005; Rating - 4.2; Author - Tony Bradley; Windows Explorer is a fairly functional tool for browsing files and folders and finding what you are looking for. But, depending on how large and how organized your hard drive is, it may take some time to sift through to the folder you really want. Using command line parameters, you can create desktop shortcuts that take you quickly to your most-used folders.
Using a Script to Add a Domain User to a Local Group: Date - Aug 31, 2006; Rating - 3.6; Author - Chris Sanders; There are sometimes situations when you need to be able to script the process of adding a domain user to a local group on a machine. Here is a script that will do just that.
Using nLite to Integrate RAID Drivers into Windows Installation Media: Date - Jan 27, 2010; Rating - 3; Author - Chris Sanders; Windows Server 2003 can be a challenge to install when the drivers for your RAID controller aren’t built into the installation CD. Here is a good way to overcome this without use of a floppy drive.
Using the Performance Console for Patch Testing: Date - Sep 20, 2005; Rating - Not Rated; Author - Mitch Tulloch; The Performance can be helpful for testing a patch before applying it to a system.
Using the TSKILL Command to End Processes: Date - Mar 16, 2006; Rating - 3.2; Author - Chris Sanders; How to Use the TSKILL Command
Using WSUS on a Server with Limited Disk Space: Date - Jul 01, 2008; Rating - 1; Author - Chris Sanders; Most administrators are under the assumption that you need a great deal of free disk space to take advantage of WSUS. This isn’t always the case.
Viewing DFS Link Limitations: Date - Mar 09, 2006; Rating - 1; Author - Mitch Tulloch; How to determine whether your DFS namespace is running out of room for more links.
Want to Improve Group Policy?: Date - Jun 30, 2005; Rating - 2.4; Author - Mitch Tulloch; How to help Microsoft improve Group Policy and other aspects of Windows Server System platforms.
When to use GPT disks: Date - May 21, 2009; Rating - 3.7; Author - Mitch Tulloch; When you should choose GPT disks over MBR.
Which version am I running?: Date - May 24, 2006; Rating - 3; Author - Mitch Tulloch; How to find the version of a program, OS or FPSE.
Why Upgrade from Windows NT 4.0 to Windows Server 2003: Date - Aug 23, 2004; Rating - 4; Author - Wayne Maples; 250 KB Microsoft Word file - Windows Server 2003 provides many new tools, services, and features that make a compelling case for upgrading from Microsoft Windows NT® Server 4.0. This white paper explains the overall benefits of upgrading and addresses the significant management and cost saving benefits provided by the Active Directory® service. The rest of the paper examines enhancements in key server roles.
Windows reports AMD on Intel hardware: Date - Jul 03, 2007; Rating - 1; Author - Mitch Tulloch; How Windows reports 64-bit hardware.