Admin Tips
- Windows Server 2008/2003/2000/XP/NT Administrator Knowledge Base
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Knowledge Base Tips topic

[	4013	]	Windows Server 2008/2003/2000/XP/NT Administrator Knowledge Base	Last updated: Feb 08, 2012
[	9	]	Accounts	Last updated: May 12, 2005
[	7	]	Administrator	Last updated: Dec 02, 2010
[	15	]	Booting	Last updated: Mar 07, 2005
[	10	]	Commandline	Last updated: Apr 20, 2004
[	18	]	Email	Last updated: Apr 20, 2004
[	16	]	Event Logs	Last updated: Apr 20, 2004
[	15	]	File Systems	Last updated: Jul 22, 2009
[	17	]	IE	Last updated: Apr 20, 2004
[	16	]	IIS	Last updated: Apr 20, 2004
[	10	]	Installation	Last updated: Apr 20, 2004
[	26	]	Logon	Last updated: Apr 20, 2004
[	114	]	Miscellaneous	Last updated: Aug 24, 2008
[	98	]	Network	Last updated: Jul 22, 2009
[	13	]	Passwords	Last updated: Sep 07, 2004
[	20	]	Print	Last updated: Nov 05, 2004
[	15	]	Registry	Last updated: Nov 30, 2010
[	33	]	Security	Last updated: Feb 04, 2009
[	13	]	Services	Last updated: Apr 20, 2004
[	6	]	Shutdown	Last updated: Apr 20, 2004
[	30	]	TroubleShooting	Last updated: May 12, 2005
[	74	]	Utilities	Last updated: Apr 07, 2005
[	17	]	Miscellaneous	Last updated: Feb 08, 2012

Latest "Admin Tips" Tips

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91) Disable Remote Desktop: Date - Nov 22, 2005; Rating - 4; Author - Mitch Tulloch; Section - Security; How to disable Remote Desktop on XP machines.
92) Improve XP start time: Date - Nov 17, 2005; Rating - 3.3; Author - Mitch Tulloch; Section - Booting; Speed XP startup by removing unneeded autostart programs.
93) Simple Ways to Harden Clients: Date - Nov 03, 2005; Rating - 2.1; Author - Mitch Tulloch; Section - Security; Three simple ways to harden Windows XP clients.
94) Eliminating the Welcome Screen: Date - Oct 26, 2005; Rating - 3.9; Author - Mitch Tulloch; Section - Security; How to prevent the Welcome screen from running when your users turn on their OEM-supplied XP boxes for the first time.
95) Wipe Your Drive: Date - Oct 12, 2005; Rating - 2; Author - Mitch Tulloch; Section - Security; Hard drives should be wiped clean before disposing of them.
96) Remove Unused Drivers and Devices: Date - Sep 16, 2005; Rating - 4.5; Author - Tony Bradley; Section - TroubleShooting; If you remove a piece of hardware, particularly USB devices that may be frequently swapped out, without first Uninstalling it in Device Manager, the drivers remain behind, but the device no longer shows up in Device Manager by default.
97) Using Users to Test Patches: Date - Sep 15, 2005; Rating - 4; Author - Mitch Tulloch; Section - Security; You can use your own users to test patches for client OSes and applications, if you do it the right way.
98) Reliable File and Folder Sharing in Windows XP: Date - Sep 01, 2005; Rating - 2.8; Author - Varun Sud; Section - Network; Explains how to share files and folders in Windows XP over a network. It was written specifically because users in our college network had unpredictable results in sharing files over LAN on Windows XP.
99) Get the Latest ADM Files: Date - Jul 12, 2005; Rating - 2.8; Author - Mitch Tulloch; Section - Security; How to obtain the latest Administrative Template files from Microsoft.
100) Group Policy and Laptops: Date - Jul 07, 2005; Rating - 2.1; Author - Mitch Tulloch; Section - Security; Common misconception concerning laptops and Group Policy.
101) Troubleshoot With Network Diagnostics: Date - Jun 23, 2005; Rating - 2.8; Author - Tony Bradley; Section - TroubleShooting; Windows XP includes a handy tool called Network Diagnostics which can be used to gather a variety of information which can be helpful for troubleshooting.
102) XP SP2 Breaks Group Policy: Date - Jun 09, 2005; Rating - 2.8; Author - Mitch Tulloch; Section - Security; Resolving an issue with adm files in XP SP2.
103) Find Out When Policy Last Applied: Date - Jun 08, 2005; Rating - 3; Author - Mitch Tulloch; Section - Security; How to find out when Group Policy was last applied to a remote machine.
104) Refresh Group Policy Remotely: Date - Jun 06, 2005; Rating - 4.3; Author - Mitch Tulloch; Section - Security; How to refresh Group Policy remotely from the command line.
105) Remove Patch Uninstall Folders To Clean Hard Drive: Date - May 04, 2005; Rating - 3.4; Author - Tony Bradley; Section - Miscellaneous; 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.
106) Use Shortcuts To Navigate Explorer Folders: Date - Apr 26, 2005; Rating - 4.2; Author - Tony Bradley; Section - Miscellaneous; 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.
107) Prevent Ordinary Users From Installing Devices: Date - Apr 06, 2005; Rating - 4.3; Author - Mitch Tulloch; Section - Security; Enhance security by preventing ordinary users from being able to install devices.
108) Map Your Network For Better Protection and Incident Response: Date - Apr 01, 2005; Rating - 3.7; Author - Tony Bradley; Section - Security; It is difficult to protect devices that you don't even know exist. In larger enterprises it is very easy to lose track of the asset inventory which leads to complacency about rogue devices. In order to effectively protect the network and to respond to incidents efficiently, an updated asset inventory and network map should always be handy.
109) Protect Wireless Access Using MAC Address Filters: Date - Mar 22, 2005; Rating - 4.1; Author - Tony Bradley; Section - Security; Wireless networks add a significant level of convenience for many users. The ability to roam at will and access the network without adding wires is quite useful. But, you need to do so securely. There are a number of basic steps you should take to protect your wireless network and filtering MAC addresses is one more way to secure it.
110) Disabling the RunAs Command: Date - Mar 22, 2005; Rating - 4.3; Author - Mitch Tulloch; Section - Security; To enhance security you can prevent users from using the RunAs command.
111) Google Yourself To Identify Security Holes: Date - Mar 15, 2005; Rating - 4; Author - Tony Bradley; Section - Security; Google is very good at what it does. It automatically and systematically catalogues every document, image, web site or other data that is web accessible so that it can be quickly retrieved using the Google search engine. That includes potentially sensitive or confidential data that wasn't intended to be shared publicly. Google your own network or sites to identify possible security holes.
112) Find It Fast With Desktop Search Tools: Date - Mar 10, 2005; Rating - 4.3; Author - Tony Bradley; Section - Miscellaneous; 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.
113) Disable Enumeration of SID's: Date - Mar 08, 2005; Rating - 4.5; Author - Tony Bradley; Section - Security; One way for an attacker to scope out a target system and, particularly, to identify the Administrator account so they can focus their efforts on the account with the most privileges is to list, or enumerate, the SID's (serial identifiers) on a Windows machine.
114) Microsoft Baseline Security Analyzer (MBSA): Date - Mar 07, 2005; Rating - 3.7; Author - Wayne Maples; Section - Security
115) Rename The Administrator Account: Date - Feb 25, 2005; Rating - 3.5; Author - Tony Bradley; Section - Security; Some experts say that renaming the Administrator account is pointless. Any worthy hacker knows that the true Administrator account has a unique identifier and how to find it. But, that doesn't mean you need to make it easy for the hackers who aren't worthy.
116) National Security Agency : Security Recommendation Guides: Date - Feb 23, 2005; Rating - 4.7; Author - Wayne Maples; Section - Security
117) Configure and Maintain AutoComplete: Date - Feb 16, 2005; Rating - 3.9; Author - Tony Bradley; Section - Security; Microsoft Internet Explorer offers the AutoComplete feature to remember past entries and automatically pre-populate fields as you type to save you some time and effort. You may find it quite convenient, but having AutoComplete remember username or password information can pose a security risk.
118) Use 'Run As' To Protect The Registry: Date - Jan 25, 2005; Rating - 3.9; Author - Tony Bradley; Section - Security; Members of the Administrators group typically have full control to modify registry keys. Unwittingly executing a malware-infected or other questionable program with Administrator privileges can result in registry additions or edits which may adversely affect the system. To safeguard the registry without logging out you can use this trick.
119) Video Drivers : How to Determine Which Video Driver Is Loading in Windows XP: Date - Jan 03, 2005; Rating - 3; Author - Wayne Maples; Section - Drivers
120) Shared printer separator page for Windows 2000 and Windows XP: Date - Dec 17, 2004; Rating - 4.2; Author - Wayne Maples; Section - Network