Name resolution and connectivity issues on a RRAS that also runs DC, DNS or WINS

To fix these problems do the following:
Configure the RRAS server to publish only the IP address of the local network adapter in DNS
If the Routing and Remote Access server is running the DNS service, you may Configure the RRAS server to publish only the IP address of the local network adapter in DNS.
To add the PublishAddresses and RegisterDnsARecords registry values for the DNS and Netlogon services, follow these steps:
1. Click Start, click Run, type regedit, and then click OK.
2. Locate and then click the following registry subkey:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\DNS\Parameters
3. On the Edit menu, point to New, and then click String Value to add the following registry value:
Value name: PublishAddresses
Data type: REG_SZ
Value data: IP address of the server's local network adapter.
If you have to specify more than one IP address, separate the addresses with spaces.
4. Locate and then click the following registry subkey:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Netlogon\Parameters
5. On the Edit menu, point to New, and then click DWORD Value to add the following registry value:
Value name: RegisterDnsARecords
Data type: REG_DWORD
Value data: 0
6. Close Registry Editor, and then restart the DNS and Netlogon services. To restart a service, click Start, point to Programs or All Programs, point to Administrative Tools, and then click Services. In the Services console, right-click the service, and then click Restart.

Configure the RRAS to register only the IP address of the local network adapter in WINS
If the Routing and Remote Access server is running the WINS service, you may configure the RRAS to register only the IP address of the local network adapter in WINS.
To do that, add the DisableNetbiosOverTcpip registry value for the Routing and Remote Access service. The DisableNetbiosOverTcpip registry value disables the NetBIOS over TCP/IP (NetBT) protocol for remote access connections. Therefore, the server will not register the PPP adaptor in the WINS database.
1. Click Start, click Run, type regedit, and then click OK.
2. Locate and then click the following registry subkey:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\RemoteAccess\Parameters\IP
3. On the Edit menu, point to New, and then click DWORD Value to add the following registry value:
Value name: DisableNetbiosOverTcpip
Data type: REG_DWORD
Value data: 1
4. Close Registry Editor, and then restart the Routing and Remote Access service. To restart a service, click Start, point to Programs or All Programs, point to Administrative Tools, and then click Services. In the Services console, right-click the service, and then click Restart.

Prevent the DNS Register A Records for RRAS
The DNS Server service registers A Records for all interfaces on a server running Routing and Remote Access. That may cause a master browser and connection issues if the server is domain controller.
To prevent this behavior, you may configure the DNS to prevent the DNS register A Record for the RRAS by follow these steps:
1. Start DNS Manager.
2. Right-click the computer name, and then click Properties.
3. Click the Interfaces tab, and then click Only the following IP addresses.
4. Remove any Routing and Remote Access IP addresses that are listed
For more information take a look at this link.

Troubleshooting "The RPC server is unavailable"

Please read the following article from Microsoft Technet Wiki

How to enumerate the list of installed hotfixes in Windows using WMI

From a command line enter the following command:
wmic qfe list full /format:htable > C:\tmp\hotfixes.htm
You can open the file htofixes.htm using your browser.

How to reset Windows Update components

Please read the following article from Microsoft.

USN and USN Rollback

Please read the following articles from Microsoft:
USN and USN Rollback
How to detect and recover from a USN rollback in Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2008, and Windows Server 2008 R2
Force Domain Controller Removal
Clean Up Server Metadata

How to connect to a SMB share in a Windows Server using an alias name

According to this Microsoft article when a client computer connects to a Microsoft Windows 2000-based computer or a Microsoft Windows Server 2003-based computer by using an alias name, the client may receive the following error message:

System error 52 has occurred.
A duplicate name exists on the network.

This problem can occur when you try to connect to the server by using a CNAME alias that is created in the DNS zone. For example, this problem may occur with a command similar to the following sample command

net view \\alias.domain name.com

where alias is a CNAME record that is created for the server in the domain name.com zone. The server is not "listening" on the alias, and therefore is not accepting connections to that name.
To resolve this problem in Windows Server 2003, follow these steps:
   1. Create the CNAME record for the file server on the appropriate DNS server, if the CNAME record is not already present.
   2. Apply the following registry change to the file server. To do so, follow these steps:
         1. Start Registry Editor (Regedt32.exe).
         2. Locate and click the following key in the registry:
            HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\LanmanServer\Parameters
         3. On the Edit menu, click Add Value, and then add the following registry value:
            Value name: DisableStrictNameChecking
            Data type: REG_DWORD
            Radix: Decimal
            Value: 1
         4. Quit Registry Editor.
   3. Restart your computer.
You may also have to set the SPN (Service Principal Name) for the Alias Name:

setspn -a host/aliasname targetserver
setspn -a host/aliasname.contoso.com targetserver

The registry key that is mentioned is applicable only to SMB 1.0. To communicate over the SMB2.0 protocol, or CIFS (Common Internet File System), you do not have to set the registry key. SMB 2.0 allows for the functionality described in this article to work by default without additional configuration. Computers that run Windows Server 2008, Windows Server 2008 R2, Windows Vista, and Windows 7 support both SMB 1.0 and SMB 2.0. Windows includes an SMB client component (Client for Microsoft Windows) and an SMB server component (File and Printer Sharing for Microsoft Windows). By default, SMB 2.0 is the file sharing protocol that is used when both client and server support it.
The SMB protocol revision to be used for file operations is decided during the negotiation phase. A Windows Vista or later client advertises to the server that it understands the new SMB 2.0 protocol. If the server understands SMB 2.0, SMB 2.0 is used for communication. Otherwise, the client and server use SMB 1.0. If SMB 1.0 is expected to be used, you can set the registry key that is mentioned above on Windows Server 2008, Windows Server 2008 R2, Windows Vista, or Windows 7.

How to remove Windows NT4 BDC From Active directory

From this Microsoft article we read:
After upgrading the NT4 domain to Windows 2000/2003 Domain, you may find out that the old BDC (Backup Domain Controller) computer account still exits in the Active Directory.We have the following options to remove the old BDC from the Active Directory:
- Option A: Upgrade the current BDC server to Windows 2000/2003.
- Option B: Remove the computer account from the Active Directory from the BDC.
  1. Log on into the BDC with an account that is a member in "Domain Admins" users group.
  2. Go to "Start" -> "Run" -> Write "srvmgr" and press on "Enter" button.
  3. Remove the BDC computer account from the domain.
- Option C: Remove the computer account from the Active Directory manually.
   1. Logon into a Windows XP workstation or into the domain controller with an account that is a member of "Domain Admins" users group.
   2. Install Windows Support tools.
   3. Go to "Start" -> "Run" -> Write "adsiedit.msc" and press on "Enter" button.
   4. If your FQDN domain name is: domain.local and the BDC remains in "Domain Controller" you can use the following instructions:
a. Expand Domain NC, expand DC=Domain,DC=Local, and then expand OU=Domain Controllers.
b. Right-click the computer name BDC, and then right click and choose "Delete"..
Note: Removing the computer account will prevent the BDC functions and will drop the option to use network resources from the domain.

Using SrvStart to Run Any Application as a Windows Service

Read the following article: http://sysadmingeek.com/articles/using-srvstart-to-run-any-application-as-a-windows-service/

How to add multiple NetBIOS names to Windows servers

You can add another NetBIOS name in the

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\LanmanServer\Parameters

section of the Windows registry by adding the

OptionalNames string value.

If three or more NetBIOS names are required, use the multi-string value with the same name.

This NetBIOS name is not treated the same as the server’s "primary" name. To aid in name resolution add a DNS CNAME record that points to the server’s primary name.

For more info take a look at http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/datacenter/?p=2593&tag=nl.e071

Another interesting post about this theme is the following:
Multiple names for one computer from Jose Barreto's blog

Registry settings for folder redirection in Windows

Read the following link from Microsoft:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/242557

ntfrs event id 13508

From JSI Tip 5439 we read:
The subject problem generally only occurs when you restore the only domain controller in the domain, or you restore all the domain controllers in the domain.

NOTE: If you run Dcdiag.exe, the FsmoCheck fails with:

Warning: DcGetDcName(GC_SERVER_REQUIRED) call failed, error 1355.

When you restore a domain controller, the FRS database is NOT restored, because a current replica is assumed to have the most current database. FRS tries to locate a replica to synchronize with and until it complete replication, it can NOT share the Sysvol and Netlogon shares. If you restore all the domain controllers, no replica can be found because they are all searching.

To fix the problem, you must designate a domain controller to be authoritative for the Sysvol replica set:

1. Stop the File Replication service on the PDC emulator FSMO role holder.

2. Use the Registry Editor to navigate to:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\NtFrs\Paramaters\Backup|Restore\Process at Startup.

3. Double-click the BurFlags Value Name, a REG_DWORD data type, and set the data value to D4, using the Hex radix.

4. Exit the Registry Editor.

5. Start the File Replication service.

NOTE: If the BurFlags Value Name is set to D4 (authoritative) on more that one replica, conflicts and collisions will occur.

File Replication Service event log contains 13552 and 13555 events

From JSI Tip 3605 we read:
The most likely cause of these errors is that the FRS Jet database, or a Jet database log file, is corrupt. To fix the problem:

1. Open a CMD prompt on the domain controller and stop the NetLogon and Ntfrs services:

net stop NetLogon
net stop Ntfrs

2. Type:

del %systemroot%\ntfrs\jet\Ntfrs.jdb
del %systemroot%\ntfrs\jet\Sys\Edb.chk
del %systemroot%\ntfrs\jet\log\edb.log
del %systemroot%\ntfrs\jet\log\res1.log
del %systemroot%\ntfrs\jet\log\res2.log

3. Type:

net start NetLogon
net start Ntfrs

4. Check the FRS event log for expected warning 13514 and 13520.

5. Close the FRS event log and go get a cup of coffee.

6. In five minutes, recheck the FRS event log for informational messages 13553, 13554, and 13516.

How to connect from a 64-bit Windows 7 client to a 32-bit Windows Server 2003 fax server

Copy the following files:

Source machine: Windows Server 2003 32-bit fax server
Source Folder: C:\windows\system32\spool\drivers\w32x86\3

Destination machine: Windows 7 64-bit
Destination folder: C:\Windows\System32\spool\drivers\W32X86\3

Files to be copied:
fxsapi.dll
fxsdrv.dll
fxsres.dll
fxstiff.dll
fxsui.dll
fxswzrd.dll

Before we copy the files we must stop the spooler service on windows 7 client using the command
net stop spooler

Soon after we copy the files we must start the spooler again using the command
net start spooler

How do I use WinDBG Debugger to troubleshoot a Blue Screen of Death

Read the following links:
http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/window-on-windows/?p=1922
http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/devtools/debugging/default.mspx
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/315263

Antivirus scan exclusions

Read this blog post: http://blogs.technet.com/b/jeff_stokes/archive/2010/05/19/anti-virus-exclusions-and-you.aspx

Read also the following links:
http://myitforum.com/cs2/blogs/scassells/archive/2007/05/14/what-anti-virus-scanning-exclusions-should-be-considered-for-system-and-servers.aspx
http://www.hypervizor.net/2010/03/configure-antivirus-exclusions-for.html
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/961804
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/822158

On any Hyper-V host you will find a couple of core processes that is crucial to host and VM performance. Prevent the following processes from AV scans by excluding the following as part of you Hyper-V AV policy.

VMMS.exe
VMWP.exe

You also want to exclude the root directories where VM configurations and Virtual Hard Disks are stored. Exclude the following directories.

C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Hyper-V
C:\Users\Public\Documents\Hyper-V\Virtual Hard Disks
Custom VM configuration, Virtual Hard Disk and Snapshot directories

Next, you want to create AV exclusions for the following file extensions.

*.XML
*.VHD
*.AVHD
*.VFD
*.VSV
*.ISO

Finally, if you are using Hyper-V R2’s Live Migration feature with Cluster Shared Volumes, then you will need to exclude the CSV path and any sub-directories. The CSV path is as follows.

C:\Clusterstorage

Failure to create this exclusion on hosts using CSV, can not only result in poor performance, but can also result in a missing or corrupt VM configuration

How to find model and s/n of your computer using wmi

From a command prompt enter these commands:
To retrieve serial number of your computer run
wmic bios get serialnumber

To retrieve model name of your computer run
wmic csproduct get name

How to remove Active Directory from a DC in safe mode

Read the following article from MS Knowledge Base:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/332199
You can also try to repair AD using this article's info:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/258062

Configuring Windows 2000/2003 for Etherboot

Read the following article: http://www.dietpc.org/windows/etherboot-w2k.html

How to setup Server for NFS in Windows Server 2003 R2

Read the following article: http://blogs.msdn.com/sfu/archive/2007/04/19/set-up-server-for-nfs-in-windows-server-2003-r2.aspx

Event ID 1009 is logged on a Terminal Server License server in a Windows Server 2003-based domain

from http://support.microsoft.com/kb/885013 we read:

If this event is logged on the Terminal Server, you must make the registry changes on the Terminal Server. If this event is logged on the Terminal Services Licensing Server, you must make changes on the licensing server.

This symptom occurs if the following conditions are true:

* The Windows Server 2003-based domain has Windows Server 2003 Terminal Server License servers with Terminal Services Per User Client Access License (CAL) tokens installed.
* The Windows Server 2003-based domain has Windows Server 2003 Terminal Services servers running in Per User mode.

This issue occurs if the LicensingGracePeriodEnded registry entry is not set. The LicensingGracePeriodEnded registry entry suppresses the event messages that appear in the System log and ends the Terminal Services license count-down process

To resolve this issue, add the LicensingGracePeriodEnded registry entry to the registry. To do this, follow these steps:

1. Click Start, click Run, type regedit in the Open box, and then click OK.
2. Locate and then click the following subkey:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\TermService\Parameters
3. On the Edit menu, point to New, and then click DWORD Value.
4. Type LicensingGracePeriodEnded, and then press ENTER.
5. Right-click LicensingGracePeriodEnded, and then click Modify.
6. In the Edit DWORD Value box, make sure that the Value data box contains a NULL value (0), and then click OK.
7. Quit Registry Editor.