Browsing: Windows and Devices

First, I’d like to say thanks to those of you that attended the Microsoft Campus Days event in Copenhagen last week. It was an amazing event with lots of great sessions. As always, I’m honored to be invited to speak at this event and it’s something that I really look forward to every year. So thank you for attending and for making speaking at the event a fun thing to do! Usually, I prefer to have my session early in the morning but this year I got the final speaker slot just before the movie and the closing party. At…

Last week I got a call from a customer, that wanted to automate the naming of new computers, that was beeing deployed using System Center Configuration Manager. They were using the build-in UDI Wizard, that comes with the Microsoft Deployment Toolkit (MDT). But the default computer name for new computers are “MININT-%SomeRandomNumber%”. They want to use the following naming standard: The first 3 characters should be static (The company prefix). In this example well use “ABC”. The next character should be the Device type (D=Desktop, L=Laptop or V=Virtual Machine). The last (up to) 9 characters should be the computer’s serial…

The Windows 10 Technical Preview, has just been announced, and  will be available for download tomorrow at the following link: http://preview.windows.com/. Microsoft has also announced a new version of System Center Configuration Manager that will fully support Windows 10 as expected. But customer running SCCM 2012 and even SCCM 2007 will be able to manage Windows 10 clients. More information: http://blogs.technet.com/b/configmgrteam/archive/2014/09/30/windows-10-enterprise-management-with-sc-configmgr-and-intune.aspx While you wait for the Preview, you can watch these Windows 10 teasers, and go ask your boos for some additional test hardware 🙂 Introducing Windows 10 – the best Windows yet A First Look at Windows 10 /Enjoy. +Ronni…

Allmost every time I get a call from a customer, or want to answer a question in the TechNet Forums about OS Deployment, I always start by asking for logfiles. There are MANY log files when it comes to ConfigMgr 2012 R2, and most of them are normally located in the same folder every time you need them. But when you are troubleshooting OS Deployment using, one of the most common log files you almost always want to check, is the SMSTS.log. And this log file is moving around depending on the phase of the deployment process. There are plenty of blogs…

This morning, one of my customers called me and told me that they bought some new Lenovo laptops (Lenovo ThinkPad S540), but they was unable start OS Deployment using SCCM/PXE. Normally when I see this behaivor, it’s caused by a missing driver in the boot image, so I told them to verify that the driver was loaded correct. Here is a guide to verify the network driver in a SCCM Boot Image: https://www.ronnipedersen.com/2009/04/importing-network-drivers-into-the-windows-pe-boot-image/ But the driver was loaded correct, so I requested the SMSTS.log and found another common issue. The SMSTS.log file can be found here: https://www.ronnipedersen.com/2014/08/sccm-2012-r2-smsts-log-located/ In the SMSTS.log…

Today I was presenting at Microsoft IT Camp, and an question about why BitLocker should always be implemented came up. So I showed this simple demo on how Windows (and other operating systems) can be hacked, if the disk is left unencrypted. The demo was showed on the latest version of Windows 8.1 Update with all updates installed. Some of the students asked for en guide, so they could show the demo where they work, so here it is… Login using a standard user account Show that the Local Administrator Account is disabled Restart the computer, and boot from a…

Within a couple of weeks, I have the honor to speak at the Microsoft TechNet TechTalk event in Copenhagen. The main focus of this event, is to provide a technical update, on the latest version of Windows 8.1 and Windows Server 2012 R2 and new features in the “Update 1” released earlier this month. Looking forward to another great event… More information is available here (in Danish): http://blogs.technet.com/b/rasmush/archive/2014/04/24/technet-techtalk-pr-230-sentere-windows-update.aspx Event Facts: Date: 21. may 2014 (08.30 til 17.00) Location: Microsoft Denmark, Hellerup Language: Danish and English Technical Level: 200-300 Registration: TechTalk General Session/Keynote: Time Session 09.00 – 10.15 Windows Update –…

Welcome to yet another meeting in the Danish System Center User Group. We are very excited to announce our next event and offer you the opportunity to come and meet with fellow System Center administrators and influencers. The main focus of this event, is Windows Azure and Hyper-V. Special Guest Speaker: Brian Mason, Microsoft MVP: Enterprise Client Management. This event will have a limited number of attendees compared to some of our previous events, and please note that this event is hosted by Microsoft Danmark. During this event you can expect to see lots of live demos of Please note…

Three brand new deployment labs, created by Johan Arwidmark, are now available on the TechNet Virtual Labs platform. Creating a Windows 8.1 reference image http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=9845755 Deploying Windows 8.1 with MDT 2013 (Lite Touch) http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=9845757 Deploying Windows 8.1 with Configuration Manager 2012 R2 and MDT 2013 (Zero Touch) http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=9845756 Enjoy. +Ronni Pedersen

The Windows 8.1, Windows Server 2012 R2 and Windows RT 8.1 Update has been released on MSDN, and will be avalible to all users from Windows Update next week. And finaly Microsoft has fixed what Windows 8 should have been from the start. This is truly a great update that improves the user experience when using Windows on a desktop without touch. More information on the Windows Experience Blog: http://blogs.windows.com/windows/b/windowsexperience/archive/2014/04/02/windows-8-1-update-important-refinements-to-the-windows-experience.aspx If you can’t wait until next week and wants to install this awesome update now, here is the recommended install order of the hotfixes that are included in the download:…