Windows Server Essentials Tips & Tricks
February 6, 2013 1 Comment
Following on from my recent post about SSL issues, another topic of conversation is the actual SSL installation process for the RWA.
Again i have blogged on that before, and the new Essentials 2012 wizard makes the process a lot lot easier. However if you get stuck with generating a CSR (Certificate Signing Request) then you can always use IIS to do this for you.
February 5, 2013 1 Comment
Whilst troubleshooting a problem on a server, have you ever reset Windows Firewall back to Defaults?
It would seem like a logical step in some cases, however it could have unexpected consequences. Read more of this post
February 1, 2013 1 Comment
I have blogged before about setting up the RWA on Essentials, we all remember that mammoth post right?
The countless hours we wasted trying to make the wizard work, troubleshooting certificates with GoDaddy, Enom, Microsoft and that’s before you worry about where your domain name is hosted. Thankfully, or should it be, mercifully, in Essentials 2012 the whole wizard process is a lot cleaner and dare i say more intuitive.
That is, however, unless you lack an understanding of what this stuff actually does and how it works.
November 23, 2012 3 Comments
A client of ours who is running a Windows Storage Server 2008 R2 Essentials on their SBS 2011 Standard network (for client PC Backup) 
likes their machines to shutdown each night after a backup.
This could apply to any of the Essentials Server SKUs including SBS 2011 E, WHS 2011 or Essentials 2012.
We schedule the backups to run between 7pm and 11pm so all the machines will have time to backup. It is really simple to set this shutdown task up, of course some people prefer their machines to go to sleep or hibernate but in this case we actually want to turn off those machines.
November 8, 2012 Leave a comment
Nice title for a post, hopefully the SEO on that one will kick in.
Had a question come into one of my mailboxes about the Windows 7 Pro Pack and making the GPOs apply to Windows 8.
If you recall, SBS 2011 Essentials launched an Addin to push out some preconfigured GPOs to clients for security settings and folder redirection. I covered the WMI filters in a post about how to extend that functionality to Windows XP and Windows Vista.
Running a GPResult /R on a Win8 client, we can see that our custom GPOs that use WMI filters, are not being applied.
July 11, 2012 2 Comments
Congratulations on your new download of the Windows Server 2012 Essentials Beta.
I am going to walk through the process of installing the beta, it’s really very simple, just as easy in fact as installing SBS 2011 Essentials.
July 5, 2012 Leave a comment
If you are interested there is now a public beta of ‘SBS8’ or Windows Server 2012 Essentials.
I am certainly not the best person to ask for a reasoned business argument about why the loss of SBS Standard is good or bad thing. Read more of this post
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