OK, this is cool….
Simple and Affordable Servers for Small Businesses
Archive for the 'SBS' Category
SBS 2008 R2 or SBS 2010 – Methinks the latter
Published April 3, 2010 Microsoft , SBS , SBS2010 2 CommentsI have no inside information, but just from perusing the interweb when the question came to mind tells me there may never be an R2 of SBS 2008.
Why do I think this?
- Microsoft has in recent times begun shipping new products more quickly – a la Vista & Windows 7; Server 2008/2008 R2.
- Server 2008 R2 has been out quite a while already. The least they could have done was provide R2 as a license for the member server (I’ve already got 3 installs working this way with separate licensing). Seems pretty silly that a new purchase of SBS Premium doesn’t get you R2 licensing (making SA kind of a must have, even though we’re left guessing).
- Exchange 2010 is out now. Why would they pass up the opportunity to release a NEW SBS product vs. R2 with only a new Server code base.
- Office 2010 is imminent.
- Eric Ligman makes a passing reference to EBS 2010 in THIS POST about the demise of EBS, insinuating EBS 2010 was the NEXT version of that product, which is/was part of the same family as SBS.
So I’m predicting a Fall release of SBS 2010. Which will be cool.
Come on Microsoft – make an announcement. I promise it won’t stop me from selling SBS 2008 (assuming it’s an ‘in-place’ upgrade 
)
Wow, got bit by this one big time.
Outlook Anywhere (aka HTTPS over RTP) or RWW wasn’t working for more than 1 concurrent user (and I use ‘working’ very loosely). RWW wouldn’t work if someone was already connected with Outlook and vice versa. In other words, only 1 https tunnel was ‘operational’ at a time.
Also, RDP through RWW wasn’t working – get a blank screen and then would error out. We thought this was totally unrelated, but discovered it working after this fix, so we actually killed 2 birds with 1 stone. Gotta find some kind of silver lining!
So me and my technician lost some hair follicles trying to figure this one out. My hairline can’t afford this kind of treatment.
We suspected the SonicWALL TZ190 – not it. Got some good experience with the TZ’s though – nice boxes.
Microsoft was blaming the NIC’s in our laptops – nope. D630’s with Vista 64 – nice machines too.
Server is a T300 with Hyper-V, SBS 2008 and a 2003 member server running BES. Also a nice machine. And Hyper-V is a cool solution – READ THIS for more on Hyper-V and how it’s being used.
So with many hours of troubleshooting and frustrated clients later, the problem looks to be fixed, but I sure wish Microsoft had issued a patch.
So as the SBS team says:
“To resolve this issue we suggest that you remove the HttptoHttpsRedir module from the /RPC virtual directory only.”
Good suggestion, problem resolved (thankfully).
UPDATE: The Official SBS Blog has published a new fix:
New Resolution
- Open regedit with administrative permissions.
- Create the below DWORD and set its value to 5000 decimal to increase the limit of concurrent requests.
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\ASP.NET\2.0.50727.0\ MaxConcurrentRequestsPerCPU
Hopefully we’ll see Microsoft an email blast to all their Partners on this one. Perhaps even worth an out-of-cycle patch.
XP SP3 Upgrades & Slipstream Install Issues with SBS RWW
Published June 28, 2008 SBS , XP 1 CommentTags: XP SP3 RWW
Some days I’m a tech-head, and some days. . .well you get the rest.
So I just said in my iPhone post that I don’t like being an early adopter – right, Dave – shake your head. XP SP3 probably has cost me ~4 hours of grief over the last couple of months. Maybe I’m just a poser, but I think not – people keep telling me I know what I’m doing, which feels great, but I’d rather be golfing than troubleshooting an RWW problem.
So I created an XP slipstream install disc for a client PC that needed a wipe & load, thinking it would ‘save me time’ (I can hear you laughing). I’ve done a few SP3 upgrade installs, and also had the RWW issues that are widely known (you have to manually enable the TS ActiveX control in IE to get RDP working from within RWW). BUT with the Slipstreamed installation, the ActiveX control ISN’T even there. Here’s a Technet thread talking about this, and there are even comments on Susan’s blog asking about it.
So figuring I’d get a credit because it appeared to be a genuine Microsoft issue, I whipped out my credit card and spent 2 hours on the phone with Microsoft support on Thursday, after getting a poor response from the SBSC managed news groups (it doesn’t seem to matter sometimes how much effort you put into detailing the initial questions there – 50% of the time, they come back with suggestions that aren’t related). The final result was to RESET IE7, and voila, the ActiveX control installs.
Funny, I just noticed the MS support guy who helped diagnose the problem posted the fix at the end of the Technet thread. They did give me a credit too. Isn’t this how it’s supposed to work?
So why does resetting fix the issue? I’ll never know, but I know I’ll do this next time before calling support. I had the Google toolbar installed, and the MS tech suggested this might have caused the issue, so I tested the theory out on an slipstreamed XP SP3 installed PC I built the other day to do Wireshark captures on my VoIP system. I hadn’t tried to use RWW with it, so I knew it would be a good test. I HAD already installed the Google toolbar on it as well, so before doing a RESET on IE7, I manually uninstalled the toolbar, and reboot. The problem still was there, so Google wasn’t to blame, and nothing else except Wireshark and OfficeScan were on the PC.
RESET IE7, and boom – all fixed.
While I’m at it, I can also say the upgrade-SP3 method (not slipstreamed) is far from an automated process to make sure it works correctly. Basically, the only time it’s been successful (and they have ALL had the TS ActiveX issue) is when there’s no anti-virus installed. In Calgary the beginning of June, and upgraded my parents XP MCE 2005 Dell, and all sorts of issues (freezing menus & just general weirdness). MS telephone support was there to make suggestions (forgot about this one, so add another 2 hours onto my SP3 labour this past while), and in the end, the solution, which has worked reliably for me since, is to use MSCONFIG to do a selective startup, go to the Services tab, check the checkbox to hide all Microsoft Services, and disable the rest. Reboot, install SP3, reboot, reset MSCONFIG to start normally, and then the only issue (I know of) that’s left is to enable the TS ActiveX control (not an issue for my parents).
Some days.
.png)
