Mark Empson's Blogalot : Tips and Tricks

Installing WSUS nightmares!

mempson — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 22:25:00 GMT

Hi, I was installing WSUS v3.1.6001.65 and the installation kept failing just as it was copying files, the error I was getting was quite a strange one in the installation logs: An exception occurred during the Install phase. System.FormatException: Input...(read more)

Exchange 2007 IS failure Oddity

mempson — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 16:09:00 GMT

Hi all, I manage a local schools infrastructure in my spare time and they had this strange little issue: After a power outage, the information store on my Exchange 07 SP1 server (running Windows 2008) would not start. All other services were running ok...(read more)

RDP to Windows 2008

mempson — Sat, 22 Mar 2008 00:05:00 GMT

Hi all, I have installed a Windows 2008 server into my Windows 2003 domain, I then enabled RDP on my Windows 2008 server verified that I could connect from my Vista client on the network. While working from home, I quickly found out that I could not RDP...(read more)

Windows Server 2008 Core Quick Reference

mempson — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 03:38:00 GMT

This month I have been setting up my first Windows 2008 core server to go into a production environment. It has been a very interesting experience as I was expecting a straight forward process but ran into a few challenges. What with some vendor specific...(read more)

Enable Remote desktop via the registry

mempson — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 15:50:00 GMT

If you have ever run into an issue where you have set up a server but forgot to put the tick in the box to enable remote desktop, then read on! Many times I have done this and then had to go all the way over to the server (sometimes in different offices)...(read more)

MBSA WSUSSCN2

mempson — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 15:46:00 GMT

If you are trying to perform a manual offline update to the MBSA tool but can't find the latest version of the database on the internet (as I struggled too), just click on the following link and download it. http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=7468...(read more)

Poster Central

mempson — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 14:27:00 GMT

Hi all, Ever wanted a change in decor in your house? rather than boring old patterned wallpaper, what about getting some great posters with core components of specific technologies to put in their place... amaze your friends, impress your spouse.. check...(read more)

Quick tips to get some text into Office...

mempson — Fri, 09 Nov 2007 00:34:00 GMT

To quickly create some text in a word 2007 document to send something decent to a printer just type: (not tried this on old versions) “=rand(20)” (without the quotes) To generate random numbers in Excel try “=RAND()*100” As an update to this blog post,...(read more)