Windows 8 - Keeps losing its mapped drives

Geez what a mission !!

We implemented a new server at one of our clients and ran into the strangest issue.  Everything worked 100%... Pretty smooth cutover... But then the issue began...

The windows 8 machines kept losing their mapped drives... Reran the login script just to see no mappings in Explorer! Frustrating... Cannot map the drives manually because the computer sees the drives as mapped already.

After ALOT of research and trying "fixes" recommended by bloggers .. Still had the same issue

Turns out its an actual Microsoft bug within the operating system.  Luckily for us they realised how critical this issue is and have an update available to sort this issue

After installing the update my users were finally happy :)  good day, indeed

Fix:

Download and install update KB2795944

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2795944

Windows 8 Pro Upgrade - Failure to configure updates

Windows 8 ... Its pretty.  Thats about it.  Its just nice to look at, I am not sold on the idea.

One of our clients did a very clever thing... He went and bought a few notebooks from some website all with just Windows 8 versions on them.

Now as you know Windows 8 is the equivalent to previous OS release home editions.

Should be easy right ... Its just a simple upgrade to Pro.

No.

Turns out it was a preloaded service and software issue.

Damn manufactures that load all kinds of crap on computers before clients purchase them.  Nobody ever uses their "built-in" applications in anycase!

Note to manufactures.  Do what your supposed to do and SELL the computers, stop trying to be "market leaders" by adding extra software, services etc to computers.  All you are doing is slowing down machines and wasting hard drive space.

Phew.. blowing off some steam :)

Issue

Manufacturer:  Lenovo

When upgrading from Windows 8 to Windows 8 Pro you get an error saying "Failure to configure updates... Reverting changes".  Machine reboots about 3 times and tries every single time to configure the update and then reverts again.

Afterwards when you get to log into the machine it advises that the extra features were not installed for Windows 8... (Thank you for stating the obvious Microsoft)


What was done to resolve the issue

• Press Windows key + R
• Type "services.msc" in the Open box and click OK
• Locate the service called "Nalpeiron Licensing Service"
• Right click this service and stop it
• Switch the service to Manual
• Try to Install the extra features again to upgrade to Windows 8 Pro

In my case I just disabled the service and uninstalled Nitro PDF

Thank you Lenovo StinkPad for an interesting waste of my time.

Error E4F3000E: Snapshot failure while using Volume Shadow Copy Service

So we decided to upgrade one of our client's systems from SBS 2003 to Windows Server 2008 R2.

With this we also implemented Symantec System Recovery 2013.

Issue I was experiencing is that my backups kept failing !!  I kept getting an error and the company was about a week behind on backups.  As you all know this is very concerning.

Here is what I did to resolve the error below.  I hope this helps others out so that your client's backups does not fall behind.

Error:

Error E4F3000E: Snapshot failure while using Volume Shadow Copy Service

To resolve:

Step 1

Right click one of your drives in Computer and select Properties

Select the Shadow copies tab

Step 2

Now select every drive you have and click Settings.

Make sure you select the "No limit" maximum size for all drives.

Make sure that ALL the drives has the No Limit maximum size selected !!

Now go back to your System Recovery and run your backup again.  Things should run smoothly now :)

Little XBOX fun

So I bought myself a XBOX 360 beginning of this year.  With a nice little 46" Samsung LCD Crystal clear TV.  

It's strange growing up I always hated consoles... I hated that you had to sit close to the TV with a lil console wired to a box with only a few buttons to press.  See now I was one of those hardcore-wouldnt-touch-a-console PC gamer.  Funny enough thinking about it now I had a damn wired keyboard... meaning I had an oversized "console" wired to a big, noisy box.  My argument = INVALID.

Anycase I'm off my point here...  I had the XBOX for just about a year now.  Never signed up for xbox live.  Never played online.  Just played my 5 games that I received with the console when I bought it.  That is until I had this crazy idea to take some leave.  See I'm also very much of a workaholic.  It was my dream to get into IT and once I got a position in the field I became obsessed with working.  My job is a game, I love to play it and I love to OWN it  -  Like most players do :)

Once again.. rambling.  So I took leave for about 3 weeks.  Time builds up when you never, EVER take leave.  I thought it would be cool... You know... Walk around in the malls, play games, chill at the pool, pretend to be undercover and stalk people - There is only so much you can do without LOSING it !!!  What is this sleeping in and not rushing off to work.  What is this dead silence and no phone ringing every hour with "please, I need your help" conversations...  Oh see the first week is aaaall awesome and you feel like OMG I don't know WHY I work when its soooo much fun to do nothing ... then time starts to move a lil slower... and slower... and slower... and it just seems to stop ! Just like that, with nothing to do

So I decided to take advantage of the 3G dongle that I got from work for "work purposes".  I connected my PC and shared the connection, connected the console to the LAN and voila.. "Your xbox has an update that it needs to run... please don't turn off your console".  I thought... ok cool, cant be THAT bad.  I'll grab a cup of coffee whilst the update completes.

....1 hour later - OK so this is not sooo bad.  Its my fault really.  I've had the thing for a year and never did any updates on it.  Im sure it will finish soon.  Toast, coffee and smoke break.

....+ 1 hour later - Oh you little ** whats going on?? I was in the mood to play a game online and now I have the lovely pleasure of staring at nothing... Thanks Microsoft and your billion updates !!

....+ 1 hour later - beeb beeb .. damn console restarts... Ahh starting up .. updates finished.

and BAM oooooohhhh so PRETTY !!!! Well done with the new look and feel MS.  Windows 8 here we come! Spreading like a wild disease, conquering all.  Takes a few minutes to get used to the "new" feel as expected.  Finally lets get that game crackin !!! Iv been wanting to play it for hours!  

Pop my GOW3 into the console... Loading.... Loading... Loading... TaDAAA it needs another update. Omyyygosh MS you are getting to me!  Lets just update.  Take another smoke break.

After another console reboot eventually I can play my game.  Multiplayer... Ohhh this is gonna be soo much fun.. I'm sure my ass will be OWNED! ha ha ha

"You need to be signed in with your live account to be able to play online"... huh.. what ? whyyyy must this be such a damn mission!  Anycase... After profile has been created etc I finally get to play online...

AWESOME !  Im kicking assss... ha ha yep well I'm sure thats what all the other players were thinking everytime they shot the snot out of my lil fella.

All in All 

The XBOX dashboard design released in Dec 2011 (update 2.0.146990) really impressed me.  Im still loving it. Even though its probably old to the rest of you guys

Online gaming?  Totally awesome, so addicted right now.  Soo getting my arse kicked - but watch this space

Blogging?  Something else I thought I would try out to help time go by ... I seriously need to rethink the whole lets-take-leave-for-a-lifetime thing

Have a good one !
Cheers