Windows Adding Firewall Rules With PowerShell
KB ID 0001538 Problem There was a question on Experts Exchange this morning, the asker wanted to be able to add a ‘Trusted’ network range to their Windows Server Firewall settings as a ‘allow all ports’ rule. Solution You can of course add this manually in the GUI, normally I’d simply Add a Firewall Rule with a Group Policy. but the problem with that is, that’s fine if you want to open a particular...
You Have Exceeded the Maximum Number of Computer Accounts
KB ID 0001536 Problem A few weeks ago, this was asked in a forum, and while I knew what the problem was, I’d never seen it myself. So I recreated the problem on the test network to look at why it happened, and how to fix / get around the problem. The following error occurred attempting to join the domain {domain-name} You computer could not be joined to the domain, You have exceeded the maximum number of computer accounts you...
Sysprep Was Unable to Validate
KB ID 0001535 Problem While building a new Windows 10 machine to be used as a template, I ran Sysprep to generalise the installation, and got this; Sysprep was not able to validate your Windows Installation. Review the log file at %WINDIR%\System32\Sysprep\Panther\setupact.log for details. After resolving the issue, use Sysprep to validate yout Installation again. Solution What I did was Google the error, instead of looking at the log...
Exchange: Create a PFX Certificate and Import a Private Key
KB ID 0001528 Problem On my test network I have an Exchange server (Exchange 2016). As it’s publicly available and connected to Office 365 it needs a digital certificate. Because its my test network, I don’t want to spend a fortune on a certificates, so I buy the cheapest one I can find. I replaced it last week with a 2 year certificate for about $5.00. When the certificate came I had certificate-name.crt, and a CA bundle,...
Exchange: Can’t Delete a Database
KB ID 0001414 Problem Every iteration of Exchange comes up with some new system/hidden mailbox type that stops me deleting mailbox databases! This mailbox database contains one or more mailboxes, mailbox plans, archive mailboxes, public folder mailboxes or arbitration mailboxes, Audit mailboxes. To get a list of all mailboxes in this database, run the command Get-Mailbox -Database <Database ID>. To get a list of all mailbox...
Windows: Deploy and Configure DNSSEC
KB ID 0001524 Problem Like many protocols and solutions, DNS was designed in a time when we all trusted each other, and a ‘hacker’ was some sort of farm equipment. To ensure when you get a response form a DNS server it is coming from where you expect it to, and you can trust it. We use DNSSEC. Basically it signs the DNS record with a digital cypher. The client can then validate the DNS record when it receives it and it...
Veeam Restore Error: Copying Data from Deduplicated Volumes
KB ID 0001521 Problem If you attempt to restore items from a backup of a server where the data was stored on a deduplicated volume, you may see the following error; Copying data from deduplicated volumes requires that the console is installed on Windows Server 2012 R2 or later with the data duplication feature enabled. Restoring files from deduplicated volumes requires that the mount server associated with the source backup...
Azure: There is Currently a Lease on the Blob
KB ID 0001517 Problem This sort of highlights my lack of experience with Azure! But I had to Google it, so if you are here, you did as well 🙂 There is currently a lease on the blob and no lease ID was specified in the request. Solution I had been uploading .vhd files and creating VMs from them, and was tidying up, so I wanted to delete anything that had been left behind. All Services > Disks (or Disks (Classic)) > Select the...
Convert (VMware) VMDK to (Microsoft) VHD/VHDX
KB ID 0001516 Problem Recently I’ve looked a lot at converting VMware resources to either Hyper-V, or Azure. But what if you want to take a Microsoft machine (or workload) and run it in VMware? Well the easiest way is to use some freeware, “StarWind V2V Image Converter”. These days I’m dubious about any piece of freeware, because it’s either a) Not Free when you actually want to use it in anger, b) Full...
Microsoft Azure ‘Route Based’ VPN to Cisco ASA
KB ID 0001515 Problem This covers the, (more modern) Route based VPN to a Cisco ASA that’s using a VTI (Virtual Tunnel Interface). Virtual Network Gateway Options With VPN’s into Azure you connect to a Virtual Network Gateway, of which there are TWO types Policy Based, and Route Based. This article will deal with Route Based, for the older Policy Based option, see the following link; Microsoft Azure To Cisco ASA Site to...