virtuEs.IT

… sharing my IT Quests

Archive for category HowTo

Unattended installation of a Domain Controller

Aug 15

Posted by admin in HomeLab, HowTo, Install, Operating Systems | Comments off

So far I’ve written about the Homelab hardware I’ve purchased and some basic configurations for my Storage and XenServers. And with the post on Sysprepping a Windows 2008 Server, I’m ready to build my Windows 2008 Test environment. With a (sysprepped) Windows 2008 Template for my VMs, I can easily clone the needed Servers and get my lab up and running and build a Windows Domain with multiple Servers and ServerRoles.

The first step in building my Windows Domain is to convert a Windows Server 2008 Member Server into a Domain Controller with the dcpromo.exe command.

 

This post is my own personal mental note for the unattended installation of my Windows Server 2008 Domain Controllers.

 
Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: , ,

diskpart.exe CommandLine Interface

Jul 27

Posted by virtuEs in HowTo, Management Tools, Scripts | 4 Comments

The easiest way to connect to you iSCSI storage LUNs from Windows Server 2008 is by using the iSCSI initiator GUI. With the GUI you can easily make a connection with your iSCSI Storage by giving the ip-address and dynamically discover the LUNs (or Volumes) it has to offer.

As I’m working on scripts to automate the installation and configuration of Windows Server 2008 systems, I was also looking for a way to configure the local disks and volumes of a Server, without having to use the GUI and manual instructions. Luckily Windows offers some nice tools for scripting. The scripting and configuration of the local disks and volumes can best be done with diskpart.exe. Which offers it’s own commandline interface and the option to use a preconfigured script with all the commands.

 

This post offers step-by-step instructions for the diskpart.exe command.

 

This article is updated with additional diskpart command information, provided by Olav Meijer.
The additions to the diskpart sample scripts are marked in red.
 

 
Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: , ,

Add Windows 2008 Firewall rule with CLI

Jun 24

Posted by virtuEs in HowTo | 1 Comment

For security reasons it is wise to keep your Windows firewall turned on. Even internal networks are not free of hack attempts. So to make sure the installed programs are functioning with the firewall turned on, you have to do your research on the communications that will occure between server and client (or other servers).
With an interest in automated installations, scripted installations and other unattended installations, I was looking for a commandline interface that would allow me to script the creation of the neccessary Windows Firewall rules for my applications.

 

For a list of known TCP and UDP IP ports you can easily check wikipedia or The Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA).
 

 

This post is my own personal mental note for creating Windows Firewall rules with the NETSH commandline interface.

 
Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: , ,

Sysprep Windows Server 2008

May 23

Posted by virtuEs in HowTo, Install, Operating Systems | 7 Comments

With Windows Server 2008 the newSID tool can no longer be used in combination with imaged deployment of servers. A deployment method that becomes even more important in Server Virtualization and Provisioned Infrastructures. Microsoft has improved the sysprep tooling by using XML config files and introducing the Microsoft Windows Automated Installation Kit (WAIK) to create the unattended answer files. For Windows Vista SP1 and Windows Server 2008, the WAIK version 1.1 can be downloaded here.

 

For Windows Server 2008 R2 and Windows 7 a different WAIK is to be used, which can be found here.

 

 

This post offers step-by-step instructions for the use of the WAIK to setup sysprep.

 

Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: ,

Wake on LAN settings for XenServer 5.5

Apr 13

Posted by virtuEs in HomeLab, HowTo, Hypervisors | 3 Comments

One of the create extra features on most NICs nowadays is the support for Wake On LAN. An option to wake up your system by sending a signal to your Network Interface Card (NIC). This signal can be a so called Magic Packet.
All you need for this option is a Motherboard that supports Wake-On-LAN (WOL) or Power Management Events (PME); which has to be enabled in the BIOS. And a NIC that also supports WOL. Even though WOL is Operation System independent, it’s behavior is usually configured from within the OS.

I want to be able to use WOL as a startup method for my XenServer systems, Therefore I looked at the options Linux has to offer to enable a NIC to listen for special WOL packets and boot up the system.

 

This post offers instructions to enable the WOL support with XenServer 5.5.

 
Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: , ,