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Dell MD3200i + VMware ESX hanging issues

noreply@blogger.com (adfrad) — Thu, 19 Apr 2012 13:27:00 +0000

The Dell MD3200i SAN is a cheap(ish) effective storage device certified for VMware ESX.
I had no issues using it with a single ESX host, but when trying to use it with more than one host I was seeing hangs of the ESX servers, loss of connectivity from hosts to the VirtualCenter and strange logs saying that it couldn't communicate with the LUN.

Mar 24 19:56:11 virt08 vobd: Mar 24 19:56:11.295: 797333253337us: [esx.problem.vmfs.heartbeat.timedout] 4eb93a45-ea456b83-4c0a-0010189da888 disk03-1.

Mar 24 19:57:36 virt08 vobd: Mar 24 19:57:36.699: 797418651679us: [esx.problem.vmfs.heartbeat.recovered] 4eb93a45-ea456b83-4c0a-0010189da888 disk03-1.

After much going back and forth with Dell ensuring that I had the network configured with their latest recommendations (they keep changing it), they took al look at the stats on the network card of the MD3200i

========================================================================
                          TCP PORT STATISTICS - PORT 0
========================================================================
  TCP Received Segments         0xf6f28bd
  TCP Tx Segments               0xd773310
  TCP Rx Segments In Error      0x0
  TCP Tx Byte Count             0x1a167dd174
  TCP Rx Byte Count             0x2683bbc3
  TCP reTx Timer Expired Count 0x584
  TCP Rx Dup ACK Count          0xa7890
  TCP RX ACK Count              0xee2915
  TCP Rx Delayed Ack Count      0x5a4256
  TCP Tx Ack Count              0x65098dc
  TCP Rx Seg Out Of Order Count 0x3242c
  TCP Rx Window Probe Count     0x0
  TCP Rx Window Update Count    0x49c

Here they saw high numbers of ACK issues (approximately 10% of all network transactions).

This prompted them to ask that I set up the IO queue depth and a delayed ACK workaround from VMware.

This immediately fixed my issue!

To change IO queue depth

esxcli nmp roundrobin setconfig --type "iops" --iops 1 --device <device UID>

Delayed ACK Workaround

Disabling Delayed ACK in ESX/ESXi 4.x and ESXi 5.0.x

Log in to the vSphere Client and select the host.
Navigate to the Configuration tab.
Select Storage Adapters.
Select the iSCSI vmhba to be modified.
Click Properties.
Modify the delayed ACK setting, using the option that best matches your site's needs:
- Modify the delayed ACK setting on a discovery address (recommended):
  1. On a discovery address, select the Dynamic Discovery tab.
  2. Select the Server Address tab.
  3. Click Settings.
  4. Click Advanced.
- Modify the delayed ACK setting on a specific target:
  1. Static Discovery tab.
  2. Select the target.
  3. Click Settings.
  4. Click Advanced.
- Modify the delayed ACK setting globally:
  1. Select the General tab.
  2. Click Advanced.
In the Advanced Settings dialog box, scroll down to the delayed ACK setting.
Uncheck Inherit From parent.
Uncheck DelayedAck.
Reboot the host

This change should be safe to apply to all MD3xxx SANs, so you could just do the global change.

You should now have a fully working system

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Can't open Discovery Search Mailbox

noreply@blogger.com (adfrad) — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 16:55:00 +0000

While I was playing about with Discovery Search, I had the issue that I couldn't open up the Discovery Search Mailbox with either OWA or Outlook.

I suspected it was a permissions issue, but I was already a member of the Discovery Management group and when I looked at the Full Access Permissions in Exchange Management Console I could see that group listed.

After much scratching of my head, I decided to dive into ADSIedit and have a look at that Mailbox.

I found the Mailbox under Default Naming Context > DC=Domain,DC=Name > CN=Users, CN=DiscoverySearchMailbox{blahblahblah}

and when I took a look, I saw that the Discovery Management group wasn't listed. I just added it back in and gave it full control and the problem was solved!

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Exchange 2010 Litigation Hold - Now What Do I Do?

noreply@blogger.com (adfrad) — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 16:41:00 +0000

It's easy to put a mailbox on Exchange Litigation Hold... but how do you get the information back out?

To view what's in the mailbox, you need to do a Discovery Search.

First you need to ensure you have the Discovery Management role assigned to your mailbox.

Add-RoleGroupMember -Identity "Discovery Management" -Member jsmith

Now you have this, you can perform a Discovery Search through the ECP webpage https://mailserver/ecp

Click on Mail Control - Discovery

Then create a new Mailbox Search, you can choose what type of items, which mailboxes and what dates. You can do an Estimate Search which is handy for showing what the results will be, and then choose a "Discovery Search Mailbox" to output the results to.

Once the search completes, you can open the "Discovery Search Mailbox" using Outlook or OWA (Click on your name and type Discovery Search Mailbox).

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Adding .NET 3.5 to Windows 2008 R2

noreply@blogger.com (adfrad) — Mon, 12 Mar 2012 18:21:00 +0000

Windows 2008R2 doesn;t install .NET Framework 3.5 automatically, yet when you download it from the MS website, it won't install (you get the error You must use the Role Management Tool to install or configure Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5 SP1).

What you need to do is install it using PowerShell in a command prompt (running as an Administrator):

powershell.exe -noexit -ImportSystemModules  Add-WindowsFeature net-framework

Easy!

Finding who's using your bandwidth on Cisco ASA

noreply@blogger.com (adfrad) — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 14:35:00 +0000

Until recently the Cisco ASA had a Top Talkers facility which shows you who is using up your bandwidth.

Now that's no longer available, one quick(ish) and easy(ish) way is to:

Connect to the ASA with Putty and capture the output of "show conn" to a CSV file.

Then edit the file with a text editor (I suggest Notepad++) and replace " bytes " with ""

Save the file, then open it up in Excel and you can sort by size and work out who's using what...

Find email addresses in Exchange 2010

noreply@blogger.com (adfrad) — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 12:18:00 +0000

The quickest and easiest way to work out who (or what) is using an email address is to open up a PowerShell command window and run:

get-recipient -results unlimited | where {$_.emailaddresses -match "address@company.com"} | select name,emailaddresses,recipienttype

for full details on the result, try

get-recipient -results unlimited | where {$_.emailaddresses -match "address@company.com "} | fl

thumbs.db can't be deleted because it's in use

noreply@blogger.com (adfrad) — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 13:30:00 +0000

If you are like me, you keep all your media on a network drive.

In what it thinks is an aid to productivity, Windows 7 (and Vista) will go to these network drives and automatically create a hidden file called thumbs.db which contains a thumbnail image of every media (video or photo) file. Naturally this takes time if you have hundreds of images or some large videos, and I often try to delete the directory before the thumbs.db have finished being created... and get an annoying error message saying that the file can't be deleted as it's still opened by another application.

You can turn off the generation of this file by going:

Start > Run > Gpedit.msc

User Configuration > Administrative Templates > Windows Components > Windows Explorer > Turn off caching of thumbnail pictures in hidden thumbs.db> Enabled

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Expanding a LVM linux partition

noreply@blogger.com (adfrad) — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 15:14:00 +0000

Linux is something of a black art to me, so when I was required to resize a Centos (RedHat) virtual machine's hard disk, it took quite a bit of effort to do. As a Windows person I was very disappointed that I had to jump through so many hoops.

First I though I'd just boot up off a GParted ISO and resize it like I would do with any other machine.. only to find out that it didn't support LVM... and just refused to go any further.
So.. here's how to do it...

Assuming you have already expanded the Virtual HDD in VMware.

1 Log on to the VM as root

Let's not mess around with SU and all that business, we're doing some pretty dangerous stuff here, and we should know what the risks are!

2 Open a command prompt

df
Filesystem 1K-blocks Used Available Use% Mounted on /dev/mapper/VolGroup00-LogVol00
26377276 3810884 21204884 16% /
/dev/sda1 101086 19650 76217 21% /boot
tmpfs 1544956 0 1544956 0% /dev/shm

The 26377276 references the old size of the HDD. It's 30GB actually but after formatting etc it comes to 26Gb

Make a note of the Volume Group name /dev/mapper/VolGroup00-LogVol00, you're going to need it later.

3 Create a new partition that will contain a new physical volume

Run the print command to view the partitions

parted /dev/sda print

Model: VMware Virtual disk (scsi)

Disk /dev/sda: 64.4GB

Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B

Partition Table: msdos

Number Start End Size Type File system Flags

1 32.3kB 107MB 107MB primary ext3 boot

2 107MB 32.2GB 32.1GB primary lvm

You can see that I have a 64.4GB HDD but the partitions only extend to 32.2GB... so I have loads spare.

I need to create a new primary partition to use this space:

parted /dev/sda "mkpart primary 32.2GB 64.4GB"

Do another print to check you now have a new partition

parted /dev/sda print

Model: VMware Virtual disk (scsi)

Disk /dev/sda: 64.4GB

Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B

Partition Table: msdos

Number Start End Size Type File system Flags

1 32.3kB 107MB 107MB primary ext3 boot

2 107MB 32.2GB 32.1GB primary lvm

3 32.2GB 64.4GB 32.2GB primary

OK, that looks good!

4 Create a new physical volume

We need to create a new physical volume. Let's look at what we already have:

lvm pvs

/dev/hda: open failed: No medium found

PV VG Fmt Attr PSize PFree

/dev/sda2 VolGroup00 lvm2 a- 29.88G 0

OK, so I already have /dev/sda2, so let's call the new one /dev/sda3

lvm pvcreate /dev/sda3

Physical volume "/dev/sda3" successfully created

and let's check that it was created properly

lvm pvs

/dev/hda: open failed: No medium found

PV VG Fmt Attr PSize PFree

/dev/sda2 VolGroup00 lvm2 a- 29.88G 0

/dev/sda3 lvm2 a- 30.00G 30.00G

Hey.. that looks good..it even shows that I have 30GB free!

5 Add this new physical volume to the volume group

lvm vgextend VolGroup00 /dev/sda3

Volume group "VolGroup00" successfully extended

6 Extend the logical volume in the volume group

Running the lvm vgdisplay command allows us to see the Free PE statistics. I want to use all this space, so make a note of it.

lvm vgdisplay VolGroup00

--- Volume group ---

VG Name VolGroup00

System ID

Format lvm2

Metadata Areas 2

Metadata Sequence No 4

VG Access read/write

VG Status resizable

MAX LV 0

Cur LV 2

Open LV 2

Max PV 0

Cur PV 2

Act PV 2

VG Size 59.84 GB

PE Size 32.00 MB

Total PE 1915

Alloc PE / Size 956 / 29.88 GB

Free PE / Size 959 / 29.97 GB

VG UUID doO2t7-BlLf-1rW5-mbNU-zvUq-pzUb-ZAsBD4

The lvm lvextend command expands the logical volume. The /dev/mapper/VolGroup00-LogVol00 comes from step 2... I told you to remember it!

lvm lvextend -l+959 /dev/mapper/VolGroup00-LogVol00

Extending logical volume LogVol00 to 55.94 GB

Logical volume LogVol00 successfully resized

7 Resize the file system

After extending the volume group and the logical volume, it is now possible to resize the file system. This is done using ext2online. First I verify the file system size, perform the resize, and then verify the size again.

df -h

Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on

/dev/mapper/VolGroup00-LogVol00

26G 3.7G 21G 16% /

/dev/sda1 99M 20M 75M 21% /boot

tmpfs 1.5G 0 1.5G 0% /dev/shm

resize2fs /dev/mapper/VolGroup00-LogVol00

df -h

Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on

/dev/mapper/VolGroup00-LogVol00

55G 3.7G 48G 8% /

/dev/sda1 99M 20M 75M 21% /boot

tmpfs 1.5G 0 1.5G 0% /dev/shm

Congratulations, you have resized your hard disk!

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Backing up Ex2010 mailboxes to PST

noreply@blogger.com (adfrad) — Tue, 29 Nov 2011 20:47:00 +0000

Exchange 2010 SP1 has a new command to import and export to a PST.

First you need to give yourself permissions to do this with the following command:

New-ManagementRoleAssignment –Role “Mailbox Import Export” –User “<username>”

You will need to close down and open up the console again to gain access to the commands below.

Then you need to run the following to actually Export for a PST

New-MailboxExportRequest -Mailbox user@domain.com -FilePath \\path\to\file.pst

You can check on the progress of the backup with:

Get-MailboxExportRequest

or

Get-MailboxExportRequestStatistics username\MailboxExport -IncludeReport | fl | Out-File c:\temp\output.txt

For full details.

You can clear any old Mailbox requests with:

Remove-MailboxExportRequest -Identity "username\MailboxExport"

or

Get-MailboxExportRequest | Remove-MailboxExportRequest

to remove them all (and be prompted)

Very simple!

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Configuring Room Finder Lists in Exchange 2010

noreply@blogger.com (adfrad) — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 13:27:00 +0000

Outlook 2010 and Exchange 2010 make booking resources like Meeting Rooms much easier.
We all know that you can invite a resource mailbox to a meeting to reserve it for your use, but Outlook 2010 allows you to view which meeting rooms are available at a particular time.

To group resources together, fire up Exchange Management Shell and type:

New-DistributionGroup -Name “Head Office Meeting Rooms” -Members "Meeting Room #1","Meeting Room #2","Meeting Room #3" -RoomList

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noreply@blogger.com (adfrad) — Tue, 06 Sep 2011 15:17:00 +0000

Microsoft seem to make every effort to hide the Google Search provider for IE9 - here's the direct link:

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/ie/searchguide/en-en/default.mspx#

Changing the default User and Computer OU

noreply@blogger.com (adfrad) — Fri, 26 Aug 2011 14:13:00 +0000

I like to keep my "Real" Users in a separate folder away from all the other system accounts. This ensures that only valid accounts are displayed if you use LDAP lookups for various applications (e.g. a network scanner)

Windows 2003 introduced a couple of new commands that allow you to change the default location:

Users:

ReDirUsr "OU=RealUsers,DC=domain,DC=com"

Computers:

ReDirCmp "OU=RealComputers,DC=domain,DC=com"

You need to run this on a Domain Controller, and you need the AD to be in Windows 2003 mode as a minimum.

As you want to ensure the path to the new directory is correct, I recommend Softerra LDAP browser (it's free) which allows you to connect to the AD with LDAP and copy object locations.

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0x8007010b errors in Task Scheduler

noreply@blogger.com (adfrad) — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 10:31:00 +0000

Windows 7 and 2008 introduced a new, more comprehensive Task Scheduler.

While the "Create Task" button provides you with every option available, I could not run any tasks without the 0x8007010b error message.

It turns out that this error is caused by the "quotes" in the Start in field. The "Program/script" field needs quotes (if there is a space in the path to the file, but all quotes must be stripped from the "Start in (optional)" field.

It's counter-intuitive, but that's the way Microsoft wrote it.

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F5 URL and URI Variables

noreply@blogger.com (adfrad) — Fri, 05 Aug 2011 15:01:00 +0000

iRules are a fantastic feature of the F5.
Sometimes you need to do operations based upon the actual URL which has been typed and this page should give you a handy lookup guide to show which variables give up which parts of the URL.
Example URL: http://example.com/directory1/directory2/directory3/filename.html?
argument1=value1&argument2=value2&argument3=value3

Variable	Description	Example
[HTTP::host]	hostname	example.com
[HTTP::uri]	Everything after the hostname	example.com/directory1/directory2/directory3/filename.html ?argument1=value1&argument2=value2&argument3=value3
[HTTP::path]	the directory path and file name	/directory1/directory2/directory3/filename.html
[HTTP::query]	everything after the ?	argument1=value1&argument2=value2&argument3=value3
[URI::path [HTTP::uri] depth]	number of directories	value of 3
[URI::path [HTTP::uri] 1 1]	directory 1	directory1
[URI::path [HTTP::uri] 2 2]	directory 2	directory2
[URI::path [HTTP::uri] 3 3]	directory 3	directory3
[URI::query [HTTP::uri] "argument1"]	argument 1	value1
[URI::query [HTTP::uri] "argument2"]	argument 2	value2
[URI::query [HTTP::uri] "argument3"]	argument 3	value3
[URI::basename [HTTP::uri]]	file name	filename.html

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Moving Public Folders from Exchange 2003 to Exchange 2010

noreply@blogger.com (adfrad) — Mon, 11 Apr 2011 12:12:00 +0000

Migrating from Exchange 2003 can be a worrisome process.
Exchange is probably the most mission critical server in your organisation you want to ensure that no data is lost.
Public folders are often overlooked and it's only when you get towards decommissioning the server that you start to think about how to get the data off it.

The concept is easy, Exchange 2003 will only allow you to delete a PF store, if all PFs are replicated on other servers.

Microsoft have provided a few scripts to help you set up the PF replication they are located on the Ex2010 server in C:\Program Files\Microsoft\Exchange Server\V14\Scripts:

AddReplicaToPFRecursive.ps1 – adds a server to the replica list for a public folder and subfolders.

For example, to add EX2010 as a replica for all public folders on server EX2003 starting at the root folder of \ you would run this command.

AddReplicaToPFRecursive.ps1 –Server EX2003
 –TopPublicFolder \ –ServerToAdd EX2010

MoveAllReplicas.ps1 – this script replaces all of the replicas on one server with the new server. It works over the whole Public Folder store so there is no need to specify the root folder.

To move all replicas from EX2003 to EX2010 you would run this command.

MoveAllReplicas.ps1 –Server EX2003 –NewServer EX2010

To check that the replicas have been set on the folders, you can run:

Get-publicfolder -recurse |fl identity,replicas

Once the replicas are all up to date, you should be able to remove the Ex 2003 public folder store.

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Setting up Exchange 2010 to relay

noreply@blogger.com (adfrad) — Mon, 04 Apr 2011 14:52:00 +0000

By default, Exchange 2010 is locked down to stop unauthenticated users sending out emails to the Internet.
This is very good practice, but sometimes you do want this functionality (for example I want my monitoring system to alert me by SMS which involves sending an email to to phone provider).

First, you're going to need a new internal IP address.. there might be ways around this, but this will minimise any security risks... you don't need another NIC, just add a second IP address to your existing one.

One you have that set up, go to Server Config – Hub Transport:

Edit Default Receive Connector to only listen on the OLD IP address.

Then:

Actions – New Receive Connector

Follow the wizard filling in the information:

Name: RelayConnector

Use: Custom

Local Network settings:

FQDN:

Remote Network Settings:

Then edit the new Receive Connector so nothing is ticked on the Authentication Tab

Then make sure Anonymous users is selected on the Permissions Groups tab

Once this is done, open up Exchange PowerShell and allow anonymous users to authenticate using:

Get-ReceiveConnector RelayConnector | Add-ADPermission -User “NT AUTHORITY\ANONYMOUS LOGON” -ExtendedRights “ms-Exch-SMTP-Accept-Any-Recipient”

You should then be able to relay from you own subnet to external IPs.

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Domain Administrator Can't Run ActiveSync on Exchange 2010

noreply@blogger.com (adfrad) — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 13:31:00 +0000

While deploying a new Exchange 2010 server I cam across an annoying issue.
After testing the new server, I moved my mailbox over, and everything good, however my phone refused to connect using ActiveSync.
After much swearing, and a very useful visit to https://www.testexchangeconnectivity.com, I found out that Domain Admin accounts have Security Permissions inheritance blocked. This meant that the Exchange Servers group did not have the correct permissions on my mailbox.

To check whether inheritance is disabled on the user:

Open Active Directory Users and Computers.
On the menu at the top of the console, click View > Advanced Features.
Locate and right-click the mailbox account in the console, and then click Properties.
Click the Security tab.
Click Advanced.
Make sure that the check box for "Include inheritable permissions from this object's parent" is selected.

A few minutes later I was able to successfully sync my Android phone to my Exchange 2010 server.

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Tweak for more battery life on the Advent Vega

noreply@blogger.com (adfrad) — Sat, 01 Jan 2011 21:42:00 +0000

The Advent Vega has pretty impressive battery life, but if you want to squeeze even more life out of the beast, you may want to try this hack.

If you look at your battery stats, you'll see that the Device Standby process is sucking down a lot of the battery use... strange, that's the process for your cellular radio... and the Vega doesn't have a phone!

So, let's connect the Vega to the computer, and run the following ADB commands (these are from the android development kit).

adb shell mount -o remount,rw /dev/block/mmcblk0p5 /system
adb shell mv /system/app/Phone.apk /system/app/Phone.OLD
adb shell mv /system/app/TelephonyProvider.apk /system/app/TelephonyProvider.OLD
adb reboot

The Advent will reboot and when it comes up it'll be no longer running the useless process.

You'll also get a notification telling you that there is no signal... annoying, but at least you know it's worked!

To undo the changes, just run this script.

adb shell mount -o remount,rw /dev/block/mmcblk0p5 /system
adb shell mv /system/app/Phone.OLD /system/app/Phone.apk
adb shell mv /system/app/TelephonyProvider.OLD /system/app/TelephonyProvider.apk
adb reboot

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Advent Vega Restore Procedure

noreply@blogger.com (adfrad) — Thu, 30 Dec 2010 21:57:00 +0000

It took me ages to find the instructions on how to restore my Advent Vega to its original configuration using the restore image off the myadventvega website, so hopefully this'll save you a bit of time:

To restore your Advent Vega to our latest base image, please follow the steps below:
DOING THIS WILL REMOVE ALL YOUR APPLICATIONS – YOUR SD CARD STORAGE WILL NOT BE AFFECTED

Download the Advent Vega USB Flash driver from www.myadventvega.co.uk
Download the latest Advent Vega restore image from www.myadventvega.co.uk
Extract the USB flash drivers to a folder on your PC (eg C:\Advent\)
Connect the Advent Vega to your Windows PC with the supplied USB cable, you must also have the Vega PLUGGED INTO THE POWER SOCKET
Place the Advent Vega into recovery mode by:

Turn the Vega off by holding down the POWER button for 6 seconds

   Once off, hold the BACK button down for 2 seconds
   Then, whilst keeping the BACK button held, press and hold the POWER button for 2 seconds
   Then release just the POWER button but keep holding the BACK button for a further 2 seconds
   Release the BACK button

If this is the first time you have completed this you will need to install the Advent Vega recovery driver
Windows should automatically prompt you for a driver – if so point it to the folder you extracted the driver to above – THIS DRIVER IS CURRENTLY NOT SIGNED – YOU WILL NEED TO ALLOW THE DRIVER TO BE INSTALLED WHEN PROMPTED – DO NOT BE ALARMED BY THIS MESSAGE

Once installed, double-click on the Advent Vega Restore Image file downloaded above.
A DOS window will appear – DO NOT REMOVE OR POWER OFF YOUR DEVICE DURING THIS PROCESS.
Once the image is installed, you will be prompted to press ENTER to exit. Your Advent Vega should now be restored/updated.
Remove the USB cable.
Power on your Advent Vega – Your system will now be updated.

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Installing a recovery image (Clockworkmod) onto your Advent Vega / POV Mobii

noreply@blogger.com (adfrad) — Mon, 27 Dec 2010 13:55:00 +0000

Hopefully you now have a nicely root POV Mobii / Advent Vega (if not, please see here).
Now it's time to get a recover image onto your system.
A recovery image is a very basic operating system that allows you to do fundamental operations on the system... for those of you old enough, think of it as a boot floppy disk!

It's a bit complicated to get it set up the first time, but here we go...

First you need to install the Android Development Kit.

Then turn on debugging on your tablet : Settings > Applications > Development > USB Debugging

Plug in your tablet, and you should see a little bug in the task bar.

Once you have installed the Android Dev Kit (I recommend you install it to the c:\android directory) open up a command prompt and navigate to C:\android\tools

Type: adb devices

You should then see your device listed:

If you don't see it you'll need to go to device manager, find the unknown device, and install the ADB driver from C:\android\usb_driver

Now you are ready to start installing the Recovery Image.

Download the recovery image from:

and extract the two files and place them in c:\android\tools

Then run the following commands:

adb push recovery.img /data/local/
adb push flash_image /data/local/
adb shell chmod 4755 /data/local/flash_image
adb shell /data/local/flash_image recovery /data/local/recovery.img

Now all you need is a simple way to reboot your Vega into Recovery Mode: just install Vega Recovery Boot from the market.

Many thanks must must go to Paul at Modaco for these instructions (and the file). I'm a subscriber to Modaco, and am very happy with the support for the Advent Vega there.

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Rooting your Advent Vega / POV Mobii

noreply@blogger.com (adfrad) — Sun, 26 Dec 2010 16:46:00 +0000

A lot of posts will tell you that the Advent Vega is supplied pre rooted, however my experience with the latest ROM (the one without Flash installed) is quite the opposite.

So, before you start your plans you customise your Vega, the first this you probably want to do is root your tablet.

To do so, all you need to do is install Z4 root. You won;t be able to finid it in the Android Market as Google have removed it, however you should be able to pick it up from here

Copy it onto your SD card and then click on it using a file manager (like eStrongs File Manager

or Astro File Manager

This will then allow you to install the APK to your system.

When you have installed it, fire it up and select "Permanent Root" and your system will then make the changes, reboot, and once it's back up you'll be sorted! To check it works, install Titanium Backup which requires boot permissions to run.

Once you have rooted your device, your next step will probably be to backup your system (using Nandroid) so you can always recover from your hacking attempts... click here for the insructions.

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Exchange 2010/2007 servers not routing email internally

noreply@blogger.com (adfrad) — Thu, 23 Dec 2010 15:38:00 +0000

When installing a new Exchange 2007 server into my organisation (which already had a Exchange 2007 system installed), I can across a strange issue.

Emails from the new server would be delivered to the old one, but any response from the old one would result in the following message:

Your message wasn't delivered because of security policies. Microsoft Exchange will not try to redeliver this message for you. Please provide the following diagnostic text to your system administrator.

After much investigation (and a costly call to Microsoft) we found that the permissions on the Default Receive Connector was incorrect and I needed to grant Authenticated Users the "Accept Authoritative Domain Send" permission.

Once this was applied, emails flowed perfectly :)

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Boxee Box displays subtitles in MKV

noreply@blogger.com (adfrad) — Fri, 03 Dec 2010 01:10:00 +0000

I've just got the Boxee Box, while I've very happy with it in general, it does have a bug where subtitles in MKV files are always displayed.

There is a temporary workaround:

While playing an MKV, open up the video settings and move to the subtitles section way down off the bottom of the screen.

Problem solved!

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Exchange 2010 Deployment

noreply@blogger.com (adfrad) — Mon, 11 Oct 2010 13:16:00 +0000

I'm about to deploy Exchange 2010, so I need to learn all about it... first the book.

FIXED: Running VMWare vSphere Client 4.x on Windows 7 x64

noreply@blogger.com (adfrad) — Tue, 03 Aug 2010 14:53:00 +0000

Having installed a fresh new ESXi 4.1 server, I downloaded the Client Application from the server itself, and ran it.
Part of the way through the install, I get the error message:

The Microsoft Visual J# 2.0 Second Edition installer returned error code '4113'.

To fix this, you need to uninstall any existing copies of "Microsoft Visual J# 2.0 Redistribuatble Package" using Control Panel > Programs > Programs and Features

Once that has finished, install this version from Microsoft.

Now you should be able to install the VMWare client. :)

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