I haven’t built a PC for some time, so this article on PC Magazine caught my eye. For everyday computing such as web browsing and word processing, this is a great deal.

Here’s the specs, and the article.

Case/power supply/motherboard: ASUS V2-M2v890 (barebones kit) $99.99 

Processor: AMD Athlon 64 X2 4400+ $58.50

Memory: 1GB Corsair DDR2 $24.99

Hard drive: Western Digital Caviar SE WD1600AAJS 160GB hard drive $44.99  

Optical drive: Lite-On 20x LH-20A1L $27.99  

OS: Windows Vista Home Basic (OEM) $89.99

TLC

Replaced the “old” SonicWALL with the new one. I decided to do the setup manually to refamiliarize myself with the configuration, and all went well except for remote connectivity!

The Enhanced OS is complicated and powerful, but once you get it in place it just works. Now I’m back in that place, but not after a call to support.

My client would connect and even allow drive mappings and Outlook connectivity but very sporadically. I could ping and get a single reply, then nothing.

Outlook would connect and then drop.

First I logged an online support session. Then I called support. Turns out that the guy that called me on the online session was more competent than the direct phone support rep! Phone Guy had me pinging servers on my LAN from the Global VPN Client (remote) and he was watching the packets fly by on the SonicWALL. He concluded that there must be a switch on the network messing things up. “Au Contrare!” I said. “It worked fine with the old SonicWALL.” He maintained his stand, and I let him off the hook, knowing I would get another call.

Online Guy called me, and he had it figured out in 20 minutes. We did a number of things to clean it up, which I summarize below!

Under Network Objects: 

Created a network group object that included our two LAN interfaces: (X0 Subnets & X3 Subnets,) Called it VPN Networks. When exporting the VPN config file, choose this network object as the connect to item.

Under VPN:

In the VPN Configuration
On the Client TAB:
Client Connections section; Virtual adapter settings are DHCP Lease, Allow Connections to: SPlit Tunnels.
The setting that I changed was the “Set Default Route as this Gateway,” by clearing the check box. Since we are not allowing Internet access through the LAN this is not configured.
On the Advanced TAB:
Cleared the check box: Require Authentication of VPN Clients via XAUTH

 > DHCP over VPN, click configure, and unchecked the box “Use Internal DHCP Server (this means the one in    the SonicWALL), Since we are passing the request to our internal (LAN network) DHCP server.

 > Advanced, Cleared the checkbox “Ignore DF(Don’t Fragment) Bit”

Re-export the config file, being sure to choose the new object. Don’t forget to save your config!

TLC

With so many people jumping into the LAMP world, this little issue seems to crop up on a regular basis. Here’s a quote from my project page on installing Debian;

Adding Index.htm as the Default Page and Removing that damn “apache2-default/” directory from the path!

Edit/create the file /sites-available/default with the entry:

DirectoryIndex index.htm index.php index.pl

Removing the directory redirection is simple too: just edit /sites-available/default and comment out

#RedirectMatch ^/$ /apache2-default/

Hope this helps those newbie LAMP installers, like me!

TLC

This was a strange one. I could get to the printers via it’s IP. It would print fine from the control panel, it just wouldn’t go online and become available.

The two printers this occured on were: HP Laserjet 4350 and a Canon iR C5185 multifunction.

What changed? Added Windows 2003 Server SP2! The fix is in though; in the driver properties on the Ports tab, click “configure port.”  I unchecked “SNMP Status Enabled”, since we don’t use that. If you do, then you should roll back SP2, go direct with that particular printer, or something else I haven’t found!

 TLC

This is a great reference for those who don’t set up Cisco routers on a daily basis!

Executive Summary:
Working with a Cisco router and the Cisco Internetworking Operating System (IOS) is a great way to experiment with networking concepts and gear and could be good for your career development. Learn the basic steps of setting up a Cisco router to provide Internet access to a small network.

Working with a Cisco router and the Cisco Internetworking Operating System (IOS) is a great way to experiment with networking concepts and gear and could be good for your career development. You can get some hands-on IOS experience by setting up a Cisco router at the Internet edge in your test lab at work or in your home office. A Cisco router allows you greater flexibility (with more granular controls than the Linksys or NETGEAR hardware commonly used in home offices) if you later want to expand your setup to include, say, a Microsoft ISA Server firewall on the back end.

Let’s go through the basic steps of setting up a Cisco router to provide Internet access to a small network. I’ll assume you have some basic IOS knowledge, including how to log on and how to save and clear configurations. I’ll also assume that you have a solid understanding of networking, including what Network Address Translation (NAT) is. I won’t cover items such as setting up Secure Shell (SSH) access and hardening access lists. You can expand into those areas as you feel comfortable and want to experiment more.

Here’s the rest of the article;

To reduce the effect adware and unauthorized programs have on the enterprise, we have been removing administrator access for most users. In order to perform admin tasks, I need to use the secondary logon as outlined here (copied from Microsoft site here.)

TLC

Install the Windows 2003 Resource Kit tools. Run the Command Shell.

cdburn.exe d: c:\yourimage.iso

ENTER

Done!

I found this article on TechRepublic while searching for just such a tutorial! I have put it here for my (and your) reference! 

Takeaway: E-mail has become a mission-critical tool in most businesses. See how Nslookup and Telnet can help diagnose problems when e-mail doesn’t go through.

Here’s the full article on my site.

Found this little gem on MSDN:

CD/DVD data burning on 2008.

Insert blank disk

run cmd prompt as administrator

format <drive> /fs:udf

Drag and drop.

Manually eject when done.

TLC

We have migrated slowly toward Dell servers and workstations. Almost all of our servers are Dell, and probably half the workstations. I’m looking for a client and server management solution, and Dell offers a free version of it’s client management suite.

QUOTE Regarding the software:

We use the Dell Client Manager Suite in our NS setup extensively. We make use of the several of the key features including but not limited to:

1. BIOS Configuration Policies - All BIOS configurations can be remotely changed silently to meet a set criteria. It was wonderful when we finally started using PXE and WOL (Had a lot of static IP addressing that impeded this initially) we simply set up and tested the policies and applied them. As machines checked in, WOL and PXE was enabled, NIC set to first boot order, silent chassis intrusion, etc.

2. BIOS Update policies - You can set up jobs to update the BIOS revisions and execute them remotely without having to make a desk side visit.

3. Hardware Monitoring - You can set up alerts to monitor for HDD space, failures, memory changes, etc. and email or take automated action, such as run a script or job. We do not currently use Help Desk Solution, but I could see value add here.

4. Real Time System Manager enhancements - Similar to BIOS Configuration Policies except you can do it on a case by case basis.

5. More in depth Dell specific inventory information - provides more detailed information about the Dell Specific hardware and provides more Dell  specific canned reporting for Inventory Solution.

I can’t really recommend it enough if you are an all Dell shop. Some of the gotchas:

1. Make sure that your machines meet the minimum supported models lists. This does not include any of the Inspiron class machines. The latest revision only covers the Optiplex 270 and up, Latitude D600 and up, and Precision 3?? and up. Also, when rolling out the Open Manage Client Instrumentation for the first time, it may require a reboot even if the documentation says it does not after the initial installation, and it does not adhere to the NS Agents Reboot Action settings such as allowing the user to delay the reboot. I found this out the hard way, but I continue to be employed. Live and learn. let me know if you have any other specific questions, please feel free to ask. I hope that this helps.

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