Archive for the 'Microsoft' Category



21
Oct

SCCM: How to enable Command console in WinPE

To troubleshoot SCCM OSD problems it is very handy to have Command console enabled. Basically what it does, it gives you a command prompt in WinPE. This allows you to do basic troubleshooting but the main thing for me is that it allows me to copy Task Sequence log file to USB drive, so I can check it for errors.

To enable this feature open Configuration Manager Console Continue reading ‘SCCM: How to enable Command console in WinPE’

21
Oct

SCCM: An error occured while starting the task sequence (0×80070032)

When deploying image to the machine you receive the following error:
An error occurred while starting the task sequence (0×80070032).

The task sequence start running fine. It creates the partition, formats it and fails straight away when it starts applying the image.

Looking at the smsts.log file you can see the following: Continue reading ‘SCCM: An error occured while starting the task sequence (0×80070032)’

29
Sep

SCCM: WinPE NIC drivers for Dell E6400

The new Dell E6400 gives some troubles while trying to OSD it. The drivers provided by Dell does not work. You can import XP drivers but not Vista. SCCM WinPE is based on Vista so you’ll need Vista drivers. without drivers the system will boot to WinPE but then it will restart.

The correct drivers can be found on Intel website.
Download both 32 and 64 bit drivers.
Once downloaded extract PRO1000 folder from both files. I used WinRar for that.

Place these to folder somewhere where your SCCM server could access them and import them to SCCM. Yuo can read on importing drivers here. You don’t have to create driver package. The only thing you need is to add the drivers to Boot images and update distribution points.

02
Sep

SCCM R2 Evaluation ready for download

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=7376214f-cba3-4e0d-81fe-ad52488be3a3&DisplayLang=en

28
Jul

Windows Installer Version Matrix

Stefan Krueger posted nice Windows Installer Version Matrix.

10
Jul

SCCM: System reboots after loading WinPE

So you are trying to OSDnew machine using SCCM. The machine boots from PXE and starts loading WinPE. You see WinPE SCCM background image with a window ‘Windows is starting up‘ after that you briefly see message ‘Preparing network connection‘. The message disappears and you only see the background, and then system reboots.

In the task sequence log file smsts.log you find the error messages:
Failed to download pxe variable file. Code(0×00000001)
PxeGetPxeData failed with 0×80004005

This means that WinPE Boot image does not have required network card(NIC) driver in order to access SCCM servers.

To solve the problem, you have to download NIC drivers and add them to Boot image. I have created a separate post how to do that.

10
Jul

SCCM: How to Import Drivers, create driver packages and add them to WinPE boot images

First do the following:
a. Download and extract the drivers to a network share
b. Create a network share that will be used for drivers storage.(I’ve created this on one of the SCCM servers)

Once you have the thing above you can Open Configuration Manager Console
1. Go to Computer Management>Operating Systems Deployment>Drivers
2. Now you can right click on Drivers and choose import but I would recommend first to create some kind of folder structure(like model\device) as this will make things easier in the future. Once you have folders created right click on it and select Import.
Continue reading ‘SCCM: How to Import Drivers, create driver packages and add them to WinPE boot images’

08
Jul

SCCM: Image Capture Wizard has failed with error code (0×80070020)

During image capture process you receive the following error:
Image Capture Wizard has failed with error code (0×80070020). For more information, please contact your system administrator or helpdesk operator.

This error might appear at any time during the image capture procedure.

In the smsts.log the following messaged error are logged:
Failed to run the action: Capture the Reference Machine.
The process cannot access the file because it is being used by another process. (Error: 80070020; Source: Windows)

The execution of the group (Capture the Reference Machine) has failed and the execution has been aborted. An action failed.
Operation aborted (Error: 80004004; Source: Windows)

Failed to run the last action: Capture the Reference Machine. Execution of task sequence failed.
The process cannot access the file because it is being used by another process. (Error: 80070020; Source: Windows)

As you can see from the error messages the problem is caused by inaccessible file. In my case capture wizard could not access the files located in HP restore partition. Because restore partinion was not needed l I’ve deleted it and image capture ran OK.

27
Jun

Microsoft: Hyper-V released to manufacturing

Hyper-V, a key feature of Windows Server 2008, has now released to manufacturing (RTM) and is available for deployment into production environments. A beta of Hyper-V was included with Windows Server 2008 and this update provides the final release. (Read More)

25
Jun

Exchange: Problem installing SP1 on Exchange 2007

Here is a problem I came across while trying to install Service Park 1(SP1) on Exchange 2007.
During the checking I was getting the following error:

You must be a member of the Exchange Organization Administrators group to upgrade the first Hub Transport server role in your organization to Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 1.

End also the same error for all the other roles.

Although I knew that the user have all necessary rights I’ve double checked that and it does.

Solution was very simple I needed to reboot exchange server and after reboot everything worked just fine.