WindowsServer

Server 2012 – Enable DHCP Failover Cluster

Windows Server 2012 introduced a new feature with the DHCP Service: the built-in DHCP Failover Cluster. This function was requested for a long time.

Before Server 2012, if you want to failover your DHCP, two possibilities:

  • Create a real cluster, and add the DHCP role.
  • Split the scope between two servers. With Server 2008, a Wizard simplifies this task.

In Windows Server 2012, it is really simple to add High Availability for DHCP Service. Each server can release lease to client and the information is synchronised between all failover members.

Let’s see how to implement the Failover Configuration:

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WindowsServer

Server Technical Preview – Enable Graphical Shell GUI

If you are testing Windows Server Technical Preview 2, you probably noticed that the Graphical interface is no more enabled by default.

In fact, in Windows Server Technical Preview, you have two choices at the installation: Core and Core With Local Admin Tools. The second choice, Local Admin Tools lets you configure your server with Server Manager.

Technical Preview Installation

Technical Preview Installation

Server Technical Preview no GUI

Server Technical Preview no GUI

Feature

Like Windows Server 2012, GUI will be enabled by using Server Manager.

  • Go to Server Manager and Select Roles and Features.
  • On the Features Page, check Server Graphical Shell under User Interface and Infrastructure.
Server Preview Enable GUI

Server Preview Enable GUI

  • Start the installation and reboot.
  • After the reboot, GUI is available:
Technical Preview GUI

Technical Preview GUI

More

You can download Windows Server Technical Preview 2 here.

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WindowsServer

Windows Server – Not display Server Manager

Since Windows Server 2012, Server Manager is displayed when you log in. This can be annoying to close it each time. Hopefully, you can disable this behavior using two solutions:

  • Locally on the server.
  • With GPO.

Local Server Manager

If you want to prevent Server Manager to start automatically:

  • Go to Server Manager, click on Manage and click on Server Manager Properties:
Server Manager Properties

Server Manager Properties

  • Check Do not start Server Manager automatically at logon.
Server Manager not start automatically

Server Manager not start automatically

Group Policy Object

You can also set this option by GPO:

  • Path: Computer/ Administrative Templates / System / Server Manager
  • Setting: Do not display Server Manager automatically at logon
  • Value: Enabled
GPO Server Manager Disabled

GPO Server Manager Disabled

More

You could get more information about Server Manager here.

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SCCM

SCCM 2012 – Installation with SQL Server 2014

System Center Configuration Manager 2012 R2 now supports SQL Server 2014. But you will have an error during the wizard if you try install SCCM 2012 SP1 /R2 on SQL Server 2014.

Issue

SCCM Installation Wizard checks the version of SQL Server. However, it treats SQL Server 2014 like a version not supported:

The SQL Server srvsql.lab.local is not accessible or its version not supported.

Fix

Microsoft released a patch to correct this problem. KB3020755
The description of the KB is “Restore fails when the site database” but we will copy dll into the Wizard folder.

We need to do 4 steps:

  • Download and extract the KB into a temporary folder.
  • Execute CM12-R2-QFE-KB3020755-X64-ENU-OOB.exe. It will extract 2 files : prereqcore.dll and setupcore.dll
  • Copy these files into the SMSSETUP\BIN\X64\ folder.
  • Exit and restart the installation Wizard.

More

SCCM Team wrote a post on this topic here

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WindowsServer

Powershell – How to format all disks

Did you know that you can manage disks, partitions and volumes using Powershell? Microsoft released a lot of cmdlet in order to facilitate handling of disks.

With virtualization, you can easily add disk to your server, but you have to create the volume yourself. I wrote a script that you can integrate in your process, runbooks or others.

Disks initialization

First thing to do, is to prepare disks to host volume. We need to set disks online and to disable Read only.

try {
#Set all disks, except the first disk, to online and writable
Get-Disk | ?{$_.number -ne 0}| Set-Disk -IsOffline $False
Get-Disk | ?{$_.number -ne 0}| Set-Disk -isReadOnly $False
 
#Initialize all disks
Get-Disk | ?{$_.number -ne 0}| Initialize-Disk -PartitionStyle GPT
}catch{
Write-Host $_.Exception.Message
}

Volume

Once disks are ready, we need to create, and format volume.

try {
#Create Partition on all disk, auto assign letter and use maximum size
Get-Disk | ?{$_.number -ne 0}| New-Partition -AssignDriveLetter -UseMaximumSize
#Get all partitions and format them
Get-Disk | ?{$_.number -ne 0}| Get-Partition |?{$_.type -like "Basic"}| Format-Volume -Confirm:$false
}catch{
Write-Host $_.Exception.Message
}

Remote

If you want to execute these command on a remote host, it is possible. We will use the cmdlet Invoke-Command

try {
#Set all disks, except the first disk, to online and writable
Invoke-Command -ComputerName $lServerName -ScriptBlock {Get-Disk | ?{$_.number -ne 0}| Set-Disk -IsOffline $False}
Invoke-Command -ComputerName $lServerName -ScriptBlock {Get-Disk | ?{$_.number -ne 0}| Set-Disk -isReadOnly $False}
#Initialize all disks
Invoke-Command -ComputerName $lServerName -ScriptBlock {Get-Disk | ?{$_.number -ne 0}| Initialize-Disk -PartitionStyle GPT}
#Create Partition on all disk, auto assign letter and use maximum size
Invoke-Command -ComputerName $lServerName -ScriptBlock {Get-Disk | ?{$_.number -ne 0}| New-Partition -AssignDriveLetter -UseMaximumSize}
#Get all partitions and format them
Invoke-Command -ComputerName $lServerName -ScriptBlock {Get-Disk | ?{$_.number -ne 0}| Get-Partition |?{$_.type -like "Basic"}| Format-Volume -Confirm:$false }			
}catch{
Write-Host  $_.Exception.Message
}

More

You can get more information about Disk Management cmdlet here.

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