Exchange vs Cloud and why SMB should care.

Back again, been a long time since I had anything useful to share but having recently done yet another Exchange to Google Apps migration I thought I should update people as to just how easy this process has become.

I have inherited a client with 10 users they have an exchange server running Windows Server 2003, it's unreliable crashes constantly and basically causes havoc with the users. Its the gateway and manages DNS and DHCP so if it goes down, internet, email, file sharing stop. The business grinds to a halt and people get upset as they cannot do anything at this stage.

They were sitting on the option to upgrade everything (the server was quite old) which would mean, new server estimated around $4000 new licenses for the server and the cal's for the other computers on the network. Not to mention the setup and ongoing maintenance. A cloud solution with Google Apps is a fraction of that cost. Before I got involved they were going to head down this road but after I met with my new client I explained the cloud and how cost beneficial it can be (not just in the initial setup but the ongoing cost's as little to no maintenance is required).

People love what they are used to Google allows a user to stay in this world.

Keen to go ahead the only concern was that the change might interrupt the current obsession that most of the staff have with outlook. Google to the rescue, they have thought of this and have the almost perfect solution Google Apps Sync for Microsoft Outlook. My client was not convinced everything will look the same as it does currently, so I showed them on my laptop I linked to my Google Apps account and all was proven. The only thing that was missing was the lack of public folders my client was using public folders for a sort of global contact list but I found a solution for that too by using Apptivo Contacts Sharing for free they were able to sync all their existing contacts and this would then sync across to all users.

So my client went ahead with the solution, migration was smooth, only thing is it takes a long long time to upload the content onto Google's servers, I used the Google Apps Migration Tool for exchange on the server. Now my client doesn't have to worry about the exchange server going down and disrupting his whole workplace. The issue now is making sure the internet connection is 100% stable and maybe even setting up a backup.

I could see how this can be a massive headache migrating a larger user set to the cloud in this manner, but for  an small to medium business without internal IT support this just makes so much more sense then having a self hosted mail solution.

D-Link Print Server DPR-2000 - Windows 7 Printer Not Responding

I have a client who is running a HP 4250 Laserjet, with no network in the printer, this is the non 'N' version from HP. The printer runs fine when plugged into the USB port through Windows 7 and all is great. Client wanted to share the printer but not be reliant on a computer having to be on to be able to send print jobs.

The D-Link DPR-2000, slow print.

I thought I would try out a D-Link print server DPR-2000 to do the job, this way all users on the network can access when the computer isn't on, and this device will serve the print jobs.

After installing the device (not hard, one plug into the USB and other into network) and setting it up getting the users printing, over the coming days users noticed the computer being very slow, and printing was taking ages. I sort of didn't believe them as I was using a couple of computers and everything was running quick for me. That is until you click on the print button, the Windows print screen screen would take about 30 seconds to a minute to come up and the program in the background would usually say 'Not Responding' and grey out like its going to crash.

You will be waiting for this screen a lot with the DPR-2000

Puzzled I tried to search for answers thinking that this was a network issue with the computers, I had AVG running so I tried opening up IP ranges, turning off the firewall completely and nothing. I also had a look for firmware updates for the DPR-2000 of which I found none. Last resort was to remove the print server all together and use Windows to share the printer. Now there are no speed issues or anything no, 'Not Responding' errors etc.

So you buy a device to do one thing and it can't do it as well as Windows built in print serving, poor form D-Link. I will refrain from purchasing your products in future.

PC turns on sometimes, others no chance.

I had a client give let me look at their old computer which would not switch back on following a hard unexpected shutdown. Where clients monitor was still on saying 'No signal detected'. The client then tried to turn the computer back on with no success, nothing at all, no sound of the computer attempting to boot, seemingly no power.

The computer is around 4-5 years old so first thought was the motherboard or power supply. Upon receiving the computer I attempted to start it up, and it did, got into Windows Vista (yuck!) and then I was able to use as normal.

So quickly I copied all the content from the PC to a USB drive just in case this was a fluke. Turns out it was a fluke, as I tried to shutdown and then turn the PC on again I witnessed what the client described, no power, no lights.

Since at this stage I was thinking definitely power supply and motherboard and that it could cost a bit to replace if its a motherboard that has become faulty, the client decided not to proceed with diagnostics and that they would buy a new PC, the most important part was the data is recovered. Fair enough, so I gave the  PC back and everyone was happy.

Seeing as though the client had the computer originally built by a friend who knows hardware, the client took the computer back to their friend to get a second opinion. Long story short the friend apparently found what the issue was, the CMOS battery had died or become faulty. Usually when this happens I find the BIOS tells you that the battery is low or CMOS memory mismatch etc, this computer no signs.

Standard CMOS Battery

Replacement of the battery is cheap, so just another thing I can check in the future when diagnosing faulty hardware next time.

Overheating Acer 5741 series

Looked at a random switching off issue on an Acer 5741 Laptop the other day. Clients main use of the computer is as a media center and was saying that is would randomly shut down when it had been on for a while. 

This was actually the second Acer machine I looked at as I had another client with a similar problem in an All in One (Z5610( which turned out to be a heat issue, so for this case that's where I headed first.

The laptop has an intel i3 inside and and Nvidia GT320 so I suspect one of these to be the culprit, I set out trying to replicate the issue and get the laptop to shutdown. So let the torture begin, I used Prime95 for CPU stressing and FurMark to test the video card. Both are free and push your components to the limit. I first ran each test independently and the CPU was close to max hovering around 70 degrees under stress, video card was at around 75 - 80 degrees. So for a laptop I thought these were fairly high.

I couldn't get the laptop to shut down on me though.

That is until I tried running both tests at the same time, within about 30 seconds the computer shut down, the heat caused by both components must have freaked the fan out and the CPU jumped to around 90 degrees before shutting down.

Problem found, now to find a fix, I ventured to google to find instruction on how to open the laptop, quickly I found an awesome Services Guide which step by step tells you how to disassemble the system and put it back together, with pictures, great news. Now the plan was to go in look at the heat contacts on the CPU and Video card and clean/re-apply thermal paste to the contacts. Close it back up and test.

Opening was easy and as soon as I got to see the CPU and Video card it was quite evident what the problem was.

CPU Before

CPU After

Seems as though Acer had been quite sloppy when applying this in the factory as that did not look right to me at all. So began cleaning both the CPU, Video card and the heat sinks.

Heat Sinks before

Heat Sinks after

Applied Artic Silver Thermal Paste and sealed the laptop back up. Booted the system and went straight back to the CPU stress testing, CPU is now hitting 45-55 degress instead of 70 under stress. Video card also has improved 55-65 under stress whereas before it was closer to 80. Now the big question will it still restart running together. The answer no, I ran the test with both components under stress for 30mins and the CPU didn't come within 20 degrees of where it was before the clean out.

So another computer saved from the scrap heap where Acer staff reported this was a software error.

QNAP TS-259 Pro and the battle of the firmware update

Today I decided to update the firmware on a QNAP TS-259 Pro, a network attached storage device which has a ton of built in servers. It runs a version of linux so is very popular with people who want to create custom firmwares etc.

QNAP TS-259 Pro NAS

I thought this would be a simple process, but I ran into a massive issue where the web interface and the QNAP Finder were not letting the update proceed. In both cases the upload of the firmware file was taking quite a while to upload, much longer then usual at least 10mins. It would get to around 20% then fail.

Next I proceeded to the Manual update of firmware
http://wiki.qnap.com/wiki/Manually_Updating_Firmware

This requires me to get Putty http://www.putty.org/ and to connect to the device and run some commands. All good pretty straight forward and then I get the error that I am out of space somewhere in the process of the extracting of the files.

To get around this I did the following:

1. Used the 'df' command in the putty prompt it shows the details of the different folders and look for any that have a high % of data used.
2. I found the /mnt/HDA_ROOT/  file is at around 95% so I targeted this folder.
3. I manually went through each file and folder in the folder and check for large files and remove, namely any tmp files I could see.
4. Eventually I came across the .spool folder in there was a file which was around 400Mb in size!, found it removed the file (using 'rm')
5. Tried again to do the process in the wiki and boom everything updated smoothly.

So in closing check the .spool folder for any large garbage files that you can clear out and then you should be  golden. After this worked for me now the GUI web interface works as well as the QNAP finder. Seeing as this server was used as a print server it might be work clearing the print queue through the web interface before trying a firmware update as I think they use the same default storage area of /mnt/HDA_ROOT/

All in all these QNAP devices are great I have used several of them and in my experience even if there is a problem it is quite easy to find a solution as they are inherently such open devices. 

Netgear DGN2200 and the Genie

Yesterday had a firsthand experience with the DGN2200 which touts the "NETGEAR Genie^® CD-less installation"  which is 'supposed' to help detect what kind of internet connection you have by using information present in the DSL connection.

Netgear DGN2200

Client I attended had a TPG account but I thought I would let the Genie do its thing, it verifies your location and then lets me know the process could take up to 6 minutes, so I sat and watched as this thing refreshed over and over again then eventually it froze my Chrome browser. So I had to restart the process, this time in IE, I am assuming they are catering towards large support levels, but this also crashed after several minutes.

I had to resort to manual set up to get the Client up and running but for a device where they obviously put some effort into the Genie it didn't seem to cut the mustard. So I set up the TPG account manually and nothing happened, no internet, DSL connection was fine as in connected but no authentication had taken place, not even an attempt.

Remembered I had to change the ADSL type from VC to LLC and I was all set, internet on and good to go. The Genie will probably be fixed with revisions in Firmware, but that doesn't help people who are buying this today with the hopes of setting it up themselves.

Needless to say, get back in the lamp.

Computer won't Start - Disk Read Error

The worst possible screen when booting up a machine happened to me today.

Simply
Disk Read Error 
Press Ctrl + Alt + Delete to Restart

The 250Gb Western Digital drive that was at best estimate 5 years old decided to bite the dust. I usually cycle my drives but this one had slipped past.

Straight away I headed into BIOS to see if the disk is still being recognised, and it was, puzzled I removed the drive and powered up my nexstar hard drive dock and checked the drive, it was working perfectly.

So i began to do what I should have done a while ago, backup the drives contents, the software of choice, Acronis True Image home, this will allow me to restore onto another drive in the future and have the thing be bootable.

Acronis True Image Home 2012


The drive mustn't be dead so it could be a Windows XP issue, (its an old machine) hopefully not as software issues in Windows are more time consuming then failed drives, Windows sort of teases you into thinking you have a chance of resurrecting your Windows install only to find that it would probably have been best to re-install and start from scratch you'll finish that install quicker then solving any lingering registry or missing dll issue you will encounter.


No biggie either way will restore backup back to new drive shortly and hope all will be good.


- Update
Yep the drive was failing only slightly enough that Windows XP couldn't boot and cried a little. As soon as I restored to a new drive Windows XP booted straight in. XP boot process could have tried a little harder to boot in my opinion, but anyways lesson learned drives don't last forever.

Again many thanks to Acronis True Image Home, made it a very simple process.