@siringo said in What Are You Doing Right Now:

how do you guys know when Mesh Central and Zerotier are updated?

For MeshCentral, you can go on the "My Server" tab and click "Check Server Version" to know if you want/need to update.

With so much development, I just update ever two or three days.

@scottalanmiller said in Server Setup for Legal Firm:

@Donahue said in Server Setup for Legal Firm:

one post wonder?

Exactly.

1PW's drive me absolutely insane. Between here (which has been realllllllly nice) and , I wish their was a count at the top for how many times the original poster replied.

Nothing worse than seen 5 pages of replies asking for further info to solve their problem when the 1PW abandons the post.

UGH, so tired of reading posts (on other boards) where multiple people reply with the same answer, sometimes a day or more later, without adding any additional info than previous posters!!

To top it off, there are only a handful of replies, so it is not hard to read the entire damn thread!!

This year I will be upgrading our 7 Windows VM's from 2K8 R2 as it is EOL in January 2020. I am trying to figure out the best route to take with regards MS licensing programs.

I found Microsoft's License Advisor and was wondering if those prices are typical? I am guessing they are

SMB with <70 users (half include clients who use RDS). I have whittled my way down to 7 Windows VM's (2 DC's, 2 RDS hosts, SQL server, Email, and File). In addition, I have two 2012 servers for special purposes but will upgrade one and remove the other at a later date.

We normally buy outright and skip an OS version but didn't make the move to 2016 for certain reason (unrelated to IT).

In the small spreadsheet I started this morning, I discovered the following;

A. Buying outright without SA is cheapest but not the best value.
B. Open with SA seems more seems to be more expensive over all in the cost vs value.
C. Open Value is higher cost but seems to have the best possible value (Spread payments).
D. Open Value Sub seems best Cost vs Value if perpetually staying on Windows

The extra values that SA brings is mobility and Upgrades.

I am wondering what the other people's experiences have discovered about which program provides the best value vs cost?

@scotth said in What Are You Doing Right Now:

@pmoncho said in What Are You Doing Right Now:

@scotth said in What Are You Doing Right Now:

@travisdh1 said in What Are You Doing Right Now:

@pmoncho said in What Are You Doing Right Now:

@travisdh1 said in What Are You Doing Right Now:

We're relaxing and trying to recover after a day spent a Cedar Point. Back in the hotel and looked at my step counter, 18093. A normal day is ~5600.

Did you get hit by any of the storms yesterday?

Around 3:45 PM. We got into the park at 9:00 AM, so we still had a long day riding rides and roller coasters. Very few lines this time of year as it's the first week Cedar Point is actually open during the week.

Wow,

I haven't been there since I was in high school. I would like to get there again.

You definitely should. Halloweekends is a great time to go if it is still warm with no rain.

The kids are in their 30's, grandkids are getting bigger. I'm pushing this out for review. They better say yes.

Absolutely. They put on a decent show with a few haunted mazes and so forth.

If you have grandkids that get scared, they do have lighted "No Boo" lanyards so characters know not to scare them. Don't stand next to them if you want the full experience though. Much more fun when they scare ya.

@scottalanmiller said in Windows Server Upgrade - MS Retail, Open, Open Value or Open Value Subscription:

My experience is that SA is basically a foregone conclusion. My rule is "if you don't want SA, then you should rethink having Windows."

That I totally get that which is why I moved a few process over to Linux and will be trying to move a few more as I am able to.

@nadnerB said in What Are You Doing Right Now:

Projects for new deployments of things, like a phone system or managed services needs to have a discovery phase where the vendor checks what they are deploying into.

I used to think that ^this^ was standard practice.
Apparently it's not, and I'd like to point out that a significant amount of the issues across a few projects that we've had over the last few years COULD HAVE BEEN PREVENTED.

So much facedesk... That reminds me I need a new desk, this one has a head shaped hole that suddenly appeared.

Help reduce the pain of your next facedesk. It will also reduce wear and tear on your next desk.

@jevans said in USG Pro 4 and our Company Security:

The "Customer Success Manager"(Rep) just emailed our CEO and President before I could have our IT meeting with them today. Here is what he sent:

"I see you are looking at using Ubiquiti hardware. That gives me pause on multiple levels.
• First Ubiquiti is not an enterprise grade system provider. While they have been making improvements on the last few years they are still pretty immature in their offerings and they are targeting the lower end of the market. I don’t have anything against them personally in fact I use some of their AP’s in my house. But for the environment you are looking to use them in where downtime is a big deal I would not look at using their equipment.
• Second is the lack of Functionality. The USG does not have the advanced security and management functionality that you will find in Fortinet and SonicWALL’s offerings.
o USG does not have any UTM options. If you will be allowing internet traffic to come and go at the branch offices and not forcing it to travers back to the centralized hub then that traffic is at risk. With using the UGS at the Atmosera Hub you will still be at risk only using a USG appliance there. I understand there has been attacks on your systems in the past (server encrypted) and the UTM protection, while not the end all be all, it is the front line defense to try and stop those types of attacks.
o DPI-SSL on the gateways is also becoming an important defensive measure. This is not something the USG can do.
• My third concern is support. Having supported a number of customers in the past that used Ubiquiti hardware for their WiFi and internal network hardware, their support model has not been impressive.
• Ubiquiti is fine for internal WiFi or network switching but I would not recommend them for gateway front line security."

Maybe you should take @scottalanmiller up on his offer for a phone call to this "sales rep" with your CEO on mute. Would definitely be beneficial.

@gjacobse said in What Are You Doing Right Now:

@pmoncho said in What Are You Doing Right Now:

@JaredBusch said in What Are You Doing Right Now:

@gjacobse said in What Are You Doing Right Now:

Too many to quote using the phone,.. thanks.

so- now it is a bit bitter sweet as I may very well lose all of my accrued PTO,..94 hours.

Will have to see

Dunno about your state, but every state I have dealt with, accrued means it is earned and is 100% required to be paid out.

For those in Ohio, the employer must have a written policy stating under what conditions accrued PTO will not be paid.

And there’s the ‘rub’ of course.

While I live and work in Kentucky, the company that pays me is in Ohio…. And yes- it’s in the Employee handbook. So it’s very very likely that I’ll get screwed out of it.

Forgot to mention, I don't see why a company believes in not paying out PTO hours for mainly, good, stable employees who put in their 2 week notice?

The now ex-employee will blab to the rest which may foster a issue amongst the current staff as the rumor runs amuck within the company.

If an employee has a good hunch they will not be paid, they might as well go on vacation for two weeks, come back for a day and then walk out a day before starting their new job. --- Seen this happen in the last few years.

You can check out orangecomputers.com They have custom build DL380's.
Build away.

@Obsolesce said in Non-IT News Thread:

@travisdh1 said in Non-IT News Thread:

@Obsolesce yes, with standard home toilets.

Really? All data shows public restroom / commercial water jet toilets. I can't find a single reference to a home toilet test or study. Nothing at all.

Until then, I have no reason to think a home toilet is at all as bad or even remotely close.

Give Mike Rowe a shot. Here is a snippit from an episode he did with a "clean" bathroom, black light, and flushing a home toilet with the lid up.

Youtube Video

Over the years, I have become a huge proponent of closing the lid before flushing.

Working on replacing two 2k8R2 TS servers with RDS 2019. These two servers host a LOB application with about 50 users.

Due to a few issues with our current setup and LOB app limitations, my plan is to create two RDS servers holding their own RDSH, RDCB, and RDWA roles. Each server will have their own collection (Containing only itself)

My question is, can these two servers still connect to one RDS License server (which will be located on a DC)? (I don't see why not but figured I'd check)

I know this is convoluted but it will change in the future to a single RDSH server with all roles as we will be upgrading to the new version of our LOB app connecting to a backend SQL Server.

Edit:added tags

@Pete-S said in Typical services and software in SMBs?:

Another related thing I've been pondering is if SMBs actually turn to MSPs/ITSPs for advice on solving business problems?

Or is it the MSPs/ITSPs that approach the SMBs with suggestions for improvement?

Or are MSPs/ITSPs just doing the work that the customer wants?

My anecdotal assessment in the SMB medical space has been:

If MSP's/ITSP's are brought in, it is via word of mouth because of some issue (Virus) or new project (Old days was moving to VOIP and now moving to cloud)

If internal IT, some contract with MSP for heavy lifting and time off coverage but this has been rare.

@scottalanmiller said in How to Stop an Ongoing RAID Rebuild HP P420i RAID Controller:

@Dashrender said in How to Stop an Ongoing RAID Rebuild HP P420i RAID Controller:

@scottalanmiller said in How to Stop an Ongoing RAID Rebuild HP P420i RAID Controller:

@dafyre said in How to Stop an Ongoing RAID Rebuild HP P420i RAID Controller:

@scottalanmiller said in How to Stop an Ongoing RAID Rebuild HP P420i RAID Controller:

@wrx7m said in How to Stop an Ongoing RAID Rebuild HP P420i RAID Controller:

@scottalanmiller said in How to Stop an Ongoing RAID Rebuild HP P420i RAID Controller:

@JaredBusch said in How to Stop an Ongoing RAID Rebuild HP P420i RAID Controller:

Shut the system down pull the failed drive and the hot spare turn it back on. You should be up and running on a degraded RAID array

We are terrified to turn the system off at this point.

I am guessing no backups? Is the system available at all?

System is currently available. In theory there are backups, but no capacity to test them and they are across the country. This isn't a managed customer, so we have no documentation, no visibility, no access. We just have to trust that they say that there are backups. But they confused their UPS with their NAS calling both their "backup" so we have literally no clue what they do and do not have.

I'd burn a couple of billable hours at least doing some investigation into their things using Mesh Commander. That way you have a better idea of where they are on the we're screwed o'meter.

That'd be great. But their CIO doesn't like us doing anything.

Then why are you still helping them?

Just waiting on them to give the orders. We aren't the CIO or the decision makers. We are the well paid button pushers here.

If they are being that "tight" (and possibly stupid) do you worry about your final bill being paid?

@travisdh1 said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

@pmoncho said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

@Obsolesce said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

@wrx7m said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

@Obsolesce said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

@Dashrender said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

@scottalanmiller said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

@Dashrender said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

@mlnews said in Miscellaneous Tech News:

Slack isn’t worried about Microsoft’s big Teams push

Slack’s CEO compares Microsoft’s Teams bundling to Google+
Microsoft revealed last week that it now has more than 13 million people using its Microsoft Teams chat software, a milestone that means the app has overtaken Slack.

It's hard not to agree. Actual engagement is the only thing that matters.

Actually, it's businesses being willing to pay for the service is all that matters.

It’s not something you pay extra for since it’s bundled with O365.

You are.

If you want Slack, it's not because you also want Google Sheets or Zimbra email with XYZ. It's because you want Slack because of what business needs it covers.
Slack is $6-$12 per user per month.

If you just want MS Teams (which is a legit need by the way), too bad, you also have to pay for other stuff you may or may not need or use.
MS Teams will cost you $5, which is cheaper than Slack, which does NOT include Office or Office Suite, but does include Exchange... whether or not you need it. To get Office, it's a minimum of $12.50 for Business Premium (< 300 users). Otherwise, you're buying enterprise O365 licenses which just goes up.

We switched from SFB/Teams to slack plus. Waste of money IMO. I didn't like either of them because I don't like chat for work.

Email is really abused and extremely inefficient for most of what it's typically used for within most organisations.

I cannot up vote this enough. You can add spreadsheets to the abused and extremely inefficiently used platform, IMHO.

And I can't upvote this enough. Have you ever had to deal with MS Dynamics? shudders

Nope. Thank goodness.

My brother's company makes him use a HUGE HUGE spreadsheet for part of their Inventory processing so Management. Heck, put it in a stupid Access DB for crying out loud. But, but, but, Excel can give Management the pretty pie chart they want.. :pensive_face:

@WrCombs said in Anyway I can Learn AD?:

@pmoncho said in Anyway I can Learn AD?:

wrcombs.com is available. Go register it for a year at godaddy (or whoever) for $12.

Then, like @thwr pointed out in his list, use something like ad.wrcombs.com as your AD domain.

doesn't sound horrible. thanks.

Welcome. Staying away from .local domains, plus knowing you are not using somebody else's domain will make your life SO MUCH easier. No need to start learning bad habits in the beginning.

@travisdh1

Big fan of Microcenter myself. It's nice to see them continue to stay busy over the last 20+ years and their nice stock of Ubiquity products.

@G-I-Jones said in New VM keeps turning off:

@black3dynamite said in New VM keeps turning off:

UEFI or BIOS VM?
If UEFI, is secure boot enabled?

UEFI, Secure Boot is Disabled

You may want to go into (on the guest) System Properties -> Advanced Tab -> Startup and Recovery -> Uncheck "Automatically Restart"

That way if you get BSOD, you can see it on the screen.

Then look for the memory dump like @EddieJennings stated. Then use program @DustinB3403 mentioned to figure out WTH is going on.

If you don't know if it is the whole host, whip up a linux machine real quick and let it run. If the Exchange server halts, see if you can still access the linux machine. Just an option.

@hobbit666 said in Securing SSH:

@DustinB3403 I've already got the password on the keys. I've just not disabled password logins in case i kill something and need to get access :). Planning on removing it once i've "SSH Key's" the other servers.

Don't forget, you can still login as root or a admin user on the console. You are only securing ssh.

If you want to test, login to the console of the server (stay logged in), change your sshd_config, restart sshd process, test logging in with your keys and/or any other testing you want to do. If all is well, log out of the console.

@Pete-S said in Does intra-VM traffic leave the host?:

Assume you have two VMs on the same host talking to each other, on a network that is not just an internal network inside the host.

Will the traffic actually leave the physical NIC on the host or will it just stay inside the host?

From my understanding of ESXi, two guests located on the same local host vswitch will not go out the physical NIC.