Feb 282020
 
Image of Small Business Server software box

Is it time to upgrade and migrate from Microsoft Windows Small Business Server to a new platform? Need help with the migration?

Windows Server 2008 (which is part of SBS) has reached it’s end of life. It’s now time to upgrade. I can help! I provide Small Business Server migration consulting services!

SBS Migration and Consulting Services

With over 50 Small Business Server migrations under my belt, I can assist, perform, and provide consulting services if your company or organization is looking to migrate from Microsoft Small Business Server to a new platform.

For more information on Small Business Server consulting services and help with migrations, please see: https://www.stephenwagner.com/hire-stephen-wagner-it-services/

Small Business Server Experience/Services

  • SBS Migration (SBS to SBS)
  • SBS to Full Microsoft Windows Server
  • SBS to Microsoft Exchange (2016, 2019)
  • SBS to Office 365
  • SBS to Microsoft Azure
  • SBS to 3rd party platforms
  • SBS Consulting and Advice
  • File and Print Server SBS Migration
  • Certificate Services Migration
  • SharePoint Services Migration
  • SBS Server decommission

Contact me for more Information

Feel free to contact me for assistance at https://www.stephenwagner.com/hire-stephen-wagner-it-services/.

Whether you need someone to complete and perform the migration, assist, plan, or just advise and check over things, I can help!

Sep 232016
 

There’s quite a few of us that started off deploying Small Business Server (SBS2008, SBS2011) environments back in the day, loving the handy all-in-one package taking care of everything from Active Directory and Exchange, to disaster recovery and business continuity. However, some of these old environments are starting to catch up with us. I wanted to open a discussion on a big issue I had a couple years ago in one of my first migrations from SBS 2008, to Windows Server 2012 R2 with the Essentials Experience role installed, with Exchange Server 2013.

As most of you know, SBS comes packaged to push “.local” domains on initial domain configuration. This used to be considered best practice, and most of us even configured .local’s on non-SBS environments. This has never really posed any problems for us I.T. guys, except for a few configuration considerations when setting up Outlook clients, DNS, etc…

Now if you’re like me, another thing I always configured, was user accounts that didn’t match e-mail addresses. An example would be “John Doe”, with the username of “JohnD”, and the e-mail address of “[email protected]”. Also, our buddy John Doe would have a AD UPN [email protected] (this was automatically populated on user setup)

User’s Name: John Doe

SAM Account Name: INTERNALDOMAIN\JohnD

Username: JohnD

AD UPN: [email protected]

E-mail Address: [email protected]

 

I always liked this as it provided some protection if the users password ever got compromised (in a phishing attack, fake e-mail logon page, etc…), as the password could not actually authenticate when using the e-mail address as a username (the username was never actually provided in the attack, only e-mail).

Now let’s flash forward to this migration from SBS 2008, to Windows Server 2012 R2 with Essentials Experience, and throw Exchange 2013 in to the mix. Right off the bat, everything is working fine, Outlook 2010 is working great, Outlook 2013 is working great. Then BAM, Outlook 2016 comes out!

Outlook 2016 does not allow manual or custom configuration of Exchange accounts. They do this for “reliability” and ease of configuration. This means that you HAVE to have autodiscover setup, and working fluidly. No more manual configuration. Internally inside of the LAN this is all automatic if you configured Exchange properly, but you will have to configure autodiscover externally.

Internally on the LAN, Outlook 2016 clients have absolutely no issues, and authentication is working fine (no password prompts). However, when configuring external users, while you can eventually get it configured, the user is constantly prompted for credentials on every Outlook start.

On these password prompts, you’ll notice it’s authenticating for the users e-mail address. In this example, it’s asking for “[email protected]” and you enter: “INTERNALDOMAIN\JohnD” and their password, it work for the session, but keeps prompting on every fresh Outlook start.

I did massive amounts of research and seriously I could not come across one article that actually provided all the information I needed, it almost seemed as if this problem was specific to this single environment. Of course, this makes me think I have something configured incorrectly, and I literally spend forever searching for information, checking my VirtualDirectories on my Exchange server, checking logs, wasting tons and tons of time.

Finally after checking my configurations 6-10 times each and spending weeks, I realized it had nothing to do with anything configured incorrectly.

Outlook 2016 does all the configuration automatically, and expects to find everything it needs via auto discover. Putting it simple, the user’s UPN must match their e-mail address.

This means we have to change John Doe’s Active Directory UPN to match his e-mail address. The SAMAccountName still remains the same, so his login to his computer will not change, however after the change he will now be able to log in both with INTERNALDOMAIN\JohnD and [email protected].

First we have to add the UPN suffix (which is the actual e-mail address domain name) to the Active Directory Domain and Trusts. Instructions are available here: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/243629. Please note Microsoft has since deleted the original knowledge base article so I created a blog post to outline the instructions here: https://www.stephenwagner.com/2018/10/16/how-to-add-an-alternative-upn-suffix-to-an-active-directory-domain/.

After adding your e-mail domain to the UPN suffix list. When you go in to “Active Directory Users and Computers”, and view a user’s properties, you’ll notice in the UPN section, you can drop it down and change it from internaldomain.local, to contoso.com (using my example domains). You can also change the username inside of the UPN.

 

Essentially for Johny boy, his AD properties window now looks like:

User Logon Name:

[email protected] (we changed the name, and chose the external domain in the drop down to the right)

User logon name (pre-Windows 2000):

INTERNALDOMAIN\ JohnD (we left this the way it was)

 

John can now login either using “INTERNALDOMAIN\JohnD” or “[email protected]”. As far as John is concerned we haven’t changed anything and he still logs in using the same format he always has, totally unaware of any changes.

Surprise surprise, autodiscover is now fully functioning for this user. Not only for easy configuration on mobile devices (iPhones, Windows Phones, etc…), but he can now load up Outlook 2016 away from the LAN on the Internet, type in his e-mail address, password, and BAM he’s good to go!

I am a little bit unsettled in the fact that the e-mail address now becomes a fully accepted username on the domain (for security reasons), but I guess we’re stuck with that!

 

In short, our problem is:

  1. Username doesn’t match e-mail (JohnD username, [email protected] email)
  2. Running Outlook 2016 and forced to use auto-discover, repeated password prompts
  3. Running .local domain internally, while using different domain externally

In Short, to fix this:

  1. Add UPN Suffix to Active Directory
  2. Change users properties so that UPN matches e-mail address, DO NOT CHANGE the old DOMAIN\Username setting

Other Considerations:

  1. Password prompts on Outlook clients can mean a whole bunch of different problems totally unrelated to this configuration and issue. Always fully diagnose the issue and confirm the issue before applying fixes. Password prompts can mean authentication problems, problems with Exchange’s virtualdirectories, issues with autodiscover, issues with certificate configuration, etc…
  2. If this is your specific issue, you can write a script to run through and update the UPNs on all the accounts. I generally don’t like scripts touching user accounts, so I’m slowly rolling out these changes per user when upgrading them to Outlook 2016. Doing this one by one as we upgrade, allows us to make sure that none of their mobile devices are affected by the UPN change.
  3. Since we are changing UPNs, this could have a major effect on any 3rd party applications that integrate with Active Directory that use UPNs. Always test, and make sure you don’t break any integration points to your 3rd party applications or line of business systems.

 

Mar 052016
 

Just wanted to write about a couple issues that I’ve seen occur after migrating customers from Microsoft Small Business Server to Microsoft Server 2012 R2 (with Essentials Experience role), with Microsoft Exchange 2013 On-Premise.

Migration documents that were available were used at the time of migration. We still observed these issues after following. Please note that since these issues occurred, migration documents may have been updated.

Just an FYI: I provide Small Business Server Migration and consulting services. For more information, click here!

Windows SBS Company Web Connector ServerName

After the migration was complete we started seeing event logs pertaining to a “Windows SBS Company Web Connector ComputerName”, often mentioning it’s referencing an object in the Deleted Items container, also referencing the connector is not being activated due to no routes available.

Event ID: 5016

Microsoft Exchange could not discover any route to connector CN=Windows SBS Company Web Connector SERVERNAME,CN=Connections,CN=Exchange Routing Group (XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX),CN=Routing Groups,CN=Exchange Administrative Group (XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX),CN=Administrative Groups,CN=First Organization,CN=Microsoft Exchange,CN=Services,CN=Configuration,DC=domainname,DC=local in the routing tables with the timestamp 3/5/2016 1:55:34 PM. This connector will not be used.  Total source server count: 1; unknown source server count: 1; unrouted source server count: 0; non-active source server count: 0.

What is happening is that a “Foreign Connector” is still present in the Active Directory and Exchange Configuration for the SBS environments SharePoint e-mail to web feature. In my client’s environments SharePoint is no longer used, so it is safe for us to delete this connector. Only delete this connector if you know you’re not using it (it is used for SharePoint e-mail to web feature).

To list and get information on the orphaned connector, open Exchange Powershell and run:

Get-ForeignConnector | Format-List

To delete the orphaned connector, enter the following command in Exchange Powershell and update the connector name to match the name shown in the command above:

Remove-ForeignConnector “Windows SBS Company Web Connector SERVERNAME”

This will remove the orphaned connector and clean up these errors from occurring. You can also remove the connector using ADSIEDIT, however I prefer to use ADSIEDIT as a last resort, and find this method not only easier, but cleaner.

SMTP rejected a (P1) mail from ‘[email protected]

Initially post-migration we started observing this event on the server. Mail flow was not affected and everything was functioning properly.

Event ID: 1025

SMTP rejected a (P1) mail from ‘[email protected]’ with ‘Client Proxy EXCHSRVR’ connector and the user authenticated as ‘HealthMailboxXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX’. The Active Directory lookup for the sender address returned validation errors. Microsoft.Exchange.Data.ProviderError

Additionally, on our corporate firewall (that provides anti-spam), we would observe numerous undeliverable bouncebacks on outgoing messages to the e-mail address “[email protected]” with the subject “Inbound proxy probe”. These messages occur on exact 5 minute intervals continuously.

Using Exchange powershell to view the active Health Mailboxes, we see that each of these bounce backs are being stored on a particular health mailbox. Essentially the mailbox will continue to grow. Due to the growth, this issue needs to be resolved so the mailbox doesn’t continue to grow in size.

Numerous things can cause this, however in our case looking at transport logs, it is seen that a HealthMailbox is sending e-mail to another HealthMailbox but using an incorrect e-mail address. The Health Mailboxes on the Exchange server have “domain.com” e-mail addresses, while according to the transport logs, the e-mails are being sent to “domain.local”.

Something got mixed up, either with provisioning the Exchange E-Mail address policies, or the domain configured as “default domain”. Either way, Exchange is configured and running, so I wanted to correct this in a manor that would have minimal consequences or changes to the system.

To correct this issue, we need to go in to ADSI edit and modify the “ProxyAddresses” value for the HealthMailbox. Note that any type of mailbox can have numerous aliases and a single default alias. Inside of ADSIEdit for “ProxyAddresses” the value/format is case-sensitive, and uppercase SMTP configures default e-mail address, while lowercase smtp configures alternative aliases. An example value: “SMTP:[email protected]” for default, or “smtp:[email protected]” for an alternative alias.

Identifying the account from the event log (note the XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX in the example), we found the account in the Monitoring Mailboxes container inside of ADSIEdit. We right-clicked on the specific HealthMailbox account, went to properties, and found the “ProxyAddresses” value. We then proceeded to create a new alias by clicking edit, using lowercase smtp and created “smtp:[email protected]” and added it to the list, we did not modify or delete any existing values. All we did is create an alternative alias.

So now the Health Mailbox is receiving e-mail for both “@domain.com”, and “@domain.local”. Immediately the bounce-backs stopped, and event logs disappeared.

PLEASE NOTE: For this fix to work, you MUST confirm that the issue is due to the domain .com and .local mismatch. I’m not quite sure, but this issue may also occur after changing the default domain, or default e-mail address policies, in which case you still could use this technique to resolve the issue.

Hope this helps some of you, cheers!

Nov 142013
 

So you’re running SBS 2011, and recently you notice (or an end user reports) that when trying to log in to your SBS 2011 Remote Web Workplace (RWW) you receive:

404 – File or directory not found.

The resource you are looking for might have been removed, had its name changed, or is temporarily unavailable.

Screenshot below:

File or directory not found SBS 2011 Remote Web Workplace

File or directory not found SBS 2011 Remote Web Workplace

 

You check your server, all is good. You test internally, and all is good. Absolutely no errors! What’s going on?

Well, as Microsoft pushes out updates to it’s Internet Explorer web browser (and with users upgrading to Windows 8, or Windows 8.1), the compatibility with the Remote Web Workplace is broken and/or lost.

To fix this, you need to add your RWW site to your Internet Explorer Compatibility list:

1)    Open Internet Explorer, and go to your Remote Web Workplace login page. (DO NOT LOG IN YET)
2)    Press the “Alt” button which brings up the internet explorer menus
3)    Drop down “Tools” and then go to “Compatibility View Settings”.
4)    Your internet domain should be in the “Add this website” box, just press the “Add” button, then hit Close.
5)    Close out of Internet Explorer, and then go back in and try getting on remotely.

Note: If you clear your internet history, you will lose the above settings and have to re set them!

And BAM! It should now work without any problems whatsoever!

If you need help with your SBS deployment, please don’t hesitate to reach out. I provide consulting services to help organizations with their Microsoft Small Business Server deployments, including migrations. More information can be found at https://www.stephenwagner.com/2020/02/28/microsoft-small-business-server-migration-upgrade/.

May 312013
 

Back in February, I was approached by a company that had multiple offices. They wanted my company to come in and implement a system that allowed them to share information, share files, communicate, use their line of business applications, and be easily manageable.

Just an FYI, I provide Microsoft Small Business Server consulting services, including migrations! For more information, please visit https://www.stephenwagner.com/2020/02/28/microsoft-small-business-server-migration-upgrade/.

The Solution – Microsoft Small Business Server 2011

The first thing that always comes to mind is Microsoft Small Business Server 2011. However, what made this environment interesting is that they had two branch offices in addition to their headquarters all in different cities. One of their branch offices had 8+ users working out of it, and one only had a couple, with their main headquarters having 5+ users.

Usually when administrators think of SBS, they think of a single server (two server with the premium add-on) solution that provides a small business with up to 75 users with a stable, enterprise feature packed, IT infrastructure.

SBS 2011 Includes:

  • Windows Server 2008 R2 Standard
  • Exchange Server 2010
  • Microsoft SharePoint Foundation 2010
  • Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2 Express
  • Windows Server Update Services
  • (And an additional Server 2008 R2 license with Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2 Standard if the premium add-on is purchased)

Essentially this is all a small business typically needs, even if they have powerful line of business applications.

Additional Domain Controller on SBS

One misconception about Windows Small Business Server is the limitation of having a single domain controller. IT professionals often think that you cannot have any more domain controllers in an SBS environment. This actually isn’t true. SBS does allow multiple domain controllers, as long as there is a single forest, and not multiple domains. You can have a backup domain controller, and you can have multiple RODCs (Read Only Domain Controller), as long as the primary Active Directory roles stay with the SBS primary domain controller. You can have as many global catalogs as you’d like! As long as you pay for the proper licenses of all the additional servers 🙂

This is where this came in handy. While I’ve known about this for some time, this was the first time I was attempting at putting something like this in to production.

The Plan

The plan was to setup SBS 2011 Premium at the HQ along with a second server at the HQ hosting their SQL, line of business applications, and Remote desktop Services (formerly Terminal Services) applications. Their HQ would be sitting behind an Astaro Security Gateway 220 (Sophos UTM).

The SBS 2011 Premium (2 Servers) setup at the HQ office will provide:

  • Active Directory services
  • DHCP and DNS Services
  • Printing and file services (to the HQ and all branch offices)
  • Microsoft Exchange
  • “My Document” and “Desktop” redirection for client computers/users
  • SQL DB services for LoB’s
  • Remote Desktop Services (Terminal Services) to push applications out in to the field

The first branch office, will have a Windows Server 2008 R2 server, promoted to a Read Only Domain Controller (RODC), sitting behind an Astaro Security Gateway 110. The Astaro Security Gateway’s would establish a site-to-site branch VPN between the two offices and route the appropriate subnets. At the first branch office, there is issues with connectivity (they’re in the middle of nowhere), so they will have two internet connections with two separate ISPs (1 line of sight long range wireless backhaul, and one simple ADSL connection) which the ASG 110 will provide load balancing and fault tolerance.

The RODC at the first branch office will provide:

  • Active Directory services for (cached) user logon and authentication
  • Printing and file services (for both HQ and branch offices)
  • DHCP and DNS services
  • “My Documents” and “Desktop” redirection for client computers/users.
  • WSUS replica server (replicates approvals and updates from WSUS on the SBS server at the main office).
  • Exchange access (via the VPN connection)

Users at the first branch office will be accessing file shares located both on their local RODC, along with file shares located on the HQ server in Calgary. The main wireless backhaul has more then enough bandwidth to support SMB (Samba) shares over the VPN connection. After testing, it turns out the backup ADSL connection also handles this fairly well for the types of files they will be accessing.

The second branch office, will have an Astaro RED device (Remote Ethernet Device). The Astaro/Sophos RED devices, act as a remote ethernet port for your Astaro Security Gateways. Once configured, it’s as if the ASG at the HQ has an ethernet cable running to the branch office. It’s similar to a VPN, however (I could be wrong) I think it uses EoIP (Ethernet over IP). The second branch doesn’t require a domain controller due to the small number of users. As far as this branch office goes, this is the last we’ll talk about it as there’s no special configuration required for these guys.

The second branch office will have the following services:

  • DHCP (via the ASG 220 in Calgary)
  • DNS (via the main HQ SBS server)
  • File and print services (via the HQ SBS server and other branch server)
  • “My Document” and “Desktop” redirection (over the WAN via the HQ SBS server)
  • Exchange access (via the Astaro RED device)

Hardware

For all the servers, we chose HP hardware as always! The main SBS server, along with the RODC were brand new HP Proliant ML350p Gen8s. The second server at the HQ (running the premium add-on) is a re-purposed HP ML110 G7. I always configure iLo on all servers (especially remote servers) just so I can troubleshoot issues in the event of an emergency if the OS is down.

Implemenation

I’ll explain how this was all implemented.

  1. Configure and setup a typical SBS 2011 environment. I’m going to assume you already know how to do this. You’ll need to install the OS. Run through the SBS configuration wizards, enable all the proper firewall rules, configure users, install applicable server applications, etc…
  2. Configure the premium add-on. Install the Remote Desktop Services role (please note that you’ll need to purchase RDS CAL’s as they aren’t included with SBS). You can skip this step if you don’t plan on using RDS or the premium server at the main site.
  3. Configure all the Astaro devices. Configure a Router to Router VPN connection. Create the applicable firewall rules to allow traffic. You probably know this, but make sure both networks have their own subnet and are routing the separate subnets properly.
  4. Install Windows Server 2008 R2 on to the target RODC box (please note, in my case, I had to purchase an additional Server 2008 license since I was already using the premium add-on at the HQ site. (If you purchase the premium add-on, but aren’t using it at your main office, you can use this license at the remote site).
  5. Make sure the VPN is working and the servers can communicate with each other.
  6. Promote the target RODC to a read only domain controller. You can launch the famous dcpromo. Make sure you check the “Read Only domain controller” option when  you promote the server.
  7. You now have a working environment.
  8. Join computers using the SBS connect wizard. (DO NOT LOG ON AS THE REMOTE USERS UNTIL YOU READ THIS ENTIRE DOCUMENT)

I did all the above steps at my office and configured the servers before deploying them at the client site.

You essentially have a working basic network. Now to get to the tricky stuff! This tricky stuff is to enable folder redirection at the branch site to their own server (instead of the SBS server), and get them their own WSUS replica server.

Now to the fancy stuff!

1. Installing WSUS on the RODC using the add role feature in Windows Server: You have to remember that RODC’s are exactly what they say! !READ ONLY! (As far as Active directory goes)! Installing WSUS on a RODC will fail off the bat. It will report that access is denied when trying to create certain security groups. You’ll have to manually create these two groups in Active Directory on your primary SBS server to get it to work:

  • SQLServer2005MSFTEUser$RODCSERVERNAME$Microsoft##SSEE
  • SQLServer2005MSSQLUser$RODCSERVERNAME$Microsoft##SSEE

Replace RODCSERVERNAME with the computer name of your RODC Server. You’ll actually notice that two similiar groups already exist (with the server name different) for the existing Windows SBS WSUS install, this existing groups are for the main WSUS server. After creating these groups, this will allow it to install. After this is complete, follow through the WSUS configuration wizard to configure it as a replica for your primary SBS WSUS server.

2. One BIG thing to keep in mind is that with RODC’s you need to configure what accounts (both user and computer) are allowed to be “cached”. Cached credentials allow the RODC to authenticate computers and users in the event the primary domain controller is down. If you do not configure this, if the internet goes down, or the primary domain controller isn’t available, no one will be able to log in to their computers or access network resources at the branch site. When you promoted the server to a RODC, two groups were created in Active Directory: Allow RODC Cached Logins, and Deny RODC Cached Logins (I could be wrong on the exact name since I’m going off memory). You can’t just select and add users to these groups, you need to also select and add the computers they use as well since computers have their own “computer account” in Active Directory.

To overcome this, create two security groups under their respective existing groups. One group will be for users of the branch office, the other group will be for computers of the branch office. Make sure to add applicable users and groups as members of the security groups. Now go to the “Allow RODC Cached Logins” group created by the dc promotion, and add those two new security groups to that group. This will allow remote users and remote computers to authenticate using cached security credentials. PLEASE NOTE: DO NOT CACHE YOUR ADMINISTRATIVE ACCOUNT!!! Instead, create a separate administrative account for that remote office and cache that.

3. One of the sweet things about SBS is all the pre-configured Group policy objects that enable the automatic configuration of the WSUS server, folder redirection, and a bunch of other great stuff. You have to keep in mind that off of the above config, if left alone up to this point, the computers in the branch office will use the folder redirection settings and WSUS settings from the main office. Remote users folder redirection (whatever you have selected, in my case My Documents and Desktop redirection) locations will be stored on the main HQ server. If you’re alright with this and not concerned about the size of the user folders, you can leave this. What I needed to do (for reasons of simple disaster recovery purposes) is have the folder re-directions for the branch office users store the redirection on their own local branch server. Also, we need to have the computers connect to the local branch WSUS server as well (we don’t want each computer pulling updates over the VPN connection as this will use up tons of bandwidth). What’s really neat is when users open applications via RemoteApp (over RDS), if they export files to their desktop inside of RemoteApp, it’ll actually be immediately available on their computer desktop since the RDS server is using these GPOs.

To do this, we’ll need to duplicate and modify a couple of the default GPOs, and also create some OU (Organizational Unit) containers inside of Active Directory so we can apply the new GPOs to them.

First, under “SBSComputers” create an OU called “Branch01Comps” (or call it whatever you want). Then under “SBSUsers” create an OU called “Branch01Users”. Now keep in mind you want to have this fully configured before any users log on for the first time. All of this configuration should be done AFTER the computer is joined (using the SBS connect) to the domain and AFTER the users are configured, but BEFORE the user logs in for the first time. Move the branch office computer accounts to the new Branch office computers OU, and move the Branch office user accounts to the Branch office users OU.

Now open up the Group policy Management Management Console. You want to duplicate 2 GPOs: Update Services Common Settings Policy (rename the duplicate to “Branch Update Services Common Settings Policy” or something), and Small Business Server Folder Redirection Policy (rename the duplicate to “Branch Folder Redirection” or something).

Link the new duplicated Update Services policy to the Branch Computers OU we just created, and link the new duplicated folder redirection to the new users policy we just created.

Modify the duplicated server update policy to reflect the address of the new branch WSUS replica server. Computers at the branch office will now pull updates from that server.

As for Folder redirection, it’s a bit tricky. You’ll need to create a share (with full share access to all users), and then set special file permissions on the folder that you shared (info available at http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc736916%28v=ws.10%29.aspx). On top of that, you’ll need to find a way to actually create the child users folders under that share/folder in which you created. I did this by going in to active directory, opening each remote user, and setting their profile variable to the file share. When I hit apply this would create a folder with their username with the applicable permissions under that share, after this was done, I would undo that variable setting and the directory created would stay. Repeat this for each remote user at that specific branch office. You’ll also need to do this each time you add a new user if they bring on more staff, you’ll also need to add all new computers and new users to the appropriate OUs, and security groups we’ve created above.

FINALLY you can now go in to the GPO you duplicated for Branch Folder redirection. Modify the GPO to reflect the new storage path for the redirection objects you want (just a matter of changing the server name).

4. Configure Active Directory Sites and Services. You’ll need to go in to Active Directory Sites and Services and configure sites for each subnet you have (you main HQ subnet, branch 1 subent, and branch 2 subnet), and set the applicable domain controller to those sites. In my case, I created 3 sites, and configured the HQ subnet and second branch to authenticate off the main SBS PDC, and configured the first branch (with their own RODC) to authenticate off their own RODC. Essentially, this tells the computers which domain controller they should be authenticating against.

And you’re done!

A few things to remember, whenever adding new users and/or computers to the branch, ALWAYS join using SBS wizard, add computer to the branch OU, add user to the branch OU, create the users master redirection folder using the profile var in the AD user object, and separately add both user and computer accounts as members of the security group we created to cache credentials.

And remember, always always always test your configuration before throwing it out in to production. In my case, I got it running first try without any problems, but I let it run as a test environment for over a month before deploying to production!

We’ve had this environment running for months now and it’s working great. What’s even cooler is how well the Astaro Security Gateway (Sophos UTM) is handling the multiple WAN connections during failures, it’s super slick!

Apr 142012
 

The other day I received a notification that one of my clients were running out of space on their SAS RAID Array which contained their Exchange 2007 mailbox data store database. While I have every plan to increase the size of this partition, I still have to temporarily fix things so we don’t run out of space. Technically, to put a temporary fix on this, I had to move the Exchange Server Data to another partition on the server which had plenty of space. Typically, this is very easy on Microsoft Small Business Server 2008. However, in this specific scenario we were getting an error when trying to run the wizard to move the data:

 

Move Exchange Data Error Message

You cannot use the Windows SBS Console to move the Exchange Server data. – You may have used the Exchange Server Management Console to perform advanced configuration tasks. For information about how to reconfigure move your data using the Exchange Server Management Console, see the documentation for Microsoft Exchange Server

 

 

 

 

 

After receiving this error I went ahead and looked for the logs pertaining to the move wizards. The error log mentioned that configuration was altered from the default (which is acceptable since we have done some modifications to our Exchange config), and I also believe this is occurred due to both our “First Storage Group” and “Second Storage Group” already being hosted on different logical partitions. From what I have read, you cannot modify your Exchange configuration too heavily, nor have your different storage groups on different partitions for the wizard to work.

Since this happened, we have to move the Exchange data manually using the Exchange Management Console. These instructions will work for both Microsoft Windows Small Business Server 2008, and also Microsoft Exchange 2007 running on a standard Microsoft Windows Server (only if your not using any replication to other Exchange Servers). Please note that during this move, all move functions will require the database to be dismounted from the information store. Only Exchange 2010 (or later) supports live moving.

Instructions to move the Exchange database (First Storage Group – Mailbox Database):

Important: Always back up your server before doing heavy operations like this in case something goes wrong. To back Microsoft Exchange up, you have to have backup software that is “Exchange Aware” and can properly back it up.

 

1) Launch the Microsoft Exchange Management Console and locate the Database Management information – You should be able to find the Exchange Management console in your start menu. When opening it should prompt for a UAC (run as Administrator) privileges, grant it. If it does not prompt you to run as Administrator, right click on “Exchange Management Console” and select “Run as Administrator”. Once you have opened the console, expand “Server Configuration” and “Mailbox”.

Exchange Server 2007 Management Console

Server Configuration -> Mailbox

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2) Move Storage Group Path -First we need to move the “Storage Group Path” for the “First Storage Group” (which contains our Exchange Mailboxes). This will move the files that are related to logs, transaction files, etc… To do this, right click on “First Storage Group”, and select “Move Storage Group Path…”. Follow the wizard. Inside of the wizard, you will choose the new location in both the “Log files path” and “System files path”. Finally after you have specified the location, it will dismount the database and perform the move function.

Move Storage Group Path Wizard

Move Storage Group Path Wizard

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

3) Move Database Path – Now we need to move the actual database path of the “Mailbox Database”. This will actually move the Exchange mailboxes on our server to a new location. To do this, right click on “Mailbox Database” and select “Move database path…”. Follow the wizard. Inside of the wizard, you will choose the new location for the “Database file path”. Finally after you have specified the location, it will dismount the database and perform the move function.

Move Database Path Wizard

Move Database Path Wizard

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

4) Move Public Folders (If desired) – If you desire, you can also move your “Public Folders” by performing the same steps for the “Second Storage Group” and the “Public Folder Database”. In my case, our public folders are very small, so I didn’t bother.

 

You have now moved your Exchange 2007 mailbox database.

If you need any assistance or help with SBS, please don’t hesitate to reach out. I provide SBS Consulting Services, more information can be found here: https://www.stephenwagner.com/2020/02/28/microsoft-small-business-server-migration-upgrade/.

Mar 112012
 

For the past 2 weeks I’ve been receiving notifications reporting that one of my clients SBS 2008 environments is about to have some Exchange certificates expire.

Please Note, I provide Small Business Server consulting services, more information is available here!

Below is an example of the event log:

Source: MSExchangeTransport
Category: TransportService
Event ID: 12017
User (If Applicable): N/A
Computer: server.domain.local  Event Description: An internal transport certificate will expire soon. Thumbprint:ZOMGZOMGZOMGZAOMGZOMGZOMGZOM, hours remaining: 46  Event Log Name: Application  Event Log Type: warning  Event Log Date Time: 2012-03-08 13:15:36

Now upon initial research, apparently we were supposed to just be able to run the “Fix My Network” wizard inside of the SBS Console. Running this during the warnings, and after the certificate actually expired did absolutely nothing. The wizard was unable to detect the certificate had expired. It did report something to do with issues with an SMTP connector, however everything was working, and when trying to fix that, the wizard errored out and could not complete. I also read another article that running the “Setup my internet address” my fix the issue, but however it did not.

I decided to take a look at all the certificates currently install and also in use. To view the certificates installed, go to “Start”, then “Run”, type in “mmc.exe” and hit OK. Click on “File”, then “Add/Remove Snap-in”. Inside of this window, highlight “Certificates” and move to the right (hit the button with the arrow). Another window should open, select “Computer Account”, and follow through with the wizard. Once the certificates open, expand “Personal” and “Certificates” underneath it.

In my environment I noticed that there were two certificates that were identical, only difference being expiration. I had a feeling that the proper certificate existed on the server, however for some reason it was using an older one that it should not be. Keep in mind, this specific server was migrated from another (SBS 2008 to SBS 2008 Migration to new hardware).

To confirm they were identical, I opened up a Exchange Shell (find it in the start menu, and right click and “Run As Administrator”). I typed in “Get-ExchangeCertificate | FL”. The output confirmed that the certificates were the same and performed the same function.

ONLY PERFORM THIS if exchange is using the wrong certificate and you have two certificates which are the same, only with different expiration dates. If you do not, you are experiencing another problem and these instruction either won’t help you, or make your problem worse.

I decided to switch Exchange over to the new certificate:

1) Get the thumbprint of the newer certificate, it will be provided when you run “Get-ExchangeCertificate | FL”. Make sure the services and information match the certificate that is about to expire.

2) With the Exchange Shell still open type in “Enable-ExchangeCertificate thumbprint -Services SMTP,POP,IMAP” (sub in the thumbprint where it says thumbprint).

3) It will ask you to confirm, click ok.

4) Delete the old certificate, but make sure you back it up first. Export the old expiring certificate using the Certificate view inside of mmc.exe (what we did above). Export it (with extended data) so it can easily be re-imported if any issues occur. If you do need to restore it, inside of the Certificate view in mmc.exe, simply right click, re-import, and use the “Enable-ExchangeCertificate” (shown above) to re-activate it.

Hope this helps!

Sep 162010
 

For some time I have had clients reporting issues when saving files using Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and other Microsoft Office applications on network locations (which includes “FolderRedirection” for the “Desktop” and “My Documents” which is included in Windows Small Business Server 2008).

Over the last couple months I have spent quite a bit of time using Google to try and find out why this is happening. Tonight I told myself I NEED to find a proper fix.

After trying numerous search strings, I started to read articles that pointed towards disabling SMB2 (SMB version 2). I would be interested in trying this approach on a typical Windows Server 2008 box, however most of my clients run SBS 2008 and I’ve seen no feedback on whether or not this will cause issues when performing this fix. Also, I have no idea what type of impact it will have on other applications. Generally I just didn’t feel comfortable doing this.

Spending another hour searching, and trying more search strings, I finally came across this KB article 2292752 posted by Microsoft (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2292752).

The KB article states that this is related to a Network Driver included inside of Windows 7, and that an alternative patch that was designed for a different type of issue also fixes this issue. This patch can be found at http://support.microsoft.com/kb/981711.

Make sure that when filling out your e-mail to download the hotfix that you download the appropriate fix (x86 vs. x64 vs. Itanium).

Please note: This fix comes with Microsoft “This has not been fully tested stamp”. We also take no responsibility in you performing this fix.

I downloaded the fix, and installed it on one of the computers that was experiencing the issue. After installing this I no longer experienced the “Save As” function, or “Save” function take forever with Office 2007/2010 apps. I will post a comment later after user testing has been completed to confirm this fully resolves the issue.

Sep 052010
 

One of the most annoying things I’ve had to deal with is installing BES Express on SBS 2008. Way back earlier in 2010, I was mostly dealing with the 5.0.1x release. There were soo many bugs, so many issues, registry hacks, SQL queries that had to be run, it was just ugly!

One word of advice, always download the latest version of the software. Do not take ANY shortcuts on installing it. Either use the video tutorial that RIM has on their BlackBerry site, or use the guide from http://www.smallbizserver.net/Articles/tabid/266/Id/343/How-to-install-BlackBerry-Enterprise-Server-Express-on-a-SBS-2008.aspx

I don’t know how much is fixed, however after installing a 5.0.2 this weekend it worked flawlessly after the first install (keep in mind I always use “Blackberry Administration Service Authentication” instead of Windows Authentication because of an old known issue).

Sep 052010
 

I’ve done a bunch of these migrations in the past, and I’ve noticed two main issues that I’m sure a lot of you have also come across. I decided to whip up a post here to go over them, and how to deal with them. I know it’s happening to other people because of how many searches bring in to my blog for people looking for this stuff.

Access denied when copying network shares from source server to destination server

When you get to the point of copying data over from the source server to destination server, using the robocopy command that is listed inside of the migration document; comes up with “Access is Denied”. To resolve this issue, you need to make sure that on both shares configured on the source server and destination server, that you have to add the share permissions to provide “Administrators”, and your Administrator account added and allowed full access. I’m not too sure, but it may also be wise to add “Administrators” and your Administrator account to the actual file security permissions as well (full access). After doing this you should be able to copy everything over perfectly.

Lack of documentation on moving “RedirectedFolders” from source server to destination server

There are typically two things I want to cover in this. The first is actually how to move them. Please note that you do NOT need to use robocopy, manually copy, or do anything to actually move them. When you update the group policy on SBS and change the location from the source server to the destination server, the workstations will automatically move their “RedirectedFolders” on their first login after the GPO has been replicated. To force a replication of the GPO, login and issue “gpupdate” from the command prompt.

The second issue (which I always come across) is when doing a migration; it mentions that the first step is to move the location of your data (ie. RedirectedFolders, UserShares, WSUS updates, etc…). In most of my installations we have a dedicated C drive for SBS and OS, and use a second array (D Drive) for all data. I’ve noticed that during these migrations, folders for each user’s “RedirectedFolders” are not automatically created on the destination server. This is very important because these folders have their own security permissions that you DON’T want to mess with. In my cases, when I update the GPO to the new location, when the folders SHOULD move, they don’t because the users don’t have security access to create \\destinationserver\RedirectedFolders\$username. What I’ve had to do is use RoboCopy to copy the user folders from “UserShares” (most of my clients don’t use the UserShares, so they are empty) to the RedirectedFolders share just to create a bunch of blank directories with the appropriate security permissions. After doing this the workstations could then move the data upon logon and all is good!

Remember, if you need help with SBS or migrating from SBS, I provide Small Business Server migration consulting services. Click here for more information!