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DSQuery Operating System Service Pack Version

Sheen — Wed, 21 Jul 2010 01:59:27 +0000

I had a requirement recently to get the service pack versions for all workstations on the domain. I tried a few different options but the easiest option was to use the extremely useful dsquery tool.

Without further ado, this is the command:

dsquery * -scope subtree -attr “cn” “operatingSystem” “operatingSystemServicePack” -filter “(&(objectclass=computer)(objectcategory=computer)(operatingSystem=Windows XP*))” -limit 100000

The output of this command would be as follows:

cn                 operatingSystem                      operatingSystemServicePack
WRK001   Windows XP Professional     Service Pack 1
WRK002   Windows XP Professional     Service Pack 2
WRK003    Windows XP Professional     Service Pack 3

Where, cn is the workstation name and the others are self explanatory.

Share your handy little tips and tricks!

Diskpart.exe Warning when expanding drive

Sheen — Tue, 19 May 2009 17:12:54 +0000

Recently when using diskpart.exe to expand a volume on a Windows Server 2000 SP4 machine, we got a warning "Deleting the primary partition has modified the partition number of the partition that contains your Windows 2000 system files. The old partition number was 2; the new partition number is 1."

We changed the boot.ini file from:

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINNT
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINNT="Microsoft Windows 2000 Server" /fastdetect

to:

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINNT
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINNT="Microsoft Windows 2000 Server" /fastdetect

On rebooting the server, the server refused to boot throwing an NT Kernel not found error.

How to fix it:

If you get this error, before you reboot the server, you first identify the active boot partition – to do this, you need to start diskpart.exe from the command line and run the command ‘list volume’. You should get an output as follows:

DISKPART> list volume

Volume ### Ltr Label        Fs     Type        Size     Status     Info
———- — ———– —– ———- ——- ——— ——–
Volume 0     D                       DVD-ROM         0 B
Volume 1     C   IBM_PRELOAD NTFS   Partition     34 GB Healthy    System
Volume 2     E   Data         NTFS   Partition    115 GB Healthy

In the output shown above, the section under ‘Info’ shows ‘System’ for ‘Volume 1’ indicating that the boot partition is on Volume 1 so the boot loader should have the following to correctly boot the OS.

multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINNT="Microsoft Windows 2000 Server" /fastdetect

Now to ensure that you have a better chance of booting the OS in case something really has gone wrong with the results of ‘list volume’ you can use a boot.ini file as follows:

[boot loader]
timeout=30
default=multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINNT
[operating systems]
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(1)\WINNT="Microsoft Windows 2000 Server" /fastdetect
multi(0)disk(0)rdisk(0)partition(2)\WINNT="Microsoft Windows 2000 Server-2" /fastdetect

The benefit of choosing the above mentioned approach is that you get the option of selecting which drive would correctly boot the OS without having to go through a painful recovery mode process of trying to fix the boot record.

Once you know which entry boots the OS, you can edit your boot.ini file to remove the incorrect entry and have the server boot fine for all successive reboots.

A Certificate could not be found that can be used with this Extensible Authentication Protocol

Sheen — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 11:09:41 +0000

I got this error today when I tried configuring a RADIUS server on Windows Server 2003. This error occurs when the server that you are trying to configure RADIUS on does not have a computer certificate assigned to it.

If you have IIS installed, requesting a certificate for any website will make this problem go away. If you dont have IIS installed, do the following:

To obtain client certificates

In your Web browser, open the form at http://servername/certsrv for requesting a certificate from your CA, where servername is the name of the Web server where the CA that you want to access is located.
Click Request a certificate, click Advanced certificate requests, and then click Create and submit a request to this CA.
Type the information requested and any other options required, including:
- Select Mark keys as exportable.
- Select Store certificate in the local computer certificate store.
Click Submit, and then do one of the following:
- If you see the Certificate Pending Web page, check on the pending certificate request.
- If you see the Certificate Issued Web page, click Install this certificate.
If you are finished using the Certificate Services Web pages, close Internet Explorer.

Once you have obtained the client certificate, verify that it is in your Personal store and is valid. To do this:

Open the Certificates MMC snap-in.
Locate the installed client certificate in the Personal store under Certificates (Local Computer), and then double-click the certificate to verify it.

Now go ahead with the RADIUS server configuration and you will be able to configure PEAP without any errors.

Let me know what your experience has been and if you have found a better way of fixing this issue.