An alternative ESU MAK Activation Solution
Written by Anton Romanyuk
This blog post was shared with me by a colleague of mine, Daniel Dorner, a Microsoft Premier Field Engineer. It’s a really an interesting one because it highlights the creativity of my colleagues - a very, very broad range of personalities that have one thing in common: an absolute dedication to customer's success.
Building the Perfect Horizon Cloud Image: A Step-by-Step Guide
Written by Anton Romanyuk
Automated reference image creation became common as IT professionals use tools like Microsoft Deployment Toolkit or System Center Configuration Manager. In most cases, creating a Windows reference image is fairly straightforward if you follow established best practices. However, there are still issues out there that may catch you off guard and you will suffer the consequences.
It’s been a busy couple of weeks for me, so I’m slowly going through a backlog of things to cover. The push to get modern continues with the third part of my series on automating the process of transitioning from BIOS to UEFI using MDT. Today's blog post discusses the process of configuring BIOS settings on supported Dell Inc. enterprise systems.
This is the second post in my series that explores one of the most common questions I’ve been asked from folks who are migrating to Windows 10: "How do I go about transitioning from BIOS to UEFI?". So naturally, I’m addressing this question. This time, I am going to discuss automating firmware configuration on supported HP (Hewlett-Packard) notebook, desktop, and workstation models. Now, it's not as if it's been no-man's-land before. I am fully aware that there are blogs out there that talk about doing this kind of thing and I’ve tried a few of the solutions with various rates of success. Still, the feedback I've been getting over the past few weeks has been that I should share my approach when working with the Microsoft Deployment Toolkit (MDT), so, here's my attempt to do precisely that.
This article is the first blog post in a series I'll write over the coming days that will provide a comprehensive overview that explains how you can automate the process of transitioning from BIOS to UEFI during "wipe-and-load" OS deployment scenario. To be able to migrate from BIOS to UEFI effectively you need to understand how to configure firmware settings, such as secure boot, legacy support, and TPM device configuration, as well as how to use the MBR2GPT tool. Unfortunately, though it seems like a relatively straightforward process when using Microsoft Deployment Toolkit, based on questions I received as well as threads posted on TechNet over the past few weeks, there is still some confusion around this in the Windows technical community. Converting a device to UEFI comes with quite a few benefits including the ability to make full use of Windows 10 modern security features, so I thought it would be worth taking a few minutes to share my approach to dealing with BIOS to UEFI conversions.
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My customers often send me exciting cases. This particular one is especially interesting because it is common in infrastructures that use "Local Administrator Password Solution" (LAPS) for password management. LAPS, which I can't recommend highly enough, provides management of common local administrator account by setting a different, random password on every managed domain-joined computer. The case opened when a customer contacted me a few weeks ago reporting that they experienced issues when re-installing computers using Microsoft Deployment Toolkit: after OS deployment, LAPS didn't update the local administrator password which in turn significantly increased the risk of lateral escalation (Pass-the-Hash (PtH)) that results when the same administrative local account and password combination is used. Given the importance of the customer, I immediately sat down to investigate.
Understanding FAILURE (5615): Boot Drive not Found
Written by Anton Romanyuk
Continuing the theme of focusing on disk-related cases (yesterday I posted an article detailing how to fix the "Verify BCDBootEx" step failing on HP ProDesk 600 MT G3 systems), this post showcases yet another reason why you should stop deploying systems in Legacy mode. It also shows how a little time spent on reviewing log files to get a couple of clues can quickly lead to a solution.
Dynamically Select SSD Drive for OS Installation
Written by Anton Romanyuk
If you’ve read any of my tweets, you know that I emphasize how Microsoft Deployment Toolkit and ConfigMgr are powerful OS deployment tools which allow a high grade of customization. This blog post is another demonstration of MDT flexibility. It also shows how a PowerShell script can quickly lead to a solution.
As my regular blog readers will be aware (yes, all three of you), there is something increasingly traditional about me writing about my customer engagements and today should be no different. With the new way of building, deploying, and servicing OS introduced with Windows 10 (Windows as a Service a.k.a. Hustle as a Service) I often kick off customer engagements with a workshop for IT professionals addressing biggest benefits of adopting Windows 10 and detailing comprehensive set of intelligent security solutions which allow organizations to protect against security threats and to better protect user and company data against sophisticated attacks thus allowing them to align themselves with the GDPR requirements. By outlining these benefits heads on, I can often persuade my customers to adopt a comprehensive set of advanced security capabilities including, but not limited to Credential Guard, Windows Information Protection, Windows Defender ATP and BitLocker.