Some Notes on the Machines

The simplest appears to be thus:

wmic computersystem where caption='oldcomputername' rename newcomputername

If it is run from an administrative CMD and the machine is in good talking relationship with its domain controller, the PC and also AD rename will complete. If either prerequisite is not met, the rename will fail. A non-admin attempt fails with code 5, DC availability fails with 1355.

There is also tool, part of the 2003 server reskit and included later on, which can do the rename of a desktop from a domain controller:

NETDOM RENAMECOMPUTER OLDNAME /newname:NEWNAME /userd:domain\domainadmin /passwordd:password /force /reboot:0

It causes a reboot of the target machine. /reboot:0 means no delay; the number is in seconds.

Do this:

DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth

This handles a lot of SFC errors and others too.

DISM is great for system image repair in 2012/8.0 and later. But from 2008R2/7 there are lots of things DISM can do to clean up a system. Here’s one:

dism /online /Cleanup-Image /StartComponentCleanup

This does much cleaning up of redundant items in WinSxS. There is also:

dism /online /Cleanup-Image /StartComponentCleanup /ResetBase

but /ResetBase eliminates removal of all patches and updates etcetera, so not necessarily best to use. And we have:

dism /online /Cleanup-Image /SPSuperseded

/SPSuperseded eliminates removal of service packs only.

Really good article here:

http://www.itquibbles.com/sql-sbsmonitoring-high-disk-usage/

Solves the problem of the database reaching max capacity, and also speeds things up in general.

Short version:

In SBS 2008, run the contents of this zip file in an administrative PowerShell window.

In SBS 2011, start this shell as administrator:

C:\Program Files\Windows Small Business Server\Bin\MoveDataPowerShellHost.exe

and then while in the shell, run the contents of this zip file.

If it says “1 row affected”, it’s done, and the messages will point out old MDF and LDF files to remove.

You may notice that the script linked here is just a tad different than the one on the itquibbles page; this one just adds the -force items mentioned as an option on that page.

It can be done, without install media or reinstall, via DISM:

https://richardstk.com/2012/04/10/in-place-upgrade-of-windows-server-2008-r2-standard-to-enterprise-or-datacenter-edition/

Here it is, all current versions:

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4027322/windows-update-troubleshooter

This error often occurs when a longstanding Windows Server network is given a much newer domain controller. The WINS records embedded in DNS, don’t work anymore; when you try to delete them or change them, you get the error message in the title of this article.

The best thing to do, is PowerShell:

Remove-DNSServerResourceRecord -ZoneName dns_zone.local -Force -RRtype "WINS" -Name "@"

Try that (substituting dns_zone.local for your LAN DNS zone!), then right-click on the zone name, choose “All Tasks” and then “Reload”, then press F5 for refresh. The error-causing situation will go away, you can then reconfigure easily. If there are other zones, you’ll want to repeat for all of them. If there is a WINS record in a reverse lookup zone, the RRtype is WINSR instead of WINS.

Administrative processes, including CMD, don’t see mapped drive letters anymore, unless you do this:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/previous-versions/windows/it-pro/windows-server-2008-R2-and-2008/ee844140(v=ws.10)

In this registry area:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System

create DWORD EnableLinkedConnections, value of 1.

Integration services are no longer automatically installed or automatically available, to guests running operating systems older than 10, on hosts running 2016. They have to be installed by powershell or DISM, directly into the guest, not the host. I found DISM to work when powershell didn’t. The appropriate image addition is downloaded here:

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/3071740/hyper-v-integration-components-update-for-windows-virtual-machines-tha

and then installed thus, e.g. for Windows 7/2008R2:

DISM /Online /Add-Package /PackagePath:C:\storage\windows6.x-hypervintegrationservices-x64.cab

This is something new to Windows 10/2016, a C runtime library different than the redistributables. It is a required additional install for some things to run on OS before 10/2016.

www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=50410