cluberti

Considering SP2 was a huge security change to just about everything, while performance of SP1 may be superior due to less code and security checks, security of SP1 over SP2 or SP3 is not.

Correct - LIPs and MUIs are not the same. If you search around, a lot of the LIPs are available (and there's not one for English, hence no displaylang=en). A LIP is similar to the XP-style MUI where most of the visible things in the OS are translated, but there's still a lot of the original language left behind. Since the OS is language-neutral, using a MUI gives you an entire translation. LIPs are available, MUIs are not.

As per the KB article on the subject: If you're a Technet or MSDN subscriber or an OEM System Builder, you already know how to acquire the lp.cab language packs. Obviously there are other ways of acquiring these files, but discussion of these methods would be against forum rules. Since we are not the police, you can choose to avail yourself of these methods, but it won't be discussed here. Or, if you know someone with a Technet or MSDN sub, have that person download them for you.

No, all possibility of acquiring extended support ended globally on July 11, 2006, and license distribution ended in January of 2004 (don't remember the date, but it's not really necessary anymore ).

Actually you *can* upgrade from 2008 x64 to 2008 R2 (even a domain controller), but speaking from experience it would not be recommended (just as I wouldn't recommend 2000 > 2003 DC upgrades, or 2003 > 2008 DC upgrades). Unless you're constrained for hardware, it makes more sense to install a new domain controller rather than upgrade one, and slowly migrate roles and services to the new one before demoting the old one and then taking it offline.

There should be a .blg file created by the log (look at it's properties for the location - usually C:\perflogs, I believe, is the default location). If you stop the log after the problem occurs and then zip / upload the .blg file, we'll have a look.

I wish you luck then, as SP2c isn't being distributed anymore (as previously mentioned) and was never available online. If you have apps that do not work with SP3 (and this time 'round, SP3 really was just an amalgamation of updates), it might be worth the trouble to get them SP3-compatible. Like I previously mentioned, you're going to stop receiving security updates after July 13 2010 for SP2 systems, so continuing to install SP2 after this point seems a little dangerous.

Search before posting indeed .

The question though is "why" - assuming that drive isn't locked down, you should be able to open files on it without a full admin token. What does process monitor say about the file open attempt? I know opening them as admin gives you a work-around, but honestly this is pretty odd behavior (especially if you're already in the admin group).

For now, the .dmp file should be sufficient. Zip it up, and then put it somewhere we can get to if you can.

Follow the steps in #2 to look at the log and try and start it from there rather than relying on the tool. Sometimes it doesn't work from the tool (for a myriad of reasons), but will from perfmon itself.

If you can get me a crash dump of the command.com process when it crashes out with the ntvdm error, I can probably tell you what's happening. After installing the debugging tools as per the above linked article, do the following: 1. Create a directory called c:\adplus 2. Open a command prompt and change to the directory where you installed the debugging tools. By default, this is "C:\Program Files\Debugging Tools for Windows" 3. Open command.com, but do not start the application install just yet 4. Type the following command in the command prompt opened in step 2: cscript adplus.vbs -crash -pn command.com -quiet -o c:\adplus 5. Go back to the command.com window and attempt the install again - the crash should occur, and adplus will generate data inside the C:\adplus folder, including a few log files and at least one .dmp file. Once the debugger finishes, zip up the adplus folder and upload it somewhere (or PM me) and we can have a look at what's causing the error.

Any particular reason you need 2c? As Trip mentioned it was never posted online and was only made available to OEMs via CD shipments (and that actually ended on January 31, 2009, so contacting your system builder rep or VAR TAM will likely not get you anywhere), but it's a little odd you are looking specifically for 2c and not the regular SP2 download or even SP3. The only thing SP2c really brought was the ability to use more product keys and some localization issues with setup, and both of those fixes exist in the SP3 package.

It also depends on the location of the file, file permissions, and owner. If you're getting a UAC prompt to save files in your profile, for example, that's bad, but if you're getting errors saving to a protected location like the root of a drive, or \Windows, or \Program Files, etc, that's expected behavior.

Speccy can give you this info as well, and it's pretty lightweight. Lavalys hasn't made or updated the home (free) edition of Everest since 2.20, which doesn't support anything newer than XP (and it's been said that version 1.5.1 was better, for what it's worth). Speccy is free (as are all Piriform apps like CCleaner or Defraggler) and also supports running back to Win98, but also runs and is supported on Vista and Win7. I'd suggest giving it a look (even in it's current beta form), as it's actively developed and supported - Everest Home edition hasn't been for years.

The sysprep.inf file (or unattend.txt, depending on how you launch setup) doesn't have the ability to extend monitors (it can only set refresh rate and display). And as Trip has previously mentioned, most video drivers store their display information in the registry, but it's machine-specific blob that depends on the video card and the monitor and their hardware ID's, and if Windows doesn't detect the exact same setup on the sysprep'ed destination, the settings will not work. This is the sort of thing you might be able to script post-setup, perhaps, but doing it in the sysprep itself is nigh impossible.

1 - Never run nLite on an nLite'd source, bad things happen 2 - You only need SP1 on a *running* system to install SP3 - you can slipstream SP3 on any SP-level source (even RTM).

Yes, actually, because those weren't the answers I was looking for . You might want to run perfwiz, let it gather logs, and then stop it and zip/upload it once you run into a low-memory situation: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details...;displaylang=en 1. Save and run PerfWiz. a. Extract the 2 files in PerfWiz.zip b. Double click on PerfWiz.exe, and click "Next" c. For "Monitoring Computer:" enter the machine name that you are monitoring from, then click "Next" d. Select "Create New Log" and click "Next" e. Choose the "Standard Perfmon log" radio button and click "Next" f. For the "Target Computer" enter the machine name that is experiencing the problem (in this case, likely the same computer name as c) g. For the "Log Name:", please name it using the name of the computer being monitored. Set "Log file size" to 250MB, then click "Next" h. Under "What is the average elapsed time for the issue to occur?" set the "Average Time to issue" to 1 hour and click "Next". NOTE: "Sample Interval" does not need to be set when the "Average Time to issue" is set. - Click the "Start" button on the "Start, Stop or Delete Performance Log" window. Once the log is listed as "Running" or "Started", click "Next". On the next screen, click the "Finish" button. 2. Steps to view or modify the performance log(s) just created: a. Click, Start > Run, and type perfmon.exe and click "OK" b. Open up "Performance Logs and Alerts" by clicking the plus sign c. Highlight "Counter Logs". Note: A green icon indicates the performance log is running - right-click the counter log and select "stop" to stop the logging

Not really enough info - what's filling the memory? What does task manager show? What does perfmon show you, specifically the process memory counters?

You're going from a flat-file, multi-setup step install that was introduced (and barely changed) since NT 3.x to an image-based, single-step install. Not easy to migrate . Have you considered looking into alternative deployment tools to augment the Novell tools you have, like MDT?

Can you get a hang dump of the iexplore.exe process the next time it happens? IE is an x86 process (even on x64 Win7), so download and install the x86 debugging tools (using the instructions linked).

You could do it in the WIM itself (mount it and rename), although I'm at a loss for *why* you'd want to risk breaking the servicing engine?

Sysprep and unattend are VASTLY different. You cannot easily "move" from one to the other, as even the setup routines that portions of the unattended files (for both platforms) drive are no longer the same. For example, you *can* use a drivers folder to deploy drivers, but it's much, MUCH easier if you can to simply pre-stage the drivers into your WIM file and let setup install the ones it needs (and skip the ones it doesn't) - just one example. It would be best to search the forums for pre-built unattended files (they're here), and read the WAIK documentation to modify one of those (via WSIM) to your needs.

Read my post fully - I linked to a UL created by MrJinJe in the WUD section of these forums.

OK, now that we know things work in safe mode (at least as far as windows goes), let's get a crash dump of the system in a regular boot - you'll need to make some changes and reboot before you actually create the crash via the keyboard, and you'll need to have a PS/2 keyboard attached (or be using a laptop) - this will NOT work with a keyboard plugged into the USB port: Memory dump of the entire system: 1. Create or set the following registry value: Key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\i8042prt\Parameters Value: CrashOnCtrlScroll Type: REG_DWORD Data: 1 2. Right-Click on the "My Computer" icon on the desktop and select "Properties", then click the "Advanced tab. On the "Advanced" tab, click "Settings" under the "Performance" header. Click the "Advanced" tab, then click "Change" under "Virtual Memory". Set the pagefile to be located on the partition where the OS is installed, and set it to be equal to Physical RAM + 50 MB. 3. Also in the "System Properties" window on the "Advanced" tab, click the "Settings" buttun under the "Startup and Recovery" header. Make sure "Complete Memory Dump" is selected (see 3a if this is not in the list). You can change the location of the memory dump file to a different local partition if you do not have enough room on the partition where the OS is installed. 3a. If the "Complete Memory Dump" option in step 3 is not available, you will need to manually set this registry value: Key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\CrashControl Value: CrashDumpEnabled Type: REG_DWORD Value: 1 4. You will need to reboot for these changes to take effect. 5. The next time that the system is exhibiting the problem, hold down the RIGHT CTRL key and press the SCROLL LOCK key twice on your PS/2 keyboard to cause the machine to bugcheck (crash) and create a memory dump. After the box comes back up and you log back in (you may need to boot info safe mode w/ networking), you'll find the resulting memory dump file in %systemroot%\memory.dmp that can be copied off, zipped up, and uploaded somewhere so we can have a look at it. Basically, these are ripped from the creating memory dumps post in this forum, for reference: http://www.msfn.org/board/creating-memory-dumps-t130003.html