FrozenPixel Posted August 11, 2011 Posted August 11, 2011 We recently migrated our users profiles from SBS 2003 to 2008 R2. Everything seemed to be working flawlessly until today , one user logged on and lost their desktop, and an message window popped up indicating the desktop reference was looking at the old server. I've checked profile paths which were directed to the new server, and checked our folder redirection in GPO, everything referenced the new server. I'm thinking during the migration another folder redirection is possibly causing the problem but didn't see anything. Any ideas where to look? Client machines are brand new Win 7 machines, however the old client machines were XP Pro. I'm baffled where its getting this reference and so far its just one user.Thanks
allen2 Posted August 11, 2011 Posted August 11, 2011 It might be referenced in the user registry (i.e.: in his roaming profile folder\ntuser.dat). You might check it when the user isn't connected by loading its hive with regedit.
FrozenPixel Posted August 11, 2011 Author Posted August 11, 2011 I will have a look at that today, thanks, that gives me another area. I'm new to windows server administration so not exactly sure what that means but I'll google it.
FrozenPixel Posted August 11, 2011 Author Posted August 11, 2011 Do I load the hive on the server or on the client machine? I went under an adminstrative account on the client machine started Regedit, click HKEY_USERS -> then Load Hive, located the folder of the persons profile and saw files such as ntuser.dat.LOG1, ntuser.dat.LOG1.LOG1, ntuser.dat.LOG1.LOG2, ntuser.dat.LOG2 etc..only one file indicates any size 256kb, and that I can't load, the other load but nothing obviously there. The one file that won't load just says Error while loading hive.
allen2 Posted August 11, 2011 Posted August 11, 2011 (edited) You need to see all the files as ntuser.dat is hidden. You can do it from the server or any computer as long as the user isn't logged on. Edited August 11, 2011 by allen2
FrozenPixel Posted August 12, 2011 Author Posted August 12, 2011 What I was doing wrong was not allowing system files to be viewed, once I enabled this the ntuser.dat file was visible and opened that into the registry. Discovered about a dozen instances of referencing the old server. I backed up the registry first then deleted the offending keys. Got rid of the nagging redirection to the old server but inadvertenly screwed outlook. I'm trying to figure a way to rescue this account because although the user had no data, I could in theory start over with this user, but thats the newb way. I have other users that do have data and may come across this issue and need to fix and rebuild not wipe and start from scratch. I've created a brand new temp account for this issue while I fiddle with the real account so they can still work and safe.Is there a way to rebuild the ntuser.dat files? GPUpdate? Thanks
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