Procedure to clearing the ConfigMgr (SCCM) client local cache (CCM cache) -Resolving Disk space isssue

Essentially the client cache is a temporary download location for software, applications and software updates that are deployed to a client.

By default, the client cache is located %windir%\ccmcache but you do have the option of changing this at install time by using the SMSCACHEDIR parameter e.g. CCMSetup.exe SMSCACHEDIR=C:\Temp.

By default, the cache size is 5120 MB, but again we can change this by using the SMSCACHESIZE parameter at install time e.g. CCMSetup.exe SMSCACHESIZE=10240. 

This would install the client with a cache size of 10GB. You can also change these settings post install either directly on the client itself using the Control Panel applet (See below), or for larger scale changes, by deploying a script.

Procedure

Navigate to Configuration Manager in Control Panel of the client computer, and then double-click to open its properties.

Click the cache button.

                                       .

To delete all of the files currently stored in the temporary program download folder, click Delete Files. Click Yes and close the screen

Windows Server 2008 R2: Procedures to cleanup WINSXS folder

Applied operating systems

Windows Server 2008 R2

Prerequisites

It is not recommended to delete the winsxs folder directly. Deleting this folder may cause BSOD error and OS may crash permanently.

• Download and install the Windows Update Pack Windows6.1-KB2852386-v2-x64.msu from the below link:  http://download.microsoft.com/download/2/A/3/2A3FD850-E45F-47D4-AFF8-8048333CBA7D/Windows6.1-KB2852386-v2-x64.msu 

• Disk cleanup utility

 The disk cleanup utility will be added by installing the Desktop Experience feature from Windows Server manager.

Procedures

Please follow the below procedures to install the desktop Experience feature

Step1: Go to server manager and select add features.

Step2: Select desktop Experience feature from the list and follow the installation.

Step3: When installing Desktop Experience, it does require additional features. Select the 

button to Add Required Features and click next and then Install.

  Step 4: A reboot is required to finalize the install.

  After reboot, a Disk Cleanup option can be found under Start --> All Programs --> 

Accessories --> System Tools:

On launch, Disk Cleanup prompts for the drive you want to clean up

Select the C drive and click OK.

Several options are provided for cleanup, including a new option for Windows Update 

Cleanup:

 

After preceding the cleanup a reboot is required to complete the cleanup process.

Here we will show one of the examples from the server USCHCVMP365AD08.us.na.ey.net

We were faced a disk space issue on this server which is showing only 19.1 MB free space

 on its C drive.

While checking the Winsxs folder, it consumes around 12 GB of size as shown in the below image:

While using the disk cleanup it showing around 4.71 GB of Windows update cleanup data.

After rebooting the server the winsxs folder consumed space reduced to 7.32 GB from 12 
GB.

Windows cluster Troubleshooting: Cannot assign new shares on file servers

Applies to

• Windows Server 2008 R2
• Windows Server 2008

Problem

In a two-node cluster, the cluster node 1 shows the correct disk size and we can share any folder as required. But for cluster node 2, we cannot initiate new shares from a particular disk. For our scenario, in node 2, the currently assigned size for the application folder is 250 MB, and there is no free space on that.





The worst case is that, whenever we fail over the cluster, it will not happen because of the application folder size is only 250 MB. Event logs will generate for the same.

Solution

Check the event ID numbers as shown below
Event ID:1037

The file system for one or more partitions on the disk for resource 'Cluster Disk 2' may be corrupt.

Run the Validate a configuration wizard to check your storage configuration. Optionally, you want to run 'Chkdsk' to verify the integrity of all volumes on this disk.
Event ID:1038:

Ownership of cluster Disk 2has been unexpectedly lost by this node. Run the Validate a configuration wizard to check your storage configuration.

From the cluster node 1, we can assign the new shares to the cluster resources.
Check the Shared storage management in both nodes for shared disks and folders information.
 The Disk size showing the correct figure.

We found that the Disk Quota is enabled for all drives.

Open server manager. Expand file services. Expand Share and storage management. Open file server resource. Expand Quota Management.

Open Quotas. It will list the quota assigned to the server.

Right-click the particular drive. Select Edit Quota properties.

 

The assigned Disk Quota limit is 250 MB instead of 250 GB from the drop-down list.

Change the Disk Quota space. In our case, it is 250 GB.

 Verify again the resource disk size by opening fail-over cluster management console. It 

will display the correct disk resources and we can create the new shares for applications.

Windows: How to check previous IP address details

Operating system

Windows 2008 Server/ Windows 7

Scenario

After replacing the motherboard, need to assign old IP configurations But unfortunately, customer is not aware of previous IP address details.

Solution

In this case, using registry we can find out previous IP address details. Windows Registry path should be specified below:

Open the registry editor and locate the interfaces path.

Current and previous IP address details will list under:

“HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Tcpip\Prameters\Interfaces”


There is a chance of multiple interfaces when we installed VMware or any other related application

Troubleshooting a paged pool leak in Windows 

Operating Systems

Windows server 2008,

Windows Server 2008 R2,

Windows server 2003,

Windows server 2003 R2

Problem

Here we will fix a real paged pool leak on your system so that we can put to use the techniques to track down the leak.

Solution

When a program needs to store some temporary information during execution, it can dynamically request a chunk of memory from the system. However, the system has a fixed amount of total memory available. If one application uses up all of the system’s free memory, then other applications will not be able to obtain the memory that they require. The implications of a “memory starved” application can range from a graceful shutdown to an unexpected crash. Most large scale applications regularly request memory, so running out of system memory tends to have a domino effect. Even if the applications do not terminate, the system will slow down to a crawl—or even hang—in low memory conditions. Clearly, none of these results are desirable, so the system never wants to run out—or run low—of memory.

responsibility of each application to “free” dynamically requested memory when they are finished using it. Freeing the memory returns it to the system, where it can be re–allocated to another application when needed. When an application dynamically allocates memory, and does not free that memory when it is finished using it, that program has a memory leak. The memory is not being used by the application anymore, but it cannot be used by the system or any other program either.

Memory leaks add up over time, and if they are not cleaned up, the system eventually runs out of memory. Most everyone has seen the “Your computer is running low of virtual memory” message box on Windows when memory gets too high. It is typically accompanied by horribly slow response time, and often the user can’t even close the wasteful application because of this sluggishness. The only response at that point is to reboot the computer.

Memory leaks are bad on any system. For the automotive platform, however, they become much more of a significant problem. This is due to the following:

Applications stay in memory when not in use. Typically, the operating system can clean up after a program which leaks memory after it terminates. However, since we do not allow the users to easily shut down automotive applications, Windows CE cannot clean up after any ill–behaved applications.

System run–time is expected to be unlimited. If all else fails, a system reboot will clean up all memory leaks. However, although we do support system reboots, our goal is that the user will never need to do so. Since you do not need to “reboot” your car stereo every few weeks because it stops working, or because the performance becomes poor, it is unacceptable to need to do so on the automotive platform.

Systems typically have lower total available system memory. Desktop applications can get away with being sloppy with memory when they run on systems with 64 megabytes of RAM and more, and with large hard drives to store swapped out virtual memory pages. But the automotive platform may have only 16 megabytes total memory, and that includes process and storage memory together! In order words, that memory must store what would be in RAM on a desktop PC, as well as what would be on the hard drive.

Paged and nonpaged pools serve as the memory resources that the operating system and device drivers use to store their data structures. The pool manager operates in kernel mode, using regions of the system’s virtual address space (described in the Pushing the Limits post on virtual memory) for the memory it sub-allocates. The kernel’s pool manager operates similarly to the C-runtime and Windows heap managers that execute within user-mode processes.  Because the minimum virtual memory allocation size is a multiple of the system page size (4KB on x86 and x64), these subsidiary memory managers carve up larger allocations into smaller ones so that memory isn’t wasted.

Coming to our experiment, we are used number of utilities for testing the memory leakage issues.

Resources used:

• NotMyFault 

• Process Explorer 

• Poolmon 

• Strings 

• TaskManger

It is the responsibility of each application to “free” dynamically requested memory when they are finished using it. Freeing the memory returns it to the system, where it can be re–allocated to another application when needed. When an application dynamically allocates memory, and does not free that memory when it is finished using it, that program has a memory leak. The memory is not being used by the application anymore, but it cannot be used by the system or any other program either.

Memory leaks add up over time, and if they are not cleaned up, the system eventually runs out of memory. Most everyone has seen the “Your computer is running low of virtual memory” message box on Windows when memory gets too high. It is typically accompanied by horribly slow response time, and often the user can’t even close the wasteful application because of this sluggishness. The only response at that point is to reboot the computer.

Memory leaks are bad on any system. For the automotive platform, however, they become much more of a significant problem. This is due to the following:

Applications stay in memory when not in use. Typically, the operating system can clean up after a program which leaks memory after it terminates. However, since we do not allow the users to easily shut down automotive applications, Windows CE cannot clean up after any ill–behaved applications.

System run–time is expected to be unlimited. If all else fails, a system reboot will clean up all memory leaks. However, although we do support system reboots, our goal is that the user will never need to do so. Since you do not need to “reboot” your car stereo every few weeks because it stops working, or because the performance becomes poor, it is unacceptable to need to do so on the automotive platform.

Systems typically have lower total available system memory. Desktop applications can get away with being sloppy with memory when they run on systems with 64 megabytes of RAM and more, and with large hard drives to store swapped out virtual memory pages. But the automotive platform may have only 16 megabytes total memory, and that includes process and storage memory together! In order words, that memory must store what would be in RAM on a desktop PC, as well as what would be on the hard drive.

Paged and nonpaged pools serve as the memory resources that the operating system and device drivers use to store their data structures. The pool manager operates in kernel mode, using regions of the system’s virtual address space (described in the Pushing the Limits post on virtual memory) for the memory it sub-allocates. The kernel’s pool manager operates similarly to the C-runtime and Windows heap managers that execute within user-mode processes.  Because the minimum virtual memory allocation size is a multiple of the system page size (4KB on x86 and x64), these subsidiary memory managers carve up larger allocations into smaller ones so that memory isn’t wasted.

Coming to our experiment, we are used number of utilities for testing the memory leakage issues.

Resources used:

Except Task manager all the utilities are downloaded from Microsoft Sysinternals.

To download simply hold Ctrl key and select the item.

The leak will be generated by the NotMyFault tool from Sysinternals.

When we run NotMyFault.exe, it loads the device driver Myfault.sys and presents the following dialog box

Click the Leak Paged button. This causes NotMyFault to begin sending requests to the Myfault device driver to allocate paged pool. (Do not click the Do Bug button or you will experience a system crash; this button is used todemonstrate various types of crashes.)

NotMyFault will continue sending requests until you click the Stop Paged button. Note that paged pool is not normally released even when you close a program that has caused it to occur (by interacting with a buggy device driver); the pool is permanently leaked until you reboot the system. However, to make testing easier, the Myfault device driver detects that the process was closed and frees its allocations.

While the pool is leaking, first open Task Manager and click on the Performance tab. You should notice Kernel Memory (MB): Paged climbing.

You can also check this with Process Explorer’s System Information display. (Click on View and then System Information.)

To determine the pool tag that is leaking, run Poolmon and press the B key to sort by the number of bytes.

 Press P twice so that Poolmon is showing only paged pool. You should notice the pool tag “Leak” climbing to the top of the list. (Poolmon shows changes to pool allocations by highlighting the lines that change.)

 Now press the Stop Paged button so that you don’t exhaust paged pool on your system.

 Run Strings (from Sysinternals) to look for driver binaries that contain the pool tag “Leak”:

Strings %SystemRoot%\system32\drivers\*.sys | findstr Leak

This should display a match on the file Myfault.sys, thus confirming it as the driver using the “Leak” pool tag.

Once we had identified the device driver, we could identify the manufacturer and work on it for the resolution..

It’s worth bearing in mind that the same technique can also be used to troubleshoot paged pool problems as well.

Computer stops responding when it is resumed from standby mode

Operating system

Windows Server 2003

Problem

When we resume the computer from standby mode, the computer may stop responding. Sometimes it may also see the "Applying Personal Settings" message box for up to an hour before the desktop appears.
Typically, when you resume a Windows Server 2003-based computer from standby, the computer is locked. Therefore, you must log on to the computer before you can access the desktop. However, when this problem occurs, the computer is not locked, and the Windows Server 2003 logon screen does not appear.

Solution

We found the following event messages may be logged in the application event log on the domain controller after restart the Windows Server 2003-based computer:

Event Type: Error
Event Source: Userenv
Event Category: None
Event ID: 1058
Description: Windows cannot access the file gpt.ini for GPO CN={31B2F340-016D-11D2-945F-00C04FB984F9},CN=Policies,CN=System,DC=domain,DC=com. The file must be present at the location <\\domain\sysvol\domain\Policies\{31B2F340-016D-11D2-945F-00C04FB984F9}\gpt.ini>. (Access is denied. ). Group Policy processing aborted. For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://support.microsoft.com.
or
Description: Windows cannot access the file gpt.ini for GPO CN={31B2F340-016D-11D2-945F-00C04FB984F9},CN=Policies,CN=System,DC=domain,DC=com. The file must be present at the location <\\domain\sysvol\domain\Policies\{31B2F340-016D-11D2-945F-00C04FB984F9}\gpt.ini>. (The network path was not found. ).

Event Type: Error
Event Source: Userenv
Event Category: None
Event ID: 1030
Description: Windows cannot query for the list of Group Policy objects. A message that describes the reason for this was previously logged by the policy engine. For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://support.microsoft.com.

When we turn on user environment (Userenv) logging, domain Distributed File System (DFS) services may not work after the computer resumes from standby. Additionally, you may receive messages that resemble the following messages in the %SystemRoot%\Debug\UserMode\Userenv.log file.
According to Microsoft this problem may occur if the Winlogon process tries to process group policies before other components are running. However, there are several other scenarios that may cause this problem. Make sure that the following components are started and that they are configured correctly Netlogon and DFS services are started.

• Domain controllers have the read and apply rights to the Domain Controllers Policy.
• NTFS file system permissions and share permissions are set correctly on the Sysvol share.
• DNS entries are correct for the domain controllers.

Method 1:

Microsoft released one Fix Microsoft Fix it 50615 for the above problem. The download link available from the below

http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=9763079

Method 2:

Update latest Service Pack for the server operating system.

Method 3:

Open the registry editor and locate the below path

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon

Create the DWORD value If the WaitForNetwork, if the value is not exists. Set the value to 1.

Close the registry editor and restart the computer

Error message 0x80070057 when backup files in windows

Operating system

Windows 7

Scenario

When we trying to backup files using the windows inbuilt backup utility called Windows Backup, the backup process fails and showing the below error

An internal error has occurred: The parameter is incorrect: (0x80070057).

Solution

Method 1:

Microsoft released the Fixit Microsoft Fix it 50719 for the above issue. The same will be available from the below link

http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=9777176

Method 2:

Change the decimal symbol setting

This problem can occur if the decimal symbol is not set to '.' (dot). This is common in languages and locales other than English (United States), such as German (Germany).
To change the decimal symbol setting, follow these steps:

1. Open Control Panel, click Clock, Language, and Region, and then click Region and Language.
2. Click the Formats tab, and then click Additional settings.
3. In the Decimal symbol field, type . (dot), and then click OK two times.
4. Restart the computer.

Method 3:

Open the registry editor by typing the regedit.exe command and locate the below path.

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\System.

Create a DWORD value CopyFileBufferedSynchronousIo and modify the value to 1.Close the registry editor and reboot the computer.