MDT 2012: Hide shell during installation

MDT 2012 introduced a new feature which is very convenient in my opinion. In MDT 2010 the shell was visible and active during installation. Which could lead to users interrupting a running installation. Now it's possible to hide the shell by using the following line in your customsettings.ini.

HIDESHELL=YES

Now you can get rid of your Post-It notes telling people to stay away from this computer.

Extend your 2008 server trial period

When the initial 60-day evaluation period nears its end, you can run the Slmgr.vbs script to reset the evaluation period. To do this, follow these steps:

1. Click Start, and then click Command Prompt.
2. Type slmgr.vbs -dli, and then press ENTER to check the current status of your evaluation period.
3. To reset the evaluation period, type slmgr.vbs –rearm, and then press ENTER.
4. Restart the computer.

This resets the evaluation period to 60 days. 

Extract files from a .msi

There are some moments that you just need the files in a .msi and don't want to run the .msi

To extract the files in the .msi from the commandline type:

msiexec /a MSIFile /qb TARGETDIR=TargetDirectory

Powershell: Create Security Groups

Last week I had to create 100+ security groups for a migration. As lazy as I am I chose Powershell for this job. I will show you what I did.

• First create a .csv file. This file will contain al groupnames you are going to create
• Now start your favorite Powershell editor. I'm using PowerGUI
• Now let's start coding:
  

Boot ISO from USB drive

Let's say you want to boot a computer without a cd drive. You have the option to boot from an USB drive. If you want to boot an ISO from an USB drive, you need diskpart for this. I will tell you what to do, it ain't rocket science.

Create your own WinPE

Ever wondered how to create your own WinPE ? I will tell you how..
We are going to create a WinPE cd and add an extra application to it.
It isn't that hard, you just have to remember quite some commandline options

The publisher of this remote connection cannot be identified. Do you want to connect anyway?

When using 2008R2 Remote Desktop Services you might run in the following situation:

When you first start an RDP session you get a warning:
The publisher of this remote connection cannot be identified. Do you want to connect anyway?

Here is how get rid of this warning by using self-signed certificates

Do you trust the publisher of this RemoteApp Program?

This screen should be well-know to people using RDS. It's a new security feature which will dissappear when you check the don't ask me again option. In large RDS environments this could be pretty annoying, causing people calling the servicedesk etc.

VMWare Workstation Bootdelay

I'm sure you will recognize this. You booted your VM from an .iso and it booted perfectly. Now when the OS had been installed, you try to boot again from another .iso, and here comes the problem... it won't! You have to change the bootorder for that, but it boots way to fast to push that button in time. Here is how I solve this problem: