Can’t install HP Branded Windows 2012 on VMware?

When installing a HP Branded Windows 2012 R2 ROK on VMware ESXi 5.5 this message appears:

The cause of this issue  is that the Windows server does not recognize the ‘hardware’ as a HP Proliant server, licensing will not succeed because a Windows ROK license (Reseller Option Kit) is used.

There is a simple solution. A parameter can be added so that the virtual machines ‘think’ that they are running on real HP hardware. After creating the virtual machine:

  • Stop the virtual machine
  • Go to Edit Settings / Options / General and select “Configuration Parameters”

 

  • Add a row, paste “smbios.reflecthost” as the name, and true as the value

 

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Slow RDP performance on Windows 2012 R2 servers running on VMware

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We were running several Windows 2012 R2 servers on a VMware ESX environment. And still, we experience a sluggish performance on the Windows 2012R2 server when connection them with any RDP-client. We tried different connections (wifi, 4G, LAN, etc.) and different clients (Windows 10 RDP, RoyalTS, Mac-RDP, etc.). The hardware could’t be a factor in the issue. So we searched to some finetune-settings in GPO and registry.

The hardware wasn’t an issue.

  • the servers did’t have a high overall load
  • there was no high CPU load
  • there was enough RAM
  • we used 15k HP SAS enterprise disks
  • there was no high IO
  • we had Teamed the NICs in VMware

This is what we did to solve the issue and get very fast RDP-performance.

  • Finetune “Remote Desktop Services” in Group Policy

Just wanted to post this for anyone else experiencing this issue.  Seems the issue does not effect Windows Server 2012 R2, and turns out it might be related to the UDP packets getting fragmenting when creating a RDP session.  Here’s the fix:

Computer Config > Windows Settings > Administrative Templates > Windows Components > Remote Desktop Services > Remote Desktop Session Host > Connections > Select RDP transport protocol = Use only TCP

You can also set this on the client side by specifying:

Computer Config > Windows Settings > Admin Templates > Windows Components > Remote Desktop Services > Remote Desktop Connection Client > Turn off UDP on Client = Enabled

 

  • Disabling TCP Offloading in Windows Server 2012

We also add below registry setting to improve performance. A little explanation of TCP Offloading:

“TCP offload engine is a function used in network interface cards (NIC) to offload processing of the entire TCP/IP stack to the network controller. By moving some or all of the processing to dedicated hardware, a TCP offload engine frees the system’s main CPU for other tasks. However, TCP offloading has been known to cause some issues, and disabling it can help avoid these issues.”

 

 

This is what you must do in the Registry

1. Open RegEdit on the Windows Server machine.
2. Navigate to this registry key in the tree on the left:
3. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Tcpip\Parameters
4. Right-click on the right side, and add a new DWORD (32-bit) Value
5. Set the value name to DisableTaskOffload and the value data to 1
6. Reconnect to the Server via RDP (to a new session) and your performance should be normal.

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Enable or Disable UAC From the Windows Command Line

This should also work on Windows 7, 8, 8.1, and Windows 10.

There’s a quick way you can enable or disable this annoying window from the command line:

Disable UAC

C:\Windows\System32\cmd.exe /k %windir%\System32\reg.exe ADD HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System /v EnableLUA /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f

 

 

Enable UAC

C:\Windows\System32\cmd.exe /k %windir%\System32\reg.exe ADD HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System /v EnableLUA /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f

 

After you enable or disable UAC, you will have to reboot your computer for the changes to take effect.

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VMware HP Raid controller commands CLI

Gets you to the command interface of the Raid Controller

Show the status of the controller and current status of Disks

Utility Keyword abbreviations
Abbreviations chassisname = ch
controller = ctrl
logicaldrive = ld
physicaldrive = pd
drivewritecache = dwc
hpacucli utility
hpacucli # hpacucli# hpacucli helpNote: you can use the hpacucli command in a script
Controller Commands
Display (detailed) hpacucli> ctrl all show config
hpacucli> ctrl all show config detail
Status hpacucli> ctrl all show status
Cache hpacucli> ctrl slot=0 modify dwc=disable
hpacucli> ctrl slot=0 modify dwc=enable
Rescan hpacucli> rescanNote: detects newly added devices since the last rescan
Physical Drive Commands
Display (detailed) hpacucli> ctrl slot=0 pd all show
hpacucli> ctrl slot=0 pd 2:3 show detailNote: you can obtain the slot number by displaying the controller configuration (see above)
Status hpacucli> ctrl slot=0 pd all show status
hpacucli> ctrl slot=0 pd 2:3 show status
Erase hpacucli> ctrl slot=0 pd 2:3 modify erase
Blink disk LED hpacucli> ctrl slot=0 pd 2:3 modify led=on
hpacucli> ctrl slot=0 pd 2:3 modify led=off
Logical Drive Commands
Display (detailed) hpacucli> ctrl slot=0 ld all show [detail]
hpacucli> ctrl slot=0 ld 4 show [detail]
Status hpacucli> ctrl slot=0 ld all show status
hpacucli> ctrl slot=0 ld 4 show status
Blink disk LED hpacucli> ctrl slot=0 ld 4 modify led=on
hpacucli> ctrl slot=0 ld 4 modify led=off
re-enabling failed drive hpacucli> ctrl slot=0 ld 4 modify reenable forced
Create # logical drive – one disk
hpacucli> ctrl slot=0 create type=ld drives=1:12 raid=0# logical drive – mirrored
hpacucli> ctrl slot=0 create type=ld drives=1:13,1:14 size=300 raid=1# logical drive – raid 5
hpacucli> ctrl slot=0 create type=ld drives=1:13,1:14,1:15,1:16,1:17 raid=5Note:
drives – specific drives, all drives or unassigned drives
size – size of the logical drive in MB
raid – type of raid 0, 1 , 1+0 and 5
Remove hpacucli> ctrl slot=0 ld 4 delete
Expanding hpacucli> ctrl slot=0 ld 4 add drives=2:3
Extending hpacucli> ctrl slot=0 ld 4 modify size=500 forced
Spare hpacucli> ctrl slot=0 array all add spares=1:5,1:7
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“Access to the resource has been disallowed” when browsing to UNC path

“By design” UNC path browsing from the Windows Explorer address bar is not possible if the “Remove Run menu from Start Menu” in GPO is active.

The NoRun policy removes the ability to launch commands or processes from the Start menu by removing the “Run” option, but also removes the ability to enter direct (UNC) paths in the address bar of the Windows Explorer.

When browsing to a UNC path from the Windows Explorer address bar, the following error message will be displayed:
“Access to the resource has been disallowed”.

Solution

The error message “Access to the resource has been disallowed”, encountered when browsing to an UNC path (\\server\share), is a Windows security message. Users are not allowed to browse to UNC paths if the “run” command is not available.

The “NoRun” registry key has the value “1” if the “Run” command is not available. It can be found at:
[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer] “NoRun”=dword:00000001

NoRun=1 -> run command not available
NoRun=0 -> run command available

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