Windows Desktop Search ADM

If you are using SUS to manage updates and you have a lot of faith in MS you probably got hit by hundreds of users asking what the new search bar is by the tray, you just got Windows Desktop Search.

Next issue is what to do, the search indexes your hard disk by default and if you are using Outlook 2003+ it will also use index the cache file on your drive. By default it does not go roaming off around the network despite what the press are saying. In fact it is actually pretty good, the toolbar is annoying but that can be turned off and it seems to overrule the default search but an extra click will get that back as well. In all whats not to like?

Of course you can set up all the settings via Group Policy but finding the ADM file was the hard bit, downloading the whole kit from: http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx/kb/917013

Extracting the files from the download section you will find the desktopsearch30.adm file which will allow you to change all sorts of settings. Of course you can also go into your SUS server and make the update a remove option.

Remove unattached Hardware from VMWare clone

Having done a clone of our BlackBerry server and settings it up in VMWare we came across an oddity. Our network card was complaining about setting its IP address to the same as one already set but we were only using one of the cards.

VMWare was imaged as usual using BartPE and Ghost but in doing so we had taken over the old hardware configuration which as we were on Win2k3 meant we couldn't see it in device manager or remove it using add-remove hardware in control panel.

Apparently we needed to make these available so from the command prompt:

SET DEVMGR_SHOW_NONPRESENT_DEVICES=1
followed by:
DEVMGMT.MSC

Please note running device manager from outside the window will mean its not using the variable you just set and nothing will work as stated.