Clinton Garbutt » XP

Lending a helping hand

Clinton Garbutt — Wed, 27 May 2009 02:30:58 +0000

Hi there,

Clinton here, with yet another exhilarating topic in the land of Windows 7. This time we are looking at support and troubleshooting.

Ok so, my day involves a stack of remote desktop support. And if it were not for this tool in my tool belt, I would be seriously stressing with hardware book-ins. In fact, it is my first tool I turn to for remote connectivity apart from Remote Desktop Connection and that is Windows Remote Assistant – run MSRA.

What is Windows Remote Assistant?

Windows Remote Assistant was originally brought to the public with Microsoft XP.
What this tool does is it enables a user/technician or sys admin to temporarily control a computer over a network or the Internet to resolve issues. Awesome!

History Lesson 101

Remote Assistant is an adaptable, fast and simple tool that has been a part of the Windows platform for some time now. And at one stage, apart from another tool that I will mention shortly, was available to businesses to provide functionality and support for desktop users, local and external.

With the release of Windows XP, Microsoft launched two (2) sets of technologies in the Remote Access arena.

· Remote Desktop

· Remote Assistance

Remote Desktop focusing on business use and integration with Microsoft technologies such as Terminal Services for providing so-called Dumb Terminal access.
A Dumb Terminal provides access to resources managed through a centralized server accessed through a client computer with a Display, keyboard and mouse. It is an administrator forcible accessing a remote device without the user needing to be present.

Windows Remote Assistance is focussed somewhat towards the home user, although it is still useful in business scenarios.

What can Windows Remote Assistant do?

Remote Assistance enables me to a do a number of things:

· It enables me to share my Windows 7 Desktop with users

· It enables me to share control of computer peripherals: Mouse and Keyboard

· It enables me to perform Peer to Peer connection without a relay server…HOT!

Therefore, Remote Assistance works equally as well with two computers over a LAN or over the Internet (WAN). The main draw card for this feature as you can imagine is it alleviates the inconvenience for me to personally visit the affected computer. As this tool enables me to diagnose and often repair problems. Sssweet!

Easy Connect

Also to make things even better Windows 7 introduces a new feature called Easy Connect. This simplifies the process of connecting to another PC remotely with only a password, no file needed. When a connection is established between both computers, contact files are exchanged which creates a trust relationship. This further simplifies future connections that are made without the need for a password.

Advanced Connection for help desk

This is how I connect to users within my network – follow me:

1. Select the Start button; enter assistance into the search programs and files field.

2. Select the Windows Remote Assistance link from the list.

3. Select option two; Help someone who has invited you.

4. Select the Advanced connection option for help desk link.

5. Enter a computer name or an IP Address into the field.

6. Click Next.

Note:
The history list is now longer for future use – just in case you forget a million IP addresses.

So things have really improved in Windows 7. Small and sinple things like this feature have made a massive difference in my day-to-day workings. Enjoy the experience!

Clinton Garbutt – Desktop Productivity Specialist
MCP, MCDST, MCTS, MCITP

DATA#3
Australia’s Integrator of the Year

Share and Enjoy:

User Account Control and Windows 7

Clinton Garbutt — Tue, 26 May 2009 05:07:20 +0000

Hi there,

Clinton here, with some more spurring thoughts on the forth coming OS, Windows 7.
I have asked this question before, in a previous post, but the impact of the question cover a vast land of thought.

Question: Why should I upgrade my business to Windows 7 rather than stay with Windows XP or Vista?

Ok, so here’s a reality check, if a good portion of your current desktop users are still running XP, then you should seriously look at moving up to Windows 7, because, Microsoft ended mainstream support for XP on April 14 2008. No ways? – Yeah seriously!

Critical security updates ONLY will be provided at no cost for XP licensed users up to the year 2014. Furthermore, if you need additional / extended support for XP because moving is not an option just yet for you, then you will need to pay for that as a paid contract customer with Microsoft.

Ok but hear me out, the most important reason why you SHOULD consider moving forward with Windows 7 from XP is security. There is more internet crime, hacking and brute force attacks on networks than ever before.

Both Vista and Windows 7 provide way better security than XP. A feature that springs to mind right away is the User Account Control (UAC). User Account Control (UAC) is a technology and security infrastructure introduced with Vista.

How does it work?

It works by improving the levels of security a user can have when working on a workstation, and it limits the application software to standard user privilege levels until your friendly system administrator gives the authorization to increase those privilege levels for the specific application.

So now, only applications that the user can trust get higher privileges. The ripple effect rolls from here into the Malware arena.
Malware is an application. So it doesn’t get privileges to run in order to compromise your Vista/WIN7 operating system, because the UAC controls the access.

In other words, a user account may have administrator privileges assigned to it, but applications that the user activates does not. So privileges for applications, unless approved beforehand will not run.

And here is the Cherry on the Cake – To reduce the possibility of lower-privilege applications communicating with higher-privilege ones, Windows 7 includes another technology called , User Interface Privilege Isolation… ooh!
This is used in together with UAC to divide these processes from each other so that more control is achieved over applications.

What are some of the items triggering a UAC prompt?

Operating system commands or actions that require administrator rights (a UAC trigger) are marked with the security shield symbol. Ding!

Tasks that require administrator privileges will trigger a UAC prompt (if UAC is enabled) are marked by a 4-color security shield symbol.

Here are tasks that will prompt for administrator authorisation:

Changes to system-wide settings or to files in %SystemRoot% or %ProgramFiles%
Installing and uninstalling applications
Installing device drivers
Installing ActiveX controls
Changing settings for Windows Firewall
Changing UAC settings
Configuring Windows Update
Adding or removing user accounts
Changing a user’s account type
Configuring Parental Controls
Running Task Scheduler
Restoring backed-up system files
Viewing or changing another user’s folders and files.

So what are you waiting for? Don’t let your guard down across the enterprise network! Boost your security and stay on top by installing Windows 7. See how it runs…! There is MORE coming up…but for now I’m playing in Windows 7 land!

So what are you waiting for? GO and download the 32 bit or 64 bit version (for Dual Core CPU’s) of Windows 7 TODAY.