Frequently Asked Questions

Hopefully you will find all the answers you need here in these Frequently Asked Questions.


Does WFBS 8.0 support Exchange 2010 SP3?

1:30 pm on May 17, 2013

I’ve seen this question asked a bit in the various mail lists and forums.  The short answer is yes it does.  Trend have documented here the supported Exchange versions for WFBS 8.0.  This document was recently updated after they completed their testing using the final RTM version of Exchang...
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User limits on Windows Server 2012 Essentials

9:00 pm on March 5, 2013

There’s more than a few questions about user limits, device limits and so on around Windows Server 2012 Essentials.  Microsoft have a few blog posts, on this but are not really all that clear – so here’s my shot at answering those questions.

How many users can I run on my Windows Server 2012 Essentials server?

Windows Server 2012 Essentials comes with...
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What is the default password for Windows Server 2012 Essentials?

1:48 pm on February 28, 2013

I was installing Window Server 2012 Essentials today for a client, and had laid down the base operating system and then walked away from the computer for a while.  When I came back, I found the screen was locked and I didn’t know the password.  Some investigation found that the default Administrator password used during the setup of Windows Server 2012 Essentials is Read more

How can I install Windows Server 2012 Essentials without a product key?

9:00 pm on December 11, 2012

In short – you can’t.  You can however install it using the trial/evaluation key available from Microsoft here and then later once you get the real product key you can put that in via the Properties of the Computer and activate it as fully licenses software.

...
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How many Network Cards are supported in Windows Server 2012 Essentials?

10:00 pm on December 10, 2012

This question is often asked by people as they try to setup things such as Network Teaming etc.  It’s always been the case that Microsoft have NEVER supported more than one Network card since SBS 2008 era.  Prior to that they supported two network cards, but only for Internet access and they’ve never supported network teaming at all.  So – in Windows Server 2012 Essentials,...
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What Exchange versions are supported with Windows Server 2012 Essentials?

8:00 am on November 6, 2012

Microsoft designed Windows Server 2012 Essentials to work with onpremise Exchange server installations.  Below is the list of Exchange versions they support with the WS2012E console integration and the ARRconfig tools.

Exchange 2010 SP1

Exchange 2010 SP2

Exchange 2013

Personally, I’ve not tried Exchange 2013 as yet, so canâ...
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What inbound ports do I need to open on my firewall for Windows Server 2012 Essentials?

11:30 pm on October 10, 2012

Windows Server 2012 Essentials is different from previous versions of SBS as it’s designed to work with 3 different types mail systems.  As a result the ports you need to have open on your firewall is also different.

If you have a uPnP router then the configuration wizards in Windows Server 2012 Essentials will do the work for you.  If you like me elect to disable uPnP then ...
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Powershell gives “File cannot be loaded because the execution of scripts is disabled on this system”

9:00 pm on October 3, 2012

You will get this on a server as standard error if you are trying to run scripts that you’ve created yourself.  To get around the issue, you need to change the execution policy on the server to allow you to run unsigned scripts.  Use the command below to do this.

Set-ExecutionPolicy Unrestricted

...
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How to troubleshoot slow Internet surfing.

9:00 pm on August 20, 2012

There’s a lot of things that go on under the covers of a domain joined computer that you just don’t realise most of the time.  One of the recent things I was involved in today was the investigation of a client network that had slow internet.  Here’s how the problem was investigated.

  1. From the users desktop – see exactly how the problem manifests itself.  Fo...
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What passwords do I change when I fire my IT Guy?

9:00 pm on August 6, 2012

Recently we took over a new site, and as part of that we went about changing passwords for a number of key services and a few more additional items.  This then became a discussion amongst my fellow MVPs about what do you change when you take over a site, I took it to task to put together a list of passwords and things to review when you take over a site. 

Network Rela...
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