Wednesday, December 21, 2011

HAPPY “ZOMBIE” HOLIDAYS

 

To all the IT Zombies out there, I’ll continue posting more stuff after the New Year, but until then I want to tell everyone to enjoy this with family, friends and co-workers.

I only ask that each of you take to stop and help total strangers; in return your actions should encourage them to do the same.

Monday, December 5, 2011

SCOM Zombie PSA#28: Windows Server Operating System Management Pack v6.0.6958.0 (BUGGY)


Last week I deployed this management pack into my lab OM07, fresh system with  no other management pack really on it. The odd thing was that the event logs was kicking out an event of 31565 about every ten minutes. My active alert, may or may not kick out an alert; it did generate an alert about every 6 hours or so.
Here is what I gotten in my event logs and eventfully the alert itself.
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Description:
Failed to deploy Data Warehouse component. The operation will be retried. Exception 'DeploymentException': Failed to perform Data Warehouse component deployment operation: Install; Component: Script, Id: '3a49a530-26a2-c525-35fe-69df5898f150', Management Pack Version-dependent Id: 'dbf18271-9643-32ff-4849-00d79d9e2a9d'; Target: Database, Server name: 'XXXXXX', Database name: 'OperationsManagerDW'. Batch ordinal: 1; Exception: Incorrect syntax near the keyword 'with'. If this statement is a common table expression or an xmlnamespaces clause, the previous statement must be terminated with a semicolon.
Incorrect syntax near ','.
Incorrect syntax near ','.
Incorrect syntax near ','.
Incorrect syntax near ','.
Incorrect syntax near the keyword 'ELSE'.

One or more workflows were affected by this.

Workflow name: Microsoft.SystemCenter.DataWarehouse.Deployment.Component
Instance name: xxxxx.xxxx.xxx
Instance ID: {4836F627-4378-5EDF-0DE7-97DAE0A2C939}
Management group: LAB
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I found a couple of things on the web that suggested to do the following:
  • I tried to do a repair on the for the Reporting Data Warehouse
  • I restarted the services for SQL and OpsMgr
  • Verified nothing new was installed on my server since I noticed the issue
What worked, came from a friend of mine that suggested the Management Pack was buggy and not my system. So I removed the newest management pack from my system, and then deployed the older version I had. It appears to be working right now.  Have not seen anything from it in a while.
  • The final fix was to remove the management pack and revert to the old one.
I would love to know if other experienced this and if they knew any other working alternatives that may be an option.
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UPDATED INFORMATION:

There is another resolution I am told by a SCOM PFE that you can just uninstall the "Windows Server Operating System Reports" Management Pack. What this resolves is the two reports that only work on SQL 2008.

Bob Cornelissen & Marnix Wolf had blogged about this a while back and are requesting a better management pack.

But I’ve ran into another problem in a few production systems where removing the management pack was not an option. So the only option I was able to do at the time was turning this alert off via the overrides.

Wednesday, November 30, 2011

SCOM Zombie PSA#27: Microsoft SQL Server 2012 Release Candidate (RC)

I am not 100% sure when Microsoft released SQL Server 2012 Release Candidate (RC). And you can download it once you register for it. I am very interested in learning if System Center Operations Manager 2012 will play nice with it, and I don’t think there will be any support for OpsMgr 2007 R2. Here is what they have to say about it.

“SQL Server 2012 will deliver mission-critical confidence with AlwaysOn availability for faster failover and greater hardware utilization and in-memory ColumnStore for 10x the data warehouse performance gains. SQL Server 2012 will also enable breakthrough insights with business intelligence solutions such as Power View for stunning, interactive data visualizations and enhancements to PowerPivot. Lastly, SQL Server 2012 will uniquely support hybrid IT environments with common management and development tools, scale elastically, and extend applications directly to the cloud through SQL Azure.”

Register to access technical product resources—such as forums, solution accelerators, white papers, and webcasts—at the SQL Server 2012 Resource Page.

Review Microsoft SQL Server 2012 RC system requirements

Register for evaluation so that you may download and install the full-featured software for 180-day trial. Receive follow-up email with resources to guide you.

Additional Information:

  • Available in these editions: 32-bit and 64-bit
  • Available in these languages: Chinese (Simplified), Chinese (Traditional), English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Portuguese (Brazil), Russian, Spanish

Thursday, November 17, 2011

SCOM Zombie PSA#25: MMS 2012 Registration Open

 

Registration began today for Microsoft Management Summit 2012 (#MMS2012). If you register by January 27, 2012 you should be able to some cash. about $300 bones, for the early bird special. After that you can expect to pay $1800 for the conference itself and to stay at the  Venetian Hotel, it will cost $2776.

Everything you need or want to know can be found here.

As much as I would love to go, I don’t expect that I will be able to this year, unless something special happens. I should be following the twitter feeds to keep up on everything. I did attend #MMS2011, and it was a blast; I really expect that this year will be huge with a large focus SCOM 2012.

Thursday, November 10, 2011

SCOM Zombie PSA#24: SCOM 2012 RC

 

As of today Microsoft released System Center Operations Manager 2012 Release Candidate. But in order to receive the download you’ll need to register for it here.

Here are the key things that are of interest to me taken right from the Microsoft website:

Feature Summary

  • Setup
    Operations Manager 2012 has a new Setup wizard. For important instructions about how to install Operations Manager 2012, see Install Operations Manager 2012 Beta.
    • Yes, this was a lot easier now, just make sure your pre-reqs are all established ahead of time.
  • Highly Available Management Group Out of the Box
    In Operations Manager 2012, all management servers are peers; there is no root management server. The workload is split among all management servers in a management group, which provides high availability without requiring a cluster.
    • In a global enterprise where servers are everywhere, I am looking forward to deploying and pushing OM12 to its limits.
  • Resource pools
    A resource pool provides the ability to distribute workloads across multiple management servers, such as availability, network device monitoring, distributed monitor health rollup, and group calculation.
    • Very promising, in the lab it worked as planned & yet my lab is very small.
  • Web console
    Operations Manager 2012 introduces a new Web console. In Operations Manager 2012, all Operations Manager views are available in the Web console.
    • Interesting
  • Network monitoring
    Operations Manager 2012 provides the ability to discover and monitor network routers and switches, including the network interfaces and ports on those devices and the virtual LAN (VLAN) that they participate in. You can also delete discovered network devices and prevent the deleted network devices from being rediscovered the next time discovery runs. For more information, see Monitor Network Devices.
    • Looking forward to this section of OM12.
  • Dashboard views
    As part of the network monitoring and application monitoring capabilities, Operations Manager 2012 includes new comprehensive dashboard views that combine multiple panels of information into a single view. In Operations Manager 2012, you can add the new dashboard views to My Workspace.
  • Display dashboard views using SharePoint
    The Operations Manager web part displays specified dashboard views and can be added to Microsoft SharePoint 2010 sites. For more information, see Add a Dashboard View to a SharePoint Site.
  • Operations Manager Module for Windows PowerShell
    Operations Manager 2012 provides a Windows PowerShell 2.0 module containing a full set of new cmdlets. The cmdlets in this module are only compatible with Operations Manager 2012. You can recognize the Operations Manager 2012 cmdlets by the "SC" preceding the noun. For additional information about the Operations Manager 2012 cmdlets, open the Operations Manager command shell and type Get-Help about_OpsMgr_WhatsNew. For information about how the Operations Manager 2007 cmdlets map to the Operations Manager 2012 cmdlets, type Get-Help about_OpsMgr_Cmdlet_Names.To use the Operations Manager 2012 cmdlets, you must establish a connection to an Operations Manager management group. You can establish either a persistent connection in which you can run multiple cmdlets, or a temporary connection when running a single cmdlet. For more information about connections, open the Operations Manager Shell and type Get-Help about_OpsMgr_Connections.
  • UNIX- and Linux-based computers
    In Operations Manager 2012, the Discovery Wizard is easier to use for discovering UNIX- and Linux-based computers. You can now use Windows PowerShell to manage UNIX- and Linux-based computers, for more information, see the UNIX and Linux section in the release notes. High availability is also supported.
  • UNIX/Linux Shell Command Template Management Pack
    This Management Pack implements authoring templates that allow the creation of rules, tasks, and monitors based on execution of shell commands on UNIX/Linux agents.
  • JEE Management Packs
    These management packs monitor JEE (Java Enterprise Edition) application servers. Management packs are available for IBM WebSphere, Oracle WebLogic, Red Hat JBoss and Apache Tomcat. ((I think this will be a key bonus for my systems))

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

SCOM Zombie PSA#23: SCOM Resource MP

 

In my environment where I work, I provide the System Center Operations Manager 2007 R2 to hundreds of system administrators and system engineers so that  they can manage and monitor more than four thousand servers, and we are still growing in monitoring each day.

The challenge is trying to get people to use the System Center Operations Manager console in our environment to monitor their systems instead of waiting until someone reports an outage and then after they all want to play the blame game. when all they needed was to have the console open and performed some monitoring.

So what if I could intergrade as much resources as I could incorporate into the SCOM console? Its Worth a thought, but this is what I have done so far to test the idea. This MP is nothing complicated of course but it is a thought I wanted to through out there, and maybe provide something on hand for other SCOM admins.

Now of course my working environment doesn’t have access to the internet, but for those of you that do have access to the internet enjoy.

Please provide feedback, that is always nice.

download: HERE

Monday, September 12, 2011

OpsMgr 2012 Beta: Topology Simplification

Things that I have taken away from the September 6 Video Conference.

A question I asked, was if the Maintenance Mode will allow for re-occurring scheduling for a system(s). Example a script is ran on a certain day and time each month, can we pre-schedule this in advance? If I get a response I’ll apply to the comments.

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  • OM 2012 removes the RMS and makes all Management servers as Equals.
  • SDK & Configurations Services runs on all management servers
  • Console can be use any management server to connect
  • Store configuration  data in the database instead of memory
  • Faster start up and a smaller demand on local resources.
  • Server Pools  distributes the workloads across multiple management servers.

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  • Some major changes to Maintenance Mode

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  • A NEW ROLE – RMS Emulator; to help if a dependencies rely on a RMS such as a management pack.
  • Never place more than 50% of your Management Servers in maintenance mode at once – do half and wait until they all come out before you do the other half.

- Okay now, got some homework to do

Next Meeting: September 20, 8:00 AM PT Dashboards

OpsMgr 2012 Beta Setup and Upgrade Meeting Notes

Here are some notes & things that I’ve taken from the the OM 2012 Beta Video Conference.

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  • When upgrading your agents from OpsMgr 2007 R2 to OpsMgr 2012; you’ll be asked if you want to upgrade all your agents if it discovers that there are OpsMgr 2007 R2 Agents out there. You may choose to move forward, but you’ll not get monitoring. You’ll need to update each of these machines.
  • SQL permissions for:

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  • If you installed the OM 2012 Beta, you have to upgrade to OM 2012 RC before your can install the OM 2012 RTM. You cannot go straight to the RTM from Beta.
  • SKD and Config account needs to be a local administrator on each system.
  • You can not change the name of your Management Group

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Thursday, September 8, 2011

Zombie Question #1: Domain GPO Modifications?

 

I want to ask everyone if they had to identify and all modifications that had to make to support SCOM.

What are some recommendations to run SCOM over a domain with the proper permissions, functions and so forth from a domain GPO?

Please leave your comments:

Wednesday, September 7, 2011

SCOM Zombie PSA#22: A reason 4 Multi-Homed Agents

 

One of my customers gave me a requirement some time ago that they wanted to upgrade their MOM 2005 infrastructure to SCOM 2007 R2. There only requirement was that was provided was that there must be a fail-over system incase there is a site isolation.

So after reviewing their current capabilities and other available resources to support their requirements, the option that was best for their environment was two separate management groups separated by geographic locations.

To keep the systems identical, the duplication of work can be a pain at times. And when the site became isolated due to a hurricane, flooding, power outages and other nature disasters that occurred; monitoring continued.

There you go, nothing complicated, just something to think about when you have to provide continuous monitoring for a customer(s). Just happy customers

Thursday, September 1, 2011

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!!!!

 

BIG 40!!!!!

 

I can see everything from up here. Well I guess it is time to start heading down.

Sunday, August 28, 2011

Back from vacation & survived hurricane Irene

The family and I went out of town for the week of vacation one last time before everything goes back to a normal routine. We went to Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, stayed in a log cabin and did a lot of sight seeing. We really had a great time there.

But now I have a lot to catch up on now.

Sunday, August 14, 2011

SCOM Zombie PSA#21: SCOM Agent Health “Not Monitored”

 

A while back a zombie pushed a large number of agents out to be installed. Without waiting until the job completed on the first management group, the zombie pushed the agents out to the same systems from another management group.

The end result was some of the systems showed up in one of the management groups as “Healthy”  while the other system either failed to install the agent or it showed up as “Not Monitored”.

Here is what Worked for me:

  • Stop and disable the Agent Service (System Center Management). This also worked for some of the agents that I couldn’t successfully deploy a second agent on.
  • From the management group with the “Not Monitored” agent I deleted the agent from my Agent Managed or from the Pending Management.
    • if you delete the agent before the agent service is stopped/disabled it may reshow back up in the Pending Management. Even if you approve the agent, it will show back up as Not Monitored in the Agent Management.
  • Next I rediscovered & redeployed the agent to the system (I did not uninstall the agent).
  • My agent successfully installed and now it is properly reporting to multiple management groups with healthy status.

This worked for SCOM 2007 R2 and I bet SCOM 2012 it would resolve the same issue.

Friday, July 29, 2011

SCOM Zombie PSA#20: Web Console: HTTP Error 404.2 – Not Found

 

I’ve encountered this issue this afternoon, after re-building my OpsMgr2012. From my computer I received this “404 – File or Directory not found”.  image

I tried to verify this from my server, which I showed a different error, just more details. Nothing populated into my event logs on either system.

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What I really liked about getting this error was that It showed me how helpful the application is. The error populated a lot of information about causes, path that failed and some resolutions etc.It allow me to link Microsoft support site directly through the web console, where I was able to gather the resolution for the 404.2 error.

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Nothing difficult, just something I thought was neat.

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Made the changes, verified my work, tested and Bingo! working on both of my systems. I also verified the reporting as well just in case I broke something else.

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SCOM Zombie PSA#19: OM12 VM Reverted back

 

Well, I did get my OM2012 operational and running with a couple of problems along the way. Resolved the issues and decided to revert my image to a staged starting point and go through the process again. Will I run into a problem this time? How well do I understand the process Microsoft provided from their documentation? What can I resolve if I come across that path?

Once I have this running, I will move on to other stuff with OM12 or OM02.

SCOM Zombie PSA#18: Monitored Item Capacity

 

Here is the recommended limits for OpsMgr 2012 from the Supported Configurations guide:

Monitored Item

Recommended Limit

Simultaneous Operations consoles

50

Agent monitored computers reporting to a management server

3,000

Agent monitored computers reporting to a gateway server

2,000

Agentless Exception Monitored computers per dedicated management server

25,000

Agentless Exception Monitored computers per management group

100,000

Collective client monitored computers per management server

2,500

Management servers per agent for multihoming

4

Agentless managed computers per management server

10

Agentless managed computers per management group

60

Agent-managed and UNIX or Linux computers per management group

6,000 (with 50 open consoles); 10,000 (with 25 open consoles

UNIX or Linux computers per dedicated management server

500

UNIX or Linux computers monitored per dedicated gateway server

100

URLs monitored per dedicated management server

3000

URLs monitored per dedicated management group

12,000

URLs monitored per agent

50

SCOM Zombie PSA#17: Operations Console Requirements

 

Straight from the Operations Manager 2012 Supported Configurations guide:

  • Microsoft Report Viewer 2008 SP1 Redistributable Package
  • Hotfix 976898
  • Recommended processor speed: 2.8 GHz or faster.
  • Minimum memory: not less than 2 GB.
  • Drive space: %SYSTEMDRIVE% must have at least 512 MB free space
  • File system: %SYSTEMDRIVE% must be formatted with the NTFS file system
  • Server Operating System: must be Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows Server 2008 or Windows Server 2008 R2
  • Processor Architecture: must be AMD64 for servers and AMD64 or i386 for a client computer
  • Windows Installer version: not less than version 3.1
  • Windows PowerShell version: Windows PowerShell version 2.0
  • Both .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 and .NET Framework 4 are required. For more information, see the following.

Thursday, July 28, 2011

SCOM Zombie PSA#16: Server Error in '/' Application

 

As I monitored my OpsMgr console, I notice my Operations Web Console suddenly became unavailable. So I fired up the web console and received this error along with some details.

Details:

Could not load type 'System.ServiceModel.Activation.HttpModule' from assembly 'System.ServiceModel, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089'

Resolution:

I came across Bruno Wouters post helping other with the exact same issue. The only difference was that I was running this in OpsMgr 2012.

use the ASP.NET IIS Registration Tool or ASP.NET Side-by-Side Overview and execute the “aspnet_regiis.exe –iru” utilizing the command prompt as an administrator and navagete to the systemroot\Microsoft.NET\Framework\versionNumber

After I completed that, my web console was back to normal.

SCOM Zombie PSA#15: The RPC server is unavailable Error Code: 0x800706BA

 

I ran into this earlier today while deploying a OpsMgr Agent in my lab.

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So I did some digging and found some causes that this would appear. Depending on the description is start there, in my case it was a modification to my domain policy.

  • The remote system is being blocked by the firewall.
    • Solution: Modify the domain or local system Group Policy Object (gpedit.msc).
    • Navigate to Computer Configuration > Administrative Templates > Network >, open Network Connections > Windows Firewall > Domain Profile (or Standard Profile)
    • Enable the following exceptions:
    • Allow Remote Administration Exception
    • Allow File and Printer Sharing Exception
  • The "Remote Procedure Call (RPC)" service is not running on the remote system.
    • Solution: Verity on the remote system that "Remote Procedure Call (RPC)" service is running and set to auto start after restart. Enable service via domain policy.
  • The "Windows Management Instrumentation" service is not running on the remote system.
    • Solution: Verity that the remote system  "Windows Management Instrumentation" service is running and set to auto start after restart. Enable service via domain policy.
  • Host name or IP address is wrong or the remote computer is shutdown.
    • Solution: Verify and correct the remote system’s host name and/or IP address. Human error?
  • The "TCP/IP NetBIOS Helper" service isn't running.
    • Solution: Verity that the remote system’s "TCP/IP NetBIOS Helper" service is running and set to auto start after restart. (If you can remote to the system it is running) Enable this and Remote Registry via the domain policy.

SCOM Zombie PSA#14: Deploying OpsMgr 2012 Beta Attempt # ONE!



  • This is my first attempt installing Operations Manager 2012 Beta. I have all my pre-requisite completed. Now lets launch this installation application.
  • I have to say it was so much more easier to install than 2007 R2. Bravo Microsoft.
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  • Legal License read and checked
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  • I want to install it all
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  • Expand each of the items to read up on what it is you’re installing and any requirements that are needed.
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  • another screen shot expanded on the funtions
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  • Since I do not install applications on my OS drive, I have established a number of drives that I will use.
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  • The first time I ran this, the system identified that my server needed to reboot. I rebooted and ran the setup again.
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  • Simple enough,
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  • Applied my server name, and since I am using the default instance, it was smart enough to verify it.
  • Changed my drive locations for the database and log files for the Operational Database.
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  • Isn’t this special, I’ve done the same thing for the Data Warehouse. I’ve notice that there is also an option to either create a new database or use one from another management group.
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  • I wanted to show this screen, since I encountered it during my first attempt. If you hover your rat over the red X, it will inform you what is broken. Resolve it and try again.
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  • Once I started my SQL Server Agent service,I re-ran this again and passed.
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  • Default is fine for my environment.
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  • This installation I used the default, but choose what you’re requirements call for.
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  • Make sure you expand on these and apply your accounts and passwords.
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  • Because I am “Pro Support”, why not?
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  • Final step, a summary of what is going to be installed, verify and correct if you goofed somewhere.
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  • And Go!
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  • Done, Duh!
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  • And GO!
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  • Not too many things are popping out at me during my first look except these. Or at least I don’t recall seeing them in 2007 R2
  • Administrator > Resource Pools
  • Administrator > Run As Configurations > UNIX/Linux Accounts
  • Monitoring > New View
  • the blasted Default Management Pack seems to be gone from the View, as it was report at MMS2011. BUT it is still in the Management Packs.
  • Now it’s time to play

SCOM Zombie PSA#13: Zombie Instructions: Installing SQL 2008 R2

 

  • I am not a SQL expert, but this the process that I used to establish my Operations Manager 2012 Beta.
  • Launch the setup.exe as administrator
  • I always like to do checks first to verify that I do not run into problems during the installations so on the SQL Server Installation Center click on Tools & run the System Configurations Checker. If you failed any of the requirements, take care of them now & then come back.
  • Installation select New installation or add features to an existing installation.
  • The system will first validate the installation process. If you have any errors, correct them first before moving on

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  • The next screen that will appear is the Product Key. Apply the key and move on.
  • Once you decide accept and agree to the License Terms and select Next to move on.
  • On the Support File window select the Install button. The setup will install the Setup Support Files. The window may disappear for a second or two

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  • The warning that I get is because the firewall is turned on. However Since I’ve applied my firewall settings via my Domain Policy, I should be good.

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  • I have select SQL Server Feature Installation for Operations Manager 2012.

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  • I am choosing everything for now. I did change the default location since I do not want this installed on my C drive.

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  • Everything passed or skipped. verify that everything is correct, resolve any errors and then re-run the test.

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  • I changed the directory once again, and placed it somewhere else other than the C Drive.

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  • Disk Space validated

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  • Established NT Authority/Network Service as a default right now.

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  • I ended up adding my user account to the administrators.

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  • I’ve added my action and sdk service & my user account.

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  • Default configurations for the Reporting services

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  • Next

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  • Installation Configuration Rules verifications. Again, correct any issues.

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  • Ready to Install now, the only thing that I was not able  to modify was this part since I do not want anything installed on the C Drive. But no option for me to modify this.

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  • SQL Server is not being installed.

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  • & Done

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