Tips, tricks, & insight from people who know.
One of our readers just sent me the following info. If you are using DD-WRT with the effected version be sure to patch/resolve this. Follow this link.
*Update* You can test your router and see if you are vulnerable by entering this into your browser:
http://routeripaddress/cgi-bin/;reboot
–Himuraken
Recently a client asked me to lend them a hand with a Cisco IP Phone 7940 that was haning during the boot process.
After some quick research online, I determined that a reset on the device was needed, and the process is really simple.
Begin by unplugging the phone and then reconnecting the power. As soon as the headset key illuminates you need to press and hold the # key. After a few seconds you should see Reset sequence detected. Once that is displayed you have 60 seconds to enter in the following key sequence: 123456789*0#. You will be asked whether to keep the network config or not, press 2 and you should see: Factory reset initiated. You can watch process from beginning to end here.
–Himuraken
We recently purchased Kaseya and needed a better server to put it on. After deciding to setup Kaseya as a VM on a ESX host and a little capacity planning, I determined that a new server would be needed. After getting the corporate overlords to approve, I ordered up a new Dell PowerEdge R610 with 12GB of RAM and six HDD’s. I’m thinking RAID 10 for this box, but a little research will make the final call.
–Himuraken
Many of my clients are getting the newer E series Dell Latitudes. The laptops seems pretty decent but they all come with the Dell ControlPoint software. The ControlPoint software aims to centralize the management of the systems settings.
While I am unfamiliar with the overall usefulness of the ControlPoint software, I do know that the ControlPoint Connection Manager is terrible. Just about every end user that I have worked with on these newer laptops asks me to uninstall ControlPoint.
Generally speaking, all that you need to do to get a decent running system is to uninstall the Connection Manager portion of ControlPoint. Just open up Add/Remove Programs and uninstall Connection Manager. After the uninstall and reboot you will notice that the WWAN card will no longer work as you no longer have an app to control the device. The link below is the for 5720 model of WWAN cards which are very common in these Dell systems. The download installs the Sprint Mobile Broadband utility.
–Himuraken
Recently, a client explained to me that he was unable to view Flash based content. He went on to say that he reinstalled Flash for Internet Explorer and Firefox. So I spent about three minutes trying the same thing thinking that he must have done something wrong. No luck, the normal “You must have Flash player installed….” message did not come up, but neither did the content.
After reviewing the issue with the client a little bit further, he explained that other users are having the same issue. Obviously, this isn’t a client computer / Flash issue.
I logged into the Sonicwall and checked the logs. Sure enough, the Sonicwall ran its daily IPS signature update and started blocking Flash. The really interesting thing is that we have pretty much no IPS configured, Sonicwall just deemed Flash unsafe. Keep an eye out for this, because if Flash “breaks” the last place you might look may be the firewall.
The IPS engine put this in the logs:
IPS Prevention Alert: MULTIMEDIA Shockwave Flash (SWF) Download 3, SID: 575, Priority: Low
–Himuraken
So the other day I was making my usual password changing rounds on my accounts and devices. One of the things that I do change regularly is my password for DD-WRT. Somehow I changed it and could no longer access the device.
Alas, I did have SSH enabled and it let me log in using the original password that I had setup. I searched all over the place for documentation on doing this, and found nothing but people asking how to reset the actual router due to a lost password, and I wasn’t in the mood to rebuild my config. So here is the steps that I took.
1. Login to the router via ssh.
2. Type in nvram set http_passwd=
3. Then type in nvram commit
Finally, open your web browser and connect to your router. Change your password on the administration page and you are good to go.
–Himuraken
As posted many times before, I purchased two Dell Mini 9’s on September 4th, 2008 which was the first day that they were publicly available. Both units have worked pretty much as expected so far.
I have seen battery run times somewhere between 3-4 hours on a full charge and had been quite impressed. As of last week my Mini running Ubuntu decided that it would no longer accept a charge. I swapped chargers, laptops, and batteries in order to verify that the issue was the battery.
Dell support replaced the battery with little hassle and it was on my doorstep within 2-3 days. I am not aware of any widespread batteries issues, but wanted to post/report about this just in-case others were having a similar issue.
–Himuraken
Using backup to disk (B2D) as a backup destination is becoming more and more common. I attribute much of this to the rock bottom prices of disk based storage as well as simplicity. It is much more convenient to point a backup to device A and call it a day, as opposed to tape and rotations etc..
Lets face it, you need to have that backup data available for as long as possible because end users often tell you about lost data when its too late. I cannot count the number of times I have been asked to retrieve files and email from 3 months prior… So retention retention retention.
Using a high capacity NAS with Symantec Backup Exec is a reliable way to achieve consistent backups and retain them for a long time. Several of the clients that I manage use Symantec Backup Exec and a large NAS for daily backups. Even though most of the NAS’ are 1TB and larger, it is not uncommon to run out of disk space when you are trying to achieve maximum backup retention.
When configuring your media set overwrite protection and append rules, it is pretty easy to make a mistake. These mis-configurations often result in media not be reused properly, thereby increasing the space used on the NAS. This will eventually lead to Backup Exec flagging the B2D device as low on space and cause all of your backups to be missed / failed.
At this point your have probably resolved the media set issues, removed the media from your device in Backup Exec, and physically removed the B2D files from your devices. Most likely, you will also notice that Backup Exec still lists the device as low on space. Restarting services and everything else you try will not clear this flag. The way that I clear this warning is actually very simple. Go to the Devices tab, and right click on your device. Click on enabled or online to set the device to disabled or offline. Secondly, right click again and pause the device. Next, right click and unpause. Finally you need to enable / online the device. At this point you should be good to go.
–Himuraken