US QuickBooks 2011 R1 – Third Party Components Install Error Plus Error on MSVCR90.DLL And More - Unresolved

We have a client that we set QuickBooks 2011 R1 (Accountant’s Edition) up for a while back. Then, the user went to use the software and it kept crashing.

The QB 2011 software was installed via RDP session by us.

The strange thing was that when we connected to the user’s desktop via Remote Assistance (SBS 2008 backend) QB 2011 would open with no issues. If the user connected to their desktop via RDP QB 2011 would open without a problem. Note that this user is operating as a Standard User.

We elevated the user to Local Admin status with no change. QB 2011 would not run unless a Remote Assistance session was active or they were connected via RDP.

We left the user at Local Admin status and had them uninstall QB 2011. Once they did so we had them attempt to reinstall only to get hit by:

Intuit QuickBooks Installer

Third party components could not be located.
The installation cannot proceed and will now exit.

Okay, so what does this mean?

• Intuit Community: Install Error – 3rd Party Components

We need to go get the R2 version of the product as the error is being generated by the RTM or R1 product which was delivered via DVD.

• Download QuickBooks products

Once we downloaded the R2 product via the above support page the user was able to install, but it still kept crashing outside of an RDP or Remote Assistance session:

Event 1000, Application Error

Faulting application QBW32.exe, . . . faulting module MSVCR90.dll.

So, while connected we had the user run the internal update feature and voila, we have updates:

Sure enough, after downloading and re-opening QB the R2 was now R3P:

After all of this we disconnected our Remote Assistance session and had the user log off and log back on again to see if they could start QB on their own. QuickBooks crashed again.

We then tried the Reboot.Bat script to register QuickBooks components as per:

• Run Reboot.bat

The script did not solve our problem. We still had the same application crash on the same DLL.

A search on the DLL brought up the following KB:

• Microsoft KB956420: FIX: Error message when you run an application that is configured to be built for the x64 platform by using the MSVCR90.dll file that calls the strncpy function: "An unhandled win32 exception occurred in 'application_name'"

This is the version set of the DLL on the problematic workstation:

MSVCR90.DLL Properties

Product version: 9.00.21022.8
Product version: 9.0.30729.1

Note that in the end the above hotfix was specific to Visual Studio 2008 so we were essentially barking up the wrong tree. This KB confirms it too:

• Microsoft KB326922: Redistribution of the shared C runtime component in Visual C++

With a further amount of searching we found this Intuit Support article:

• Intuit Support KB1010556: Error: "This application failed to start because ####.dll was not found. Reinstalling the application may fix this problem."

Note the specific reference to the MSVCR80.DLL. While not the same one as the DLL we are dealing with, it is close enough. We are at step 6 where we need to perform a clean uninstall of QuickBooks 2011.

If that works, we will update this post as well as publish a new post with a pointer back to this one. If it does not, then we are against the wall as Intuit has not given us any indication that they know what is going on either.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Windows Live Writer

Outlook 2010 – “My Address Book Is Gone” Importing The NK2 File

How many of us have heard, “My address book has disappeared!” after migrating the user to a new workstation.

We learned the hard way in the past to migrate the NK2 file, or what is called the Nickname Cache, to the new workstation _after_ creating a new one in Outlook 2007 or earlier.

With Outlook 2010, we need to go through an import process in order to get those nicknames into the user’s new Outlook mailbox setup.

• Microsoft KB980542: How to import .NK2 files into Outlook 2010

To import .nk2 files into Outlook 2010, follow these steps:

1. Make sure that the .nk2 file is in the following folder:

   %appdata%\Microsoft\Outlook

   Note The .nk2 file must have the same name as your current Outlook 2010 profile. By default, the profile name is "Outlook." To check the profile name, follow these steps:

   1. Click Start, and then click Control Panel.
   2. Double-click Mail.
   3. In the Mail Setup dialog box, click Show Profiles.
   4. 
   5. The original Outlook 2007 file is shown above.
2. Click Start, and then click Run.
3. In the Open box, type outlook.exe /importnk2, and then click OK. This should import the .nk2 file into the Outlook 2010 profile.
4.  
5. Note After you import the .nk2 file, the contents of the file are merged into the existing nickname cache that is currently stored in your mailbox.

Note The .nk2 file is renamed with a .old file name extension on the first start of Outlook 2010. Therefore, if you try to re-import the .nk2 file, remove the .old file name extension.

Make sure to follow the profile name verification as the import does not work if that step is not followed. The Outlook 2007 file was named Default.NK2.

Also:

Our Outlook.NK2 file did not get the .OLD extension tied onto it after the file was imported into Outlook. We could tell that the file was indeed in there because typing a letter in the TO field of a new e-mail brought up _lots_ of e-mail addresses.

Obviously our client would not have been too happy if their address book was deleted.

Now, what happens when we want to move them from this system to another system whether with Outlook 2010 or newer version of Office has yet to be seen. Given that the above KB is a “Fast Publish” article, we can only hope that an avenue to move that nickname cache between Outlook 2010 profiles or to newer Office versions will happen.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Windows Live Writer

CaseWare Working Papers 2010 – Network File Locations Errors

Just lately we have been seeing a lot of problems with CaseWare Working Papers 2010 and the files associated with the program being located on Windows Server 2008 and Windows Server 2008 R2 (including SBS) file shares.

CaseWare has this to say:

• File corruption when using Windows Vista/Windows 7 or Windows Server 2008 with SMB2

CaseWare International highly recommends disabling SMB2.

Specifically, the problems have reared their head with the Working Papers R2 and R3 updates applied.

This situation really gives us cause for pause.

Why, you might ask?

Because CaseWare’s recommendation to disable SMB2 (the network sharing protocol that gives us 100MB+/Second file copies on the network) takes us a huge step backwards in network performance.

Now, for a small accounting firm this may not be a big deal . . . depending on how many QuickBooks and Simply clients they are bookkeeping for. Or, how many large files are moving around on the network.

As soon as we disable SMB2 we are at a disadvantage for any large data sets moving around on the network. So, for our larger accounting firm clients with quite a number of QuickBooks files open simultaneously plus their regular network traffic we may start to hear complaints about poor network performance.

In our opinion, the suggestion to disable SMB2 comes at too high a cost for most accounting firms.

With the just released R7 for CaseWare Working Papers 2010 we are hoping that we will see things settle down to the same level RTM had (virtually no issues).

If not, we may be looking at setting up a small NAS appliance with a folder share _just for CaseWare files_ so as to not impact the overall performance of the network.

BTW, our last attempt to contact CaseWare support took 5 days before their initial response which was to e-mail another department and then _another_ 3 days before the answer finally came through. Eight days to straighten out an activation issue with CaseWare Working Papers 2010 . . . ouch.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Windows Live Writer

ShadowProtect 4.0.1–Windows 7 Ultimate x64 Restore Good To Go

We supplied a number of new machines into a new client when we did a new SBS 2008 install not too long ago.

One of the machine’s hard disks was causing some flaky behaviour and throwing Disk errors in the Event Logs.

We installed ShadowProtect 4.0.1 Desktop edition on the machine yesterday and set up a scheduled backup to run every hour to a network share.

When we arrived this morning we ran a final Incremental backup prior to shutting down the system. We swapped out the bad drive for a new one and then booted off of our ShadowProtect IT Edition’s USB flash drive.

Once we created the necessary disk signature, rebooted, we were able to restore the 100MB partition that Windows 7 creates and then the actual system partition.

There was some initial concern because that 100MB partition normally does not have a drive letter associated with it plus the restore process flagged a bad BCD Database restore in red.

Once we ran through the actual system drive’s restore process there was a note in the Details pane that showed that the BCD Database was edited and successfully corrected.

We then closed ShadowProtect IT Edition and the system rebooted. It complained about not being shut down properly, but Windows 7 Ultimate did indeed boot up without a hiccup.

A quick check in Disk Manager showed that 100MB partition as not having a drive letter and everything was good to go!

Total time to swap out a bad drive and restore the system on an Intel Core 2 Duo E8500 on an Intel DQ45EK Mini-ITX motherboard with a 320GB 7200 RPM Momentus was about an hour and 10 minutes. A full OS install, driver install, updates, and application install would have been about 3-4 hours.

Note that ShadowProtect must be installed and configured on a Backup Schedule in order to have access to creating Incremental backups. A manual backup (Backup Once) will not allow for any incremental backups.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Windows Live Writer

Intel’s New Server System SR1695GPRX 1U 1P 4 Hot Swap Drive

We just received a new Intel Server System SR1695GPRX 1U uni-processor system that has four hot swap SAS/SATA drive bays capable of handling both 3.5” and 2.5” drive sizes out of the box.

This new Intel Server platform is an excellent fit for the SMB space in that it offers the same enterprise class 1U server features as a dual processor unit but at a single processor price level.

This configuration has been on our wish list for _a long time_ now.

• 1U profile provides for lots of room in that 24U enclosure.
• Single processor leads to a lower cost point based.
• A single processor server board with extended RAM capabilities.
• 4 hot swap drive bays give us access to RAID 10 configurations.
• A full height PCI-E slot for a high performance RAID controller.
• Intel Remote Management Module 3 (LITE) capable.
• Takes over NIC5 to provide out-of-band console access via Web.

As we can see the server system also has dual redundant power supplies which is absolutely critical to providing our clients with needed hardware redundancy. On the right hand side at the bottom of the above shot are two ports where we can plug in a couple of additional I/O modules such as dual Intel Gigabit server NICs to bring the total NICs available on this box to eight (without the RMM3LITE NIC).

• The SR1695GPRX is dual power supply capable (watch that part number!)
• Can add another set of dual port Intel Gigabit server NICs.
• Can add an entry level performance SAS RAID I/O module without using the PCI-E slot.
• Some RAID I/O modules have the ability to add a cache battery.

Given that we can have up to eight NICs in this system we now have an excellent platform for a single server Hyper-V host when deploying SBS 2008 plus the second server or as an inexpensive node in a Hyper-V cluster attached to iSCSI storage for Clustered Shared Volumes.

The shot above is just prior to dropping the airflow baffle back on between the fans and the CPU and the memory.

The RAID controller is an Intel RS2BL080 with battery backup situated near the top of the shot (shiny object). We have an RS2BL040 on order but it will not be here until the end of the week. Since Intel RAID controllers can be inter-changed we have this Hyper-V server built up already and will swap in the production controller when it shows up.

From now on this particular hardware configuration will be our principle offering for any situations where we need a 1U server system whether the client is looking for standalone server systems, a couple of virtualized server operating systems, or even a small two node cluster based on two of these units and one or two NAS devices that act as iSCSI targets.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Windows Live Writer

Toshiba Tecra S11 Core i7-620M 160GB X25-M WinSAT Score

We have just completed configuring a number of new Toshiba Tecra S11 laptops with 160GB X25-M Intel SSDs.

• Toshiba Tecra S11 PTSE3C-011013

Our own Tecra S10 WinSAT scores can be found here:

• Intel 160GB SSD Performance In the Tecra S10 Versus RAID 0 2x 80GB SSDs on DX38BT

The Tecra S10’s scores were:

• Disk  Sequential 64.0 Read              203.74 MB/s        7.3
• Disk  Random 16.0 Read                    39.33 MB/s        6.3
• Disk  Sequential 64.0 Write              88.15 MB/s          6.3
• Total Run Time 00:01:25.32

The Tecra S11’s scores were as follows:

• Disk  Sequential 64.0 Read                   240.75 MB/s          7.5
• Disk  Random 16.0 Read                       215.20 MB/s          7.8
• Disk  Sequential 64.0 Write                  103.40 MB/s          6.6
• Total Run Time 00:01:10.07

The second stat in the S10’s numbers must have been an anomaly. We will revisit the WinSAT test on that unit to see how the performance has stood up over time.

There is a tangible performance difference on the Core i7-620M based Tecra S11 versus the Core 2 Duo T9600. The system is a lot more responsive in so many ways.

So, it is not surprising to see that the SSD performance on the new S11 takes a step up versus the previous generation.

In the end, the cost of the SSD is more than made up by our client’s users increased productivity.

While one of the drivers for having the SSD installed has been Windows XP Mode on Windows 7, most of our client’s line of business applications have come up to date and are Windows 7 compatible. There are still a few hold outs, but for the most part XP Mode is slowly being deprecated.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Windows Live Writer

Windows 7 Enterprise Upgrade Edition

Okay, so we cannot plug in a Windows 7 Enterprise OS based flash drive and do an in-place upgrade of Windows 7 Professional.

• TechNet: Windows 7 Upgrade Paths
• Microsoft Forums: Upgrading Windows 7 Pro vs Enterprise

This is important to note when it comes to any time quoting for things like replacing spindle based hard disks with Intel X25-M SSDs and expecting to drop the OEM default recovery on the SSD and then upgrade to Windows 7 Enterprise using the client’s Software Assurance.

Windows 7 Enterprise will always have a fresh install requirement if the base OS was Windows 7 Professional.

The Windows 7 Enterprise Upgrade version will upgrade certain prior Windows Vista versions though.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Windows Live Writer

Laptop Start-up – Stalled At “Please Wait …”

We have been seeing a few situations where a laptop that is not connected to any wired or wireless network connection will hang at “Please wait” for quite a long time.

• Microsoft Forums: Boot up hangs at "Please wait" for "ever". NLA Service is culprit.

It took a long time to figure out the right search terms to bring up the above Forums post.

While the general consensus among folks on the forum post is to disable the NLA Service, this will kill any connection that the laptop may have to a Home Group, disable the laptop’s ability to change default printers based on location, and more.

So, we suggest trying to set the NLA Service to Automatic (Delayed Start). If that still causes the stall at start up, then change the service to Manual so that the OS can still fire up the service if it is required.

Once the setting change is complete, the laptop should boot up and display the logon screen in essentially the same amount of time whether connected to a network or not.

Hat Tip: Kevin Atkey

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Windows Live Writer

Seagate’s New Model Numbering Scheme

We just received a Seagate Partner e-mail that indicates that Seagate is changing the product model numbering scheme.

• Seagate Is Rolling Out New Model Numbers. Are You Ready?
• A registration form fronts the video which is hosted on a third party site.

As we can see, the model numbers have changed significantly relative to the current model number structures. In the current scheme The prefix ST3 means 3.5” drive, ST9 means 2.5” drive while the suffix AS is SATA, ES is Enterprise SATA, and SS is SAS. The numbers in between the prefix and suffix would be the size of the drive and then three numbers indicating model specifics.

A breakdown of the model number and what each means is this:

What we will end up with will actually be a simpler way to order Seagate drives. No more needing to know the various model numbers for whatever feature we want with a 500GB drive for example. With the new model number scheme the number will remain the same for the 320GB drive across all of is various feature sets while the model number will be specific to those feature sets.

It means that internally we can track all of the various feature sets for inventory purposes but our externally facing collateral will use the one model number to describe a 320GB drive. This makes for a much simpler presentation too.

Ultimately, when it comes to ordering product the new model numbering scheme will not make too much of a difference when searching our distribution channels for product. Now, we can search ST31000*SS to find any 1TB SAS drives, ST3500*NS to find any Enterprise SATA drives, and so on. After modifying our wildcard location to ST500* we will find any and all 500GB SKUs available to us. We can then use the same methodology as above to limit our search results to ST500MX* for Mission Critical 500GB drive models or ST*MX to bring up all Mission Critical products.

Note that not all distribution search engines support wildcard searches beyond dropping the asterisk at the end of some alpha characters.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Windows Live Writer

Microsoft Bluetooth Mobile Keyboard 6000

One of our Microsoft Wireless Entertainment Keyboard 6000s had its space bar button die. We tried to get things working, but it seems that it would not cooperate.

So, we needed a replacement.

For those of us with bad wrists, in my case due to slinging a wrench for so many years without initial training on protecting them, a wave style keyboard helps to reduce the need to wrist pivot the hands while typing.

We have found that the Microsoft wave style is one of the ergonomic keyboards available.

 

With this particular keyboard being Bluetooth enabled we were able to pair both the keyboard and the number pad with the workstation’s built-in Intel DP55KG Bluetooth in a matter of seconds.

Key action on the new 6000 provides great feedback with a smooth action. For comparison, it has the feel of a high quality laptop keyboard.

Due to its compact size though, there were some compromises on the number and type of keys included on the keyboard. The one button that we really miss is the right mouse click key. In its place is a blue Fn key for the page up, down, home, end, and other such keys.

When working in Word or Outlook it is much easier to tap on that key to gain access to the right click menu for copy and paste or to work with e-mail.

While a user’s preference for a keyboard style is particular to them, there is an added benefit to having the separate number pad for folks that work in accounting offices. So, we will be suggesting this keyboard and number pad combination to our accounting clients.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Windows Live Writer

Gearing Up – Back At It

The last three weeks have certainly had their fair share of ups and downs.

Today we are back in business, though it may take time to gain a full head of steam.

We have a lot to do to catch up with a long list of client requests that will need to be dealt with over this week and into the next.

We then have a few prospective deals that we are working on with some being close to being deals in principle.

So, posting may continue to be light over the next while as we catch up with everything and begin to work on new projects as well.

Thanks to all for your support both here and privately via e-mail and phone. We really appreciate it! :)

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Windows Live Writer

BESx On A Standalone Server – No Terminal Services/Remote Desktop Services Eabled

It seems that after hitting the wall as many times as we have with our BESx install, we took advantage of the free support incident to find out what was going wrong.

It seems that BESx will not install the full server application set on a server that has TS/RDS enabled. The BB technician indicated that there should be a KB on BB’s site indicating such, but we have not been able to find it.

Needless to say, if BESx is going on a standalone server that will be serving Terminal Services or Remote Desktop Services, install BESx before the TS/RDS role.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Windows Live Writer

BlackBerry Enterprise Server Express Installation – Error Initializing System

We are having a lot of “fun” putting together a standalone BESx installation.

On this run through we received the following error when we restarted the BESx setup routine:

BlackBerry Enterprise Server Express Installation

Error initializing system

BlackBerry has a Knowledgebase article on the above error:

• BB Support KB23428 – “Error initializing system” error appears when starting BlackBerry Enterprise Server 5.0 SP2 setup

The above knowledgebase article tells us how to work around the error:

1. Click Start > Run.
2. Type regedit.
3. Navigate to the following location depending on the version of Windows Server®:
   • If you are running a 32-bit version of Windows, navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Research In Motion\BlackBerry Enterprise Server.
   • If you are running a 64-bit version of Windows, navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Research In Motion\BlackBerry Enterprise Server.
4. Remove the Database registry key.
5. Navigate to the following location depending on the version of Windows Server:
   • If you are running a 32-bit version of Windows, navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Research In Motion\BlackBerry Enterprise Server.
   • If you are running a 64-bit version of Windows, navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Research In Motion\BlackBerry Enterprise Server.
6. Remove the Database registry key.
7. Restart the setup.exe application and complete the installation

Once we had removed the above registry settings we were able to run the setup routine again. However, it continued on from where things went sideways in the first place.

Now we need to figure out how to uninstall everything manually as the Uninstall routine does not work at all.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Windows Live Writer

Windows Phone 7 – No GAL Access on Exchange 2003

It looks as though ActiveSync connectivity on the newly released Windows Phone 7 may not be totally there yet.

• Microsoft KB2463128: You cannot search the Global Address List with Windows Phone 7 when connecting to Exchange Server 2003

Quote:

When using a Windows Phone 7 device to connect to Exchange Server 2003 using Exchange ActiveSync, you are unable to resolve user names within your Global Address List (GAL). 

When creating a new e-mail message, you type the name or alias of an e-mail recipient in your organization's GAL in the TO field and the name is not resolved.  In addition, you are unable to Search the GAL, and can only search local Contacts.

A workaround for now is to use the full e-mail info@sbscougar.ca in order to send an e-mail on a Windows Phone 7.

Judging by the Windows Phone site, the release version of the product looks as though it is more focused on consumers as opposed to corporate users:

• Windows Phone 7 Site – Discover

There is no real indication as far as ActiveSync feature integration other than Email, Calendar, and some sort of “Social networking” address book integration. People Hub may pull from Contacts on Exchange, but the Tasks synchronization seems to be missing completely.

If Tasks are indeed missing, then there will be no real incentive to drop the ailing HTC Touch Pro that I currently use until Windows Phone 7 gets a more business like approach. The Tasks/To Do list is needed to manage the little things that may get lost in the rush of day-to-day business.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Windows Live Writer

Troubleshooting HTTP and HTTPS Traffic With WFetch

This little utility has helped us out on numerous occasions when we were trying to figure out if a system was compromised, proxy settings were wrong, proxy server not responding, or browsers were just plain not working.

• WFetch 1.4 (Microsoft download site)

The above screenshot shows a successful connection from the workstation to Bing’s site. This is one utility that belongs in our Technician’s Thumb Drive (blog category).

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Windows Live Writer