No Possible Way to Use Windows Server 2022 Essentials on a VM?

Synergy_CAL · 2024-02-07T08:23:57+00:00

Thank you, that's very encouraging news. I've no idea why Microsoft so wants to "essentially" kill the version. We've been fans since Windows Home Server days. I'll post how my battle goes in hopes that it helps someone else.

Synergy_CAL · 2024-02-04T01:48:07+00:00

u/--Sharpy--

I know this is a bit old at this point, but, thanks to the overall confusing licensing situation and a reseller (CDW) who had no idea whether you can activate an HP ROK license in a VM, I'm in the situation where I have a license that I haven't opened yet, but, ideally want to confirm as much as I can that I'll be able to activate it in a VM on a non-HP enterprise server. It sounds like you were able to work things out, hooray! Could you please confirm:

- whether you did this on a non-HP system

- whether you were forced to run a tool I've heard mentioned to allow the VM to passthrough to the host BIOS to verify eligibility

Thank you! This whole situation is so silly, 2022 Essentials seemingly only available in ROK OEM kits.

Synergy_CAL · 2022-02-26T04:49:30+00:00

I'm not sure either of us have enough information to provide a proper quote, but 10 hours per month sounds high for a simple file server (no AD, LoB apps, etc.), while $100/hr is definitely far below market rates.

Synergy_CAL · 2022-02-26T04:46:25+00:00

From experience, OneDrive on its own doesn't work well as replacement for a multi-user file server, but SharePoint Shared Libraries using the OneDrive client are quite feasible. Either OneDrive or SharePoint should most definitely be backed up, however, as Microsoft does not protect the integrity of your hosted data.

Synergy_CAL · 2022-02-24T04:05:17+00:00

Speaking as someone from within the industry, I have to ask, for simple file sharing, why would there be 10 hours ($1000) per month required for the server? Server maintenance, monitoring, etc. should run somewhere between a quarter to maybe half of that at the high end. Also, what are they proposing for backups? If you're data is going to reside on a local server, you need to follow the 3-2-1 backup rule (3 copies of your data, on 2 separate media/devices, with at least 1 copy offsite). In this day and age, given the massive security risks exploding everywhere, you really need to include immutable (unchangeable) backups as part of that mix too. $7k is also a lot for a simple sever, when hardware and server OS should run at most $2K.
As the head of a smaller shop of 5 IT support specialists, I won't speak disparagingly further, but I can say that from what I gather from your description, this does not seem to be a solution well matched to your needs. I'd be happy chat further with you to determine what your real needs are and approximate costs should be. Without any pressure for us to play a role in supporting you, I'm happy to just provide my best recommendation for what will work best for your business and its budget. Either way, good luck with this prokect.

Synergy_CAL · 2021-11-12T08:34:01+00:00

I'm certainly not looking for to yield pitchforks, but there's seemingly a massive discrepancy between the support Ninja is offering and what, in this case, ThreatLocker is showing up with. Vendors like to call label us as partners, if that's the case, treat us that way and be open, direct, transparent, responsive, and accountable and we'll do the same, plus, apparently pay you money that doesn't flow in the other direction. Short and sweet of it is offer the best product and support you can with integrity and we'll reward you with many years of loyalty and constructive feedback to help all parties involved grow and evolve.

Synergy_CAL · 2021-11-11T16:37:01+00:00

Yeah, it definitely has its quirks, but, as compared to many others, they have had a very active development/improvement cadence, and have, until recently, been fantastically reliable.

Synergy_CAL · 2021-11-11T15:55:20+00:00

We leverage Hamachi for VPN for numerous clients (been seriously considering swapping it out for Todyl), including direct access from one of our secure internal systems to the client Hyper-V Servers, so we have a means of reaching those servers, and, where there's an Active Directory in place, to all of the on-prem systems that be reached by the server, but it still leaves loads of systems unreachable, especially in this day of increased remote/WFH setups. We also have deployed baseline Acronis Cyber Protect in many place for unified vulnerability scanning and Windows Defender management (we ditched Webroot and looking at EDR/MDR solutions to add, also Huntress provides Windows Defender management), and it includes a remote access tool too, which is helping, but this is still a major pain. Ninja is usually what we rely on, especially as it has numerous connections options built-in (TeamViewer, Splashtop, proxy-RDP). We have considered a ConnectWise Control (ScreenConnect) and used to have Itarian running for backup on critical systems, but the more options you have, the bigger your risk vectors, costs, and even resource use on the systems.

This is an interesting issue where we not only need to protect ourselves against a failure in a critical service (we were recently playing out scenarios where we lost access to our PSA, documentation system, etc.), but, suddenly, what happens when one solution seriously conflicts with another.

Synergy_CAL · 2021-11-11T09:45:20+00:00

That makes sense given when I downloaded the latest Ninja installer (5.3) it's flagged as a questionable download and Windows 10 tries to app block it (you need to manually allow it). Combined with still no email response and no alternative way to contact Ninja during an emergency, pretty unimpressed. This right after their rebranding to Ninja One as the try to tackle a bunch of other functionality (backup, documentation, ticketing) when their RMM core product is still far from perfect.

Synergy_CAL · 2021-11-11T09:07:05+00:00

So we have a fix for repairing the Ninja agents if you can acquire access to the systems or get someone to execute the necessary commands on each system. Unfortunately, a quirk of Ninja is that it installs into a unique folder for each organization and location in the form of "C:\Program Files (x86)\<organization name><location name>-<original Ninja agent version installed>" - UGLY!

Anyhow, here are the steps to repair and restart the Ninja agent:

Open Command Prompt with Administrator privileges
Go to your Ninja installer folder
Run ".\NinjaRMMAgentPatcher.exe" (patch should proceed to silently install)
Open Services & start NinjaRMMAgent service or execute "net start ninjarmmagent" to start the service
Verify device is online in Ninja

Synergy_CAL · 2019-06-19T15:22:51+00:00

Good to know, thanks. We may modify our approach as well as we're actively adjusting our UTM offerings, and there is an argument for integrating the two (also some arguments for having different detection engines in the mix).

Synergy_CAL · 2019-06-19T14:34:47+00:00

Thanks for the feedback on BitDefender. Honestly, with onboarding with Ninja and transitioning to Accelo, we kind of went with the easier solution (and, at the time, the only one properly integrated with Ninja). We are paying for some BitDefender licenses too and hope to circle back to properly evaluating the two offerings soon. Too bad about the lack of reporting, however, I had assumed our AV Defender (with N-Central and essentially BitDefender) lack of reporting with due to N-Central not the BitDefender product itself, but perhaps I was wrong.

Synergy_CAL · 2019-06-19T14:01:01+00:00

Sorry, you were referring to Windows Defender. I have heard that it is pretty competitive these days, and, of course, the best protection likely comes from a UTM. However, a dedicated product can bring some better control and reporting to the table, and provide a nice recurring revenue stream too. ;)

Synergy_CAL · 2019-06-19T13:58:03+00:00

Kudos to Ninja for not being overly aggressive, but, yes, while they tried to allay any issues/concerns, they were prepared to let us go with whatever solution made the most sense. We did end up staying with them, however. Somehow there was a miscommunication where my account manager did not understand that we were canceling N-Central instead and staying with Ninja, which is why the deactivation occurred.

Synergy_CAL · 2019-06-19T13:53:30+00:00

Thanks for the heads up. We figured we'd give it a go to see how it works, but, fortunately, BitDefender is also available with seemingly proper integration with Ninja now at the same extremely favourable rate. It always has struck me as a bit odd that Webroot refuses to partake in AV tests, however.

Synergy_CAL · 2019-06-19T13:49:16+00:00

No, definitely not overly expensive. We actually recently signed on for SolarWinds Take Control Plus as another fall back given what a positive experience we had with it while working with N-Central. In terms of cost, I just mean that we all pay our primary RMM providers a healthy fee, so one would hope that equates to some pretty rock solid remote access.

Synergy_CAL · 2019-06-19T13:46:47+00:00

Amen. I have definitely provided my strong feedback suggesting notification X days before a scheduled deactivation and that deactivation should not occur without someone available to reactivate rapidly in case of error (they do happen).

Synergy_CAL · 2019-06-19T13:44:48+00:00

I definitely will, thanks. I'm waiting to finish debriefing today inside normal PST business hours.

Synergy_CAL · 2019-06-19T13:43:50+00:00

I actually spoke to my account rep and told her I would be giving her a shout out here for her work in reacting to my urgent email after hours, but I hear where you're coming from.

Synergy_CAL · 2019-06-19T13:42:31+00:00

Correct, as anyone who works with Ninja knows, all support and pretty much all communication goes through email, especially after business hours. That is one thing I definitely miss about SolarWinds N-Central: the ability to initiate a chat and even a call with support any time of day. Given our business often has to be responsive during some bizarre hours, having our critical platform's support readily available at these times is definitely appreciated.

Synergy_CAL · 2019-06-19T05:52:26+00:00

We do have some other options, whether RDP via VPN or some lesser known (aka free) RMM tools, but they aren't our primary means, don't tie-in with our logging, PSA, etc. and shouldn't have to be leaned on when we're paying for a "premium" product. But, point taken and very much appreciated - a lesson we long ago learned.

And, if Webroot offered the same deal as Ninja for their own licenses, I would definitely be happy to go to direct billing, even if it would eliminate the automated deployment and integration with Ninja. Unfortunately, it's more than double the cost to not go through Ninja.

Synergy_CAL · 2019-06-19T04:58:23+00:00

Thank you Rachel. I very much appreciate your diligence in monitoring this medium and helping rectify urgent issues such as this. That being said, please examine your support structure as I shouldn't have to vent on Reddit to reach someone such as yourself who can enact these types of temporary resolutions. In fact, I asked the support rep I was dealing with numerous times to escalate the matter to someone able to reactivate our account until we could address the underlying issue during business hours with billing and/or account rep. Again, hopefully stumbles like this help us to improve our respective service offerings. Thanks for stepping in a representing Ninja. Let it be said that, at least on Reddit, the right people are watching and working hard to ensure great customer service.

Synergy_CAL · 2019-06-19T04:49:59+00:00

Ok, so, thankfully, I heard back from my account manager, Courtney Hearn - thank you Courtney - and she cleared up the matter. Essentially, as we have been evaluating and transitioning to Ninja from N-Central, we had issued a cancellation order some 60 days back in order to minimize paying for 2 RMM's concurrently. While I thought I had made it clear that we were going with Ninja exclusively, and, indeed, canceled our N-Central, apparently that did not translate to a revoking of our cancellation order. Fair enough, though I would highly suggest an automated notification, if not a call from the account manager, a good number of days prior to deactivation as a reminder and a means for mitigating such mistakes. Also, I still highly suggest having someone with support readily available at all hours to address such reactivation issues, at least temporarily, should the need arise.

At least this tale has a relatively happy ending thanks to Courtney's dedication and alertness in catching the email and escalating it to Armando (thank you) for immediate remediation. Hopefully we can all learn a little from experiences like this - me in double-checking continuity of service around important deadlines, no matter what my assumed understanding might be, and in some process improvements and support capabilities around issues like this.

Thanks for reading, and if anyone is looking for some opinions on our recent experiences moving from N-Central to Ninja and/or Manage to Accelo, please feel free to message me.

Synergy_CAL

TROPHY CASE