David Vielmetter

Adventures in stupid technology

  • Silently upgrade Office 2013 to 2016 via GPO

    [the problem] How to silently deploy Microsoft Office 2016, uninstall previous versions of MS Office, migrate existing MAPI profiles, and remove old shortcuts & replace them with new ones. NOTE: This article is for deploying Microsoft Office 2016 Standard or Professional with a perpetual volume license or MAK key. To deploy Office 365 applications, I’d…

  • Define a hotkey for windows playback device settings

    Switching your HDMI inputs can cause Windows to reset your computers Sound playback device configuration back to Stereo. At my house, I’m using a Sony amplifier to control several HDMI devices connected to a single Sharp TV. [the problem] When I switch audio sources on the amplifier from Windows (used for DVR) to my PS4,…

  • Microsoft Office cannot verify the license for this product

    Apparently this is a known issue with Microsoft Office 2013 and 2016. Unfortunately the support article describing the resolution to the issue isn’t very clear. I spent some time analyzing this issue and here’s what I’ve found. [UPDATE] This issue and resolution applies specifically to Microsoft Office 2013 and 2016 on Windows 7 and Windows…

  • Wipe securely and track what you’ve wiped

    It can be a tedious task to bulk wipe systems to DoD 5220.22-M standards. Especially if you need to keep track of what you’ve wiped and when. There are a handful of tools available for free which allow you to essentially boot and wipe systems and there are many vendors selling appliances to bulk wipe…

  • Outlook data recovery from a PST file

    [sponsored] If you’re using Microsoft Outlook with a single POP3 account to manage email, all your personal data will likely exist in a PST file. If this file gets corrupted for whatever reason, Outlook may fail to start. [the problem] Outlook will not start and hangs at a splash screen showing starting… or processing… or…

  • Google Apps to Office 365 migration the wrong way

    So if you’re planning on moving from Google Apps to Office 365, don’t perform a PST migration. The result could be that each migrated email has an incorrectly formatted x400 email address and replying to any migrated messages will yield a 550 5.1.11 RESOLVER.ADR.ExRecipNotFound NDR. [the problem] When using Outlook 2016 and Google Apps Sync…

  • Microsoft breaks USB device input with cumulative update KB4074588

    –UPDATE 4/10/18– Microsoft has released the 2018-04 Cumulative Update (KB4093110) and again there are reports ranging from disabled USB input devices to broken start menu issues. Microsoft acknowledges some installation related issues with this patch here, but fails to disclose issues reflecting what users are reporting. –UPDATE 3/6/18– Microsoft has acknowledged issues with the 2018-02 Cumulative Update…

  • Troubleshooting ping general failure aaand it’s Symantec

    Having worked in IT for some years, I’ve developed a special kind of hate for Symantec. I remember Symantec Mail Security for Exchange recursively quarantining all email messages with .ppt (powerpoint) attachments across your datastores, failed tape backups with every Symantec Backup Exec update or Symantec Endpoint Protection Management (SEPM) log files overfilling the OS…

  • Deploying TeamViewer unattended host

    So I’ve been playing with deploying TeamViewer 13 unattended host for several hours today and have reached the conclusion that the deployment documentation is just grossly inadequate. Here’s what I’ve learned after looking at several forum posts: Don’t try to deploy your customized TeamViewer unattended host MSI application via the GPO software installation package method…