Laptops won't take image from server

I hope this is the right group and I'll try to keep this short. The company I work for recently bought new laptops to replace the old ones. We use PXE Boot to pull an image from our server using Windows Deployment Toolkit. The old ones worked fine, running Win 10, the new ones, running Win 11, connect to the server but always end in the same error: "A connection to the deployment share (local\server) could not be made. The following networking device did not have a driver installed. PCI\VEN8086&DEV550A&SUBSYS0CB91028&REV20". I don't believe the OS has anything to do with it but I felt it was important to mention it.

I may be wrong but I suspect a driver issue (probably obvious). The only thing is I cant find any driver other than the exe or msi files and those don't work.

The laptops are Dell Latitude 5550. Any help or advice would be greatly appreciated.

https://redd.it/1nogm7x
@r_systemadmin

US Government: "The reboot button is a vulnerability because when you are rebooting you wont be able to access the system" (Brainrot, DoD edition)

The company I work for is going through an ATO, and the 'government security experts' are telling us we need to get rid of the reboot button on our login screens. This has resulted in us holding down the power or even pulling out the power cable when a desktop locks up.

I feel like im living in the episode of NICS where we track their IP with a gui made from visual basic.

STIG in question: Who the fuck writes these things?
https://stigviewer.com/stigs/red\_hat\_enterprise\_linux\_9/2023-09-13/finding/V-258029

EDIT - To clarify these are *Workstations* running redhat, not servers. If you read the stig you will see this does not apply when redhat does not have gnome enabled (which our deployed servers do not)

https://redd.it/1nomec1
@r_systemadmin

Drivers, drivers, drivers

Can someone explain to me why so many people are against pushing out firmware updates to enterprise equipment?

I’ve spent the last month updating PC / Laptop drivers that were years behind. Magically, our ticket volume has dropped by 19%.

Updated our network gear and magically everything is fine now.

What am I missing?


https://redd.it/1noq94o
@r_systemadmin

Someone just learned how to use ChatGPT

We have a massive addition being done to the service shop at one of our locations. Construction has been underway for months and is (hopefully) going to be done by the end of the year. I've been in the majority of meetings with the contractor to make sure IT needs are covered.


Cut to today. I get the following email from a random service manager at that location:

>Good afternoon, nlbush20.

> 

>I just wanted to touch base and see if there were already some plans/approvals for WAPs in the new building. I want to make sure that the heatmaps for the WAPs provide enough coverage to include factors such as interference from infrastructure yet at the same time not oversaturate, as this could create its own problems. Also, wanted to make sure that they will mesh in with the current WAPs in the existing structure, so we do not lose a connection going from one side of the wall to the other. With us relying heavily on remote troubleshooting connection session I need to make sure that we have adequate throughput speeds and that our firewall and network switch can accommodate the additional porting.

> 

>Your thoughts when you have time. Please and thank you! Much appreciated!


Gonna go out on a limb and say someone just showed him what ChatGPT is, and he believes that he has just crafted an extremely intelligent question/statement.


Thanks, buddy. We've got it covered.

https://redd.it/1not4s2
@r_systemadmin

Password policy for 2025?

Out of the blue I get sent a password policy for review. We have already had a password policy in place for many years. Don't understand why someone thinks we need a new one.

The "new" policy is like walking backwards 10 years. There is no mention of biometrics, SSO and very brief mention of MFA.

What are others using for password policies these days, does anyone have a template to share?

https://redd.it/1norwci
@r_systemadmin

Hired into company with near-zero IT infrastructure, tasked with bringing them up to speed

Edit: Wow! Didn't expect the support I've received so far! Thank you all!! Happy to be "joining" this community and can't wait to pay it forward.

Hi! Up front - I know I am probably in over my head, but hoping to focus less on that and more on what I CAN do! Try not to roast me too hard haha.

That said, I am a BIM Manager by trade that was hired into a 30-40 person AEC company to fulfill both that role and some/all of their IT requirements. They currently don't have an IT staff besides me now, but they do have some BIM folks, so my focus is more on the IT side at the moment. I do have fairly extensive experience using KACE for endpoint management, handling software deployments, GPOs, noscripting, and I'm pretty well versed in hardware, networking, etc., since these are all things I had to do in my past role. I interfaced with our IT team frequently and like to think I speak the language.

However, I'm moving on from that and into a company with no endpoint management and where every computer has the same password (*dies*) for ease of access haha. Quite different. Their networking was handled by an outside consultant, so it's fairly robust, and they have what I would consider the essentials in place in that regard (hardware firewalls, VPN, etc.). Hardware-wise we're doing OK. The most tech savvy person here has been in charge of getting folks computers and such by running to Microcenter. No other setup is done really. He has been doing a great job of maintaining an Excel log of everything as well, but definitely not the best format for this sort of thing and certainly not "live".

I feel like my first step towards being able to get us compliant with some basic cybersecurity requirements, as well as being able to effectively distribute software, fixes, noscripts, policies, etc., is to get us on Microsoft 365 Business Premium and rolling out Microsoft Intune. It seems like Intune is pretty well regarded and will help me check a ton of boxes in terms of bringing us up to speed, and it integrates well with the Microsoft 365 suite we already have. But I know that I don't know what I don't know.

Any other essentials I should be working towards immediately for a company starting from zero? Anything Intune doesn't handle well that would be better done by something else? Eventually I will be tasked with moving us towards CMMC Level 2 (NIST 800-171) compliance, but I know I need to walk before I can run and that is a wayyyyys off.

Thanks for all of your help!

https://redd.it/1norpd1
@r_systemadmin

Why is r/ITCareerQuestions so much gloom and doom all the time?

You always see people posting negative shit like applied to 2000 jobs and no interviews. I see lots of good posts about people getting their first help desk job with no experience. We need optimism and hope. Every sub for nursing, lawyers, mechanics, etc has that kind of negativity and I hate it.

https://redd.it/1noxik1
@r_systemadmin

Have been at the same company for 17 years. Would you stay at this point?

Been at the same company for 17 years. Would you stay at this point?

I’ve been at the same company for 17 years here in Ohio. I’m 40 years old, started there when I was 23. Salary is $120k, $7k bonus, work remote 4 days a week, plus other good benefits. Have managed to save $600k in a 401k from this job. I’m a senior systems administrator. Hours average 40 hours a week or less, overall great work life balance.

Would you stay at this company for the rest of your career? I feel happy and content but also a bit complacent after this many years. By complacent I mean I know my job very well which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Some friends and family keep telling me to look elsewhere to keep moving up but why rock the boat I figure. I would like to be done by 55.

Thank you

https://redd.it/1noytee
@r_systemadmin

Being proactive is rarely a boon

Proactively helping other departments and taking action on glaring issues without someone first bringing it up often ends in misery and someone upset.

Sorry folks, that's the way it is, and despite learning this lesson over and over I still tend to have to learn it again.

This is the last time though.

It's not worth the headache. Stay in your lane, unless it's really going to make you look good.

https://redd.it/1noy5t2
@r_systemadmin

8.8.8.8

What is everyone's thoughts on putting 8.8.8.8 as the second DNS on everything.

https://redd.it/1np2z6v
@r_systemadmin

The Admin Aura Effect

I was reminded of this phenomenon the other day when I saw it mentioned in an r/askreddit thread, and it struck me that it really needs a proper name.

You know how sometimes a computer or system is misbehaving, but the moment a technically capable person shows up, it suddenly starts working again? It’s not quite the observer effect or a Heisenbug — those don’t capture that it only seems to happen when someone competent is nearby.

So I’m calling it The Admin Aura Effect.

If you have it, your mere presence makes the broken system behave.

If you don’t, you’re the one stuck saying: “I swear it wasn’t working a second ago!”


I thought it deserved its own name because it’s such a shared experience in IT circles, but also funny enough that I think most people have seen it happen in some form.

What do you think?

https://redd.it/1np51hq
@r_systemadmin

Microsoft enforcing MFA 1st Oct. - best practices to avoid service account mishaps?

Hi everyone,

new Sysadmin here in need of support, apologies for the probably somewhat simple question

Been part of this fairly small business with a 2 people IT-Team for about half a year, during which i've implemented regular (legacy) MFA for all actual users using physical authenticators or business phones, where available.

At the start of next week, MS will force MFA before performing any resource management actions in Azure.

ATM we have hybrid identity with on-prem AD + Entra.

We have a few "user accounts" that are abused as service account for communication (CRM system, Monitoring, few others - created in the on-prem AD)

We have the option to delay the enforcement by 3,6 or 9 months, which we will very likely make use of, but i would still like to use this opportunity to learn.

What are the practices to apply? How do i find out which accounts would be affected? How would i migrate these accounts to service principals or similar?


Many thanks.



https://redd.it/1npa58e
@r_systemadmin

We integrate with Slack/Teams/PagerDuty/etc. Why is ServiceNow $50k + red tape?

We build an open-source monitoring tool. Users asked for a simple integration: when an alert fires, open an incident in **ServiceNow**. Easy, right? We’ve done this dance with Slack, Teams, PagerDuty, Opsgenie, Splunk, you name it, usually a webhook, API token, done.

ServiceNow, however, is a… special snowflake.

* No obvious self-serve dev path or trial we could find.
* Filled the “contact us” form multiple times → silence for months.
* Found humans → got bounced to sales (again).
* Finally reached someone → **minimum paid account is \~$50k** just to get in the door.
* Suggestion: go through a partner “Build” program to maybe get an instance… eventually.

We don’t make a cent from this. This is to help **their** customers use **their** tool better with our alerts. We’re not asking them for money or a co-sell. We just want an environment we can use to build and test a basic incident creation flow.

So, questions for folks who actually run ServiceNow or use/ship on it:

1. Is there a legit **self-serve route** we missed to build/test an integration without paying $50k or spending months in partner purgatory?
2. Are there any **workarounds** that you are using today, that we're just missing?
3. If you’ve shipped a third-party integration, **how did you get access** to a dev instance for testing?

Not trying to dunk on anyone, just stating what happened and looking for a practical way forward for our shared users.

*(Mods: not selling or recruiting. Dev experience + asking for actionable guidance.)*

https://redd.it/1np7n43
@r_systemadmin

Anyone else worried these attacks are slipping past the usual SOC stack?

First it was the M&S breach, then Co-op, and now Jaguar Land Rover grinding to a halt after hackers got in. Every time the story comes out, it feels like the same playbook: 3rd party software with a missed patch, outsourced IT, and attackers bragging online before the company even admits the scope.

What worries me isn’t just the money lost or factories stopping. It’s that these groups keep recycling methods across industries, and we only find out once they’ve already hit multiple companies.

how are you dealing with this in your own orgs? Are you doing more active monitoring outside your own perimeter, or still mainly focusing on internal hardening?

I feel like waiting for official disclosures means you’re already too late. Curious what practical steps others are taking to spot threats earlier.



https://redd.it/1npbyr3
@r_systemadmin

TeamViewer: Upgraded whether you like it or not. Enjoy your ‘missing out’ benefits.

So I got this gem from TeamViewer today:

>“In the next two weeks, you’ll be upgraded to the new TeamViewer Remote interface. This is a free and automatic switch. No action is required to enjoy the benefits.”

Translation: We’re flipping the switch whether you like it or not.

I’ve apparently been “missing out” by using the product I already paid for.
They promise a “familiar interface” (aka: it’s going to look different and you’ll hate it).
You can roll back… but only “for a limited time.”
Of course, they sprinkled in the buzzword salad: “AI, Intelligence, Global Search, Device Dock.”

Nothing says customer-first like telling me I’m missing out on features I never asked for, then strong-arming me into the “future of TeamViewer.”

https://redd.it/1npb7cq
@r_systemadmin

How strict should security be in early stage startups?

My devs use whatever SaaS tools they want. Marketing has 12 Chrome extensions.
Finance uploads spreadsheets into free tools. Should I clamp down now or let it slide until we scale?

any recommendations?



https://redd.it/1npbbgf
@r_systemadmin

MFA for all users

Quick question, how does everyone handle mfa for users in 365.

What I mean is, there are users who never leave the office and as such don't have a corporate mobile do you require these users to enable mfa on personal devices.

We have a ca policy that blocks sign ins for these users from outside the network but I feel we should still some how get these users enrolled in mfa. Just wondering what are options are

https://redd.it/1npk7lt
@r_systemadmin

WTF is wrong with Ninja One's Sales Team

Seriously, these clowns are really pissing me off. Am I the only one? They kept leaving me voicemails at work for months, spamming emails, it was driving me nuts.

Finally, one of these clowns called me on my personal cell phone (I have no clue how they got it) after work hours. I ended telling the guy to never call this number again. I was pretty pissed and obviously upset but the guy kept pushing. I told him I wasn't interested in a sales pitch and if we wanted anything we would contact them.

But this clown kept pushing anyway and told me he wasn't sales and he just wanted to invite me to see a demo. At that point I just blew up at the guy. Point blank asked him "do you think I'm that fking stupid? A demo for what? A product that you want to sell me." And this ass kept going "I'm not a sales person" at which point I finally hung up.

It blew me away how hard this guy kept pushing. I was simultaneously curious to see if/when he would get the message and back off, but clearly after explicitly telling him multiple times he still wouldn't stop.

Today rolls around and the new entry level tech who started 3 weeks ago gets a phone call from guess who? Ninja Fking One. And here's the bonkers part: he goes by a nickname and doesn't use his legal name. It's not on any of his emails or any accounts.

But he picks up on speaker phone and the woman on the other end says "hey <nickname>, how are you doing today?" She then says she's from Ninja One and she interested in talking to him about the services they offer. At that point I yell over at him "fk those guys. Don't talk to them, hang up."

Honestly I thought about putting all of the email blocks and phone blocks in place before, but after I chewed out the first guy, no one had heard from the until today. I'm going to be talking to the CIO tomorrow to clear putting the blocks in place, but seriously: fk these guys.

I get sales people are trying to make a living like anyone else, so generally I'm super polite with them but these guys are really, really screwing the pooch here. When you get the "no", it means "no". I will never use nor recommend Ninja One products ever.

https://redd.it/1npt7k4
@r_systemadmin

It's not you, dockerhub is down

I’ve been fighting this for like an hour thinking I'm crazy before I realized dockerhub is just down right now. So, FYI!


https://www.dockerstatus.com/

https://redd.it/1nps6p1
@r_systemadmin

If you're in Canada and you've been losing your mind over random mailboxes failing to load, my ticket with MS just got an incident opened

https://admin.cloud.microsoft/#/servicehealth/:/alerts/EX1158764

Thought I was going insane this past week with OWA bricking mailboxes on a daily basis..

https://redd.it/1npmxrm
@r_systemadmin

Office remodel - IT department being moved to center of office

They are remodeling our office, and we are losing our individual cubes ... the new layout will be open concept and all groups of 4 desks with low dividers. To make matters worse, they have moved the IT department right in the middle of the office. We will have one 14 foot table "shared space" to work on units shared between 3 of us.Also we are going from a 20 foot by 10 foot storage room to a closet to lock all stock up. We can't work in the server room they say because it has an inert gas fire suppression system installed.

I'm really dreading being out in the open, trying to build and repair PCs while every one walks by my desk. I don't understand why we can't be in a locking room.

So how do I make the open concept work? At this point I would prefer to be in the factory part of our building and just wear steel toes everyday.

https://redd.it/1npta1z
@r_systemadmin