Setting Network Interface Priority On Windows 8 with PowerShell

Yesterday I posted a blog on Setting Network Interface Priority on Windows 8 with the GUI, today I am going to show you how to do it with PowerShell.

Firstly you are going to have to run PowerShell at an elevated prompt, to do this, simply right click on the icon and click “Run as Administrator”

Type Get-NetIPInterface to get a list of all the network interfaces on your system. The 2 interfaces we are looking for are Ethernet and Wi-Fi, both on IPv4

Get-NetIPInterface

The Interface Metric is set to auto, and have been assigned 10 for the Ethernet and 20 for the Wi-Fi

To change this type the following to set the interface metric on the Ethernet interface to 5

Set-NetIPInterface -InterfaceAlias Ethernet -AddressFamily IPv4 -InterfaceMetric 5

Now change the Wi-Fi interface to 1

Set-NetIPInterface -InterfaceAlias Wi-Fi -AddressFamily IPv4 -InterfaceMetric 1

Now if we check the Get-NetIPInterface you will see that the interface metric for the adaptors Ethernet and Wi-Fi have changed to 5 and 1 respectively

You can also specify either IP4 or IP6 by changing the AddressFamily to either IPv4 or IPv6

Remember: You must do this for all active NICs to make sure they are in the right order.

Setting Network Interface Priority On Windows 8 with the GUI

Since upgrading to Windows 8, I have had problems with applications working with the proxy at work, ISA 2004.

As ISA 2004 is going to be decommissioned in the next couple of months, and the fact I have way too much work on, I opted for the easy way out, get my internet access from the guest wireless while using my wired connection for my domain related activities.

First type “view network connections” and click on the first option. This will throw you out to the Desktop and open the Network Connections window.

      

Right click and select Properties for the network adaptor that you wish to change the priority for.

Scroll down to Internet Protocol Version 4 (TCP/IPv4), if that is what your using and click “Properties”

Next click the “Advanced…” button in the bottom right hand corner

        

Untick the “Automatic metric” and type a number in the “Interface metric” box. The lower the number the higher the preference.

       

Click “OK” on all the windows to close them out and your done.

In my configuration, I set the wired connection to 5 and the wifi connection to 1.

Remember: You must do this for all active NICs to make sure they are in the right order.

So what, exactly, is this Backup Exec V-Ray Edition?–Recap

 

This months Google+ hangout with the Backup Exec team is all about V-Ray edition of Backup Exec.

The hosts of the hangout are:

Matt Stephenson, Product Marketing Manager; Social Media (@PackMatt73)

and

Scott Baker, Product Manager (@PScottBaker)

Important links:

@SYMCPartners
@BackupExec
Download Backup Exec V-Ray edition – http://www.symantec.com/backup-exec-vray-edition

The Hangout

You can click on the links to jump to that part of the hangout.

What does ‘per processor’ licensing mean?

What features are included in the Backup Exec V-Ray Edition?

How does the Backup Exec V-Ray Edition work in a virtual and physical environment?

Licensing Scenarios for Backup Exec 2012 V-Ray Edition

Scenario 2

Scenario 3

Scenario 4

 

How you can get V-Ray for free!

Symantec is giving Microsoft MVPs and VMware vExperts the opportunity to get V-Ray for free. Click the links below to apply.

If your a vExpert you can apply here for your free supported for 1 year copy of Backup Exec V-Ray Edition

Microsoft MVPs can apply here for your free supported for 1 year copy of Backup Exec V-Ray Edition

Backup Exec Beta FAQ

This morning the Backup Exec Beta team posted an update to their blog answering some questions they have been getting surrounding the beta program.

Here are the key points that I took away from this update.

• You must have Backup Exec 2010 or Backup Exec 2012 already installed on your system. The beta will be delivered as a Service Pack update and should be installed as such (SP3 for Backup Exec 2010 and SP2 for Backup Exec 2012).
• This initial delivery of the beta will only support remote protection (Agent for Windows) of Windows Server 2012, this means that Backup Exec must be installed on a Windows Server 2008 R2 box or lower.
• No multi-server jobs will be available in the initial release of the beta, the job monitor will also not be available..

Links to trail version of Backup Exec and Windows Server

Backup Exec 2010 https://www4.symantec.com/Vrt/offer?a_id=91912

Backup Exec 2012 https://www4.symantec.com/Vrt/offer?a_id=142338

Windows Server 2008 R2 http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/evalcenter/dd459137.aspx

Windows Server 2012 http://technet.microsoft.com/en-au/evalcenter/hh670538.aspx

Unable to Connect to ESXi Host with WinSCP

Just a quick little blog post as I had this issue with connecting to 3 ESXi hosts at the client site I am visiting for the next couple of weeks.

Out of the 20 odd hosts I’ve connected to, I am getting this error on 3, which all happen to be VMware ESXi 4.1

“Cannot initialize SFTP protocol. Is the host running a SFTP server?”

The solution to this is simple, but of course I couldn’t find setting for 5 minutes….

Once I located the setting that was right in front of me the whole time, I changed the protocol from SFTP to SCP and I was able to connect to 3 ESXi servers that I was having issues with

Backup Exec 2012 Deduplication VS Windows Server 2012 Deduplication

Please note that Backup Exec 2012 is currently UNSUPPORTED on Windows Server 2012

I was curious about how the Backup Exec 2012 deduplication functionality would work under Windows Server 2012, so I setup a couple of servers to test this out.

 

The Configuration

On my Backup server, I created 2 drives and configured Backup Exec disk storage for both of them, 1 with standard disk storage, and the other with Deduplicaiton disk storage.

           

I then installed the Backup Exec 2012 remote agent for Windows on a Windows Server 2012 server and configured two jobs. One going to Disk storage 0001, and one going to Deduplication disk storage 0001.

The files that I will be backing up total to 13.9 GB, the files are purposely duplicated otherwise this would all be pointless.

 

The Backup Exec Results

Once both backup jobs had completed I compared the amount of space used in each folder, first by the folder properties in Windows and then with the backup job properties.

     

       

Here we can see the duplication ratio of 1.8:1 or 55.6% (I used this site to convert to a percentage)

 

The Windows 2012 Deduplication Results

On the server that I have been backing up, I created a new drive and configured it for Windows 2012 deduplication. I then copied all the files over to this drive, and let the deduplication run its course.

Coming back the next day, I checked the progress on the drive and found that the dedup stats where in!

As you can see, the SavingsRate is 55% and the OptimizedFilesSavingsRate is 56%. I’d say that the 55.6% of Backup Exec Deduplication sits comfortably in the middle of the savings rates in Windows.

While obviously you would these 2 deduplication options in different circumstances, its good to know that the savings being afforded to you are extremely close. I think this is also a good example of how good the deduplication technology in Backup Exec 2012 really is.

If you have any questions, comments or suggestions, please let me know by leaving a message or hitting me up on twitter.

Cut the FUD – Debunking Common Misconceptions About Backup Exec

At 4am this morning (Australia EDST) the Backup Exec guys had their first Google+ Hangout titled “Cut the FUD – Debunking Common Misconceptions About Backup Exec”.

I would have loved to have caught this session live, but unfortunately my day job kinda demands that I’m asleep at 4am lol.

The Backup Exec guys hosting this hangout are:

Matt Stephenson – Product Marketing Mgr; Social Media – @PackMatt73
Scott Baker – Product Mgr– @PScottBaker
James McKey – Enterprise Support; Social Media – @SYMCJames
Elizabeth Teffner – Engineering, Usability Testing Mgr – @Eteffner

Other twitter contacts:

@SYMCPartners – For Symantec Partners
@BackupExec – Monitored by Technical Support

Sign up for the upcoming beta program

Follow Symantec over on Google+

Some of the topics covered:

• Virtualisation agents
• Configuring and Installing Backup Exec
• Licensing
• Backup Exec works with tape, disk, or both?
• Scaling and flexibility
• Social media presence

So if you have a chance I really suggest you give it a listen, I’m sure there will be at least 1 little nugget of information that you will pick up