A Vista update
Great, so I got Vista installed yesterday evening. I tried updating last night after installation, but no dice. So I figured what the heck, I just did some pretty good surgery on it, I'll let it rest, and do it's update thing overnight at its regularly scheduled interval. Fast forward to this morning, I wake up bright and early (read: 9:30) and race down stairs (more like stumble) and look in on the Tablet. Nothing new, no update, nuttin!!!
Those who know me really well, know there's just a couple of things I really despise. The first is Printers, I hate 'em, they don't work and when they do, they just whine and complain about 'give me paper' or 'I need toner', wha wha wha. They are worse than little children!!! The second, and for the purposes of this tirade, more irritating, thing I really hate is troubleshooting piddly stuff. Troubleshooting drivers is like looking for a needle in a haystack. Let's stick with that analogy for a moment. WHAT'S SO FREAKIN' IMPORTANT ABOUT THAT NEEDLE IT AIN'T DIAMOND ENCRUSTED. IS THERE SOME RUN ON NEEDLES AT THE LOCAL EVIL EMPIRE (read: wal-mart, but then you knew that one already didn't you)? NEEDLES ARE ALL OF ABOUT A DOLLAR OR SOMETHING!!! Argh, it just kills me, why am I looking for a freakin' needle, I'll just get a new one and get on with it!!! Fortunately I did not just fall of the turnip truck (do ya like the agrarian references? nice huh?). So like searching for needles in haystacks, I try to add some logic to the fold…
First let's divide up the haystack into smaller haystacks, and search them one at a time. Normally that would be enough, but then I add another bit of logic to all this missing impossible…so this needle probably weighs a bit more than the surrounding hay, and given the jostling and agitation the hay(stack) has been under, let's start looking at the bottom of the various haystacks. Confidence is high as I start digging!!! Low and behold what's this?!?! Insert amazed emoticon here à
This Tablet is part of an SBS R2 Domain. What's more I have Group Policy set to get updates from the SBS Server rather than the Microsoft Updates. Huh?!?! What if I connect to the SBS Server via, oh I dunno, I'm just spit-ballin' here, the VPN? Yea, I'll do that, because following the freaking M$ Knowledgebase articles has gotten me this far, but I am starting to see bricks!!! Connect up the VPN and just when I should expect WHAMO, brick wall, nuttin'!!! in fact, what's this??? Insert amazed emoticon here à
UPDATES ARE FLOWING LIKE WATER OVER NIAGRA FALLS!!! Could it be happening?!?! Yes, yes, yes, Oh this is the greatest day of my life!!!
Back to reality…the lesson here is, that if you have a Vista machine under SBS R2 WSUS Management, it may just need to connect or check-in with its den leader to find out if it is ok to talk to those big servers over at Microsoft holding the candy, saying 'come here little fellow, there's nothing to worry about' all while Ice-T is singing in the background: 'I'm your pusha'
Alas my little naïve Tablet is learning more about the world every day. Perhaps one day I'll be able to let it go over to Timmy's house to play Need for Speed without fear of what's out there, but for now, it's just one day at a time…