{"id":306,"date":"2014-07-01T04:09:43","date_gmt":"2014-07-01T04:09:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.itcrumbs.com\/?p=306"},"modified":"2019-02-07T04:39:45","modified_gmt":"2019-02-07T04:39:45","slug":"how-to-make-windows-server-2012-r2-essentials-client-connector-install-behave-just-like-windows-home-server","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.itcrumbs.com\/?p=306","title":{"rendered":"How to make Windows Server 2012 R2 Essentials client connector install behave just like Windows Home Server"},"content":{"rendered":"

http:\/\/www.tinkertry.com\/how-to-make-windows-server-2012-r2-essentials-client-connector-install-behave-just-like-windows-home-server\/<\/a><\/h3>\n

Connect to Windows Server 2012 R2 Essentials without affecting your DNS, staying in workgroup mode<\/em><\/strong><\/h3>\n

To find this article and registry setting easily when you\u2019re out and about, just type tinkertry.com\/connect<\/a> which brings you back to this article. Please bookmark\/share!<\/em><\/p>\n

When you install the R2 connector for daily backups, if you\u2019d rather it skip the domain join (staying in a workgroup), AND not have it not monkey with your all your NIC\u2019s DNS settings (including Hamachi, VMware, etc), then this article is for you! The connector install is now incredibly fast on Windows 8.1, a vast improvement over all previous client connector installs. See for yourself, in the video I created below.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been wanting to get around to making the move from Windows Server 2012 Essentials (with Update Rollup 3) over to Windows Server 2012 R2 Essentials. But R2 has no Update Rollups yet. Remember those nifty Microsoft-documented tweaks<\/a> for DNS that I like to think I had a little something to do with<\/a>? They don\u2019t work under R2. Even worse, that Windows Server LAN Configuration service is gone too. So I found myself in a bit of a pickle. How to make R2 behave more like its predecessors, so I could make the move?<\/p>\n

Another hurtle is that R2 Essentials users face a rebuild from scratch anyway. Yes, you heard that right, there is no upgrade path to R2 from Windows Server 2012 Essentials, explained here<\/a>. So when an issue arose with my faithful daily backup methods these past 10 months, I was facing reconfiguring my daily PC backups for 14 machines, with 5TB of daily backups to re-seed. This became strong motivation to stop fiddling with the old, and start over with the new R2. I figured I\u2019d much rather build from scratch, while keeping my 3TB network share drive intact, just as I\u2019ve been doing with all prior upgrades to.<\/p>\n

For some reason, I thought it might not be too hard to figure out what Microsoft is doing with the registry keys.<\/p>\n

So first, I simply followed the tweaks listed the Microsoft-documented tweaks<\/a> for 2012 Essentials, just for grins, to see if they\u2019d happen to work on 2012 R2 Essentials. No joy, client DNS messed up.<\/p>\n

So I dove in deeper. Tried a few things with a bunch of Windows 8.1 builds and connector install methods. And before long, there it was, that wonderful eureka moment of discovery, obtained when tinkering with a purpose, persistently, patiently. It\u2019s actually fun.<\/p>\n

This one tweak to the registry, at the right spot in the install, was all I needed to get everything working just like I wanted, with:<\/h4>\n