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Mitchell Grande

Mitchell Grande

Systems Engineer
Contributions by Mitchell Grande

Diagnosing Disk Performance Issues

Disk performance issues can be hard to track down but can also cause a wide variety of issues.  The disk performance counter available in Windows are numerous, and being able to select the right counters for a given situation is a great troubleshooting skill.  Here, we'll review two basic scenarios - measuring overall disk performance and determining if the disks are a bottleneck.

Mitchell Grande by Mitchell Grande

Diagnosing Failed RDS Broker Role

A while back, we received a support case regarding a Windows Server 2016 box that was set up with an all-in-one RDS configuration where a single server is both the broker and session host.  At some point after the build engineer handed the box off to the client, the RDS roles basically stopped working.  Let's walk through the troubleshooting process and final resolution.

Mitchell Grande by Mitchell Grande

Azure VM Performance Diagnostics

Performance Diagnostics is an Azure tool to help diagnose performance-related problems with VMs.  The tool installs the PerfInsights extension into your VM which is then used to collect configuration and performance-related data on-demand.  This data is automatically compiled into an easy-to-read report with potential issues highlighted.

Mitchell Grande by Mitchell Grande

PowerShell Core

PowerShell 5.1 is the latest release of the original PowerShell.  Starting with version 6.0, PowerShell is now referred to as PowerShell Core.  PowerShell Core 6.0 is cross-platform - supported on macOS, Linux, and Windows - and built on .NET Core instead of the traditional .NET framework.

Mitchell Grande by Mitchell Grande

Hung Server Troubleshooting

When a server hangs, it can oftentimes be difficult to find the root cause.  There are a variety of potential factors, and narrowing it down can be tough.  Here, we'll review the general process for troubleshooting a hung server.

Mitchell Grande by Mitchell Grande

Azure News - June 2019

Summary of recent Azure updates, including Azure Bastion and Azure to Azure ASR improvements.

Mitchell Grande by Mitchell Grande

Windows Virtual Desktop Host Management

Windows Virtual Desktop brings us a modern, cloud-centric way to deliver desktops and applications to end-users.  Although the service takes care of the overhead of managing RDS infrastructure roles (such as the connection broker and gateway), the host servers themselves still need to be managed and maintained.

Mitchell Grande by Mitchell Grande

Diagnosing Slow Page Loads due to CRL Checks

Recently, a support ticket was opened for an issue where a couple of websites were slow to load after blocking outbound internet access from a VM.  The IP addresses of these websites were whitelisted, but the browser would hang for about 30 seconds before they'd load.  In the end, we found that the SSL certificate CRL check process was causing the hang.  Let's take a look at the diagnosis process and how we discovered the root cause.

Mitchell Grande by Mitchell Grande

Windows Virtual Desktop Management Web App

Windows Virtual Desktop entered public preview on March 21, 2019.  Currently, the only official way to manage Windows Virtual Desktop is via the PowerShell module.  Although support in the Azure Portal is coming, there is no public ETA.  In the meantime, there is an Azure Web App that you can deploy and host yourself to manage your WVD tenant.

Mitchell Grande by Mitchell Grande

Attack Surface Analyzer

Attack Surface Analyzer is an older tool that Microsoft has recently updated and re-released as v2.0.  This tool tracks changes to files, services, network ports, certificates, registry, and local user accounts.  Although it is primarily for Windows, it is an open source product available for macOS and Linux as well.

Mitchell Grande by Mitchell Grande

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