Single User Profile under 2k

[JonF2003]

At our company we operate a loan system for laptops, this is for when staff go off site and need to access emails etc while they are away.

We used to be all Win98 which was no problem. Now we are converting these laptops to W2k.

The problem is, sometimes we get little or no notification of a laptop going out of the office. Obviously is the user has never logged on to that machine before, there will be no profile for that member to login to locally.

Is there a way that you could create a profile so that any user can login and get a standard desktop, for instance a RAS connection shortcut, internet explorer settings already set and exchange settings mostly set.

This is proving to be a major problem as we have 20 or so loan laptops which will need to be converted very soon.

Thanks in advance for any help.

Jon Faulkner
IT Support Manager.

 

[kippy13]

Hi,
I am not quite sure how u need to work this so bear with me. Basically it is possible to configure W2K to "always assume that this user has logged on" in which case u put in a username and password once and it doesnt ask for it ever again, it just logs on straight away without prompting for username and password. You may need to set up and account for this "User" on the domain if u intend the laptops to be used on the domain and change policy group settings as you see fit. This may breach your network security policy as its not possible to pin down one user.
Other wise what u can do, is install the software,shortcuts on the desktop of one user and copy them into doc and settings\all users\start menu....desktop.....whatever- so that the same shortcuts will appear for all users.
Let me know if you need more information on this,
JP

 

[Accessdabbler]

kippy's advice is good. However, for security reasons, I would never allow the laptops to auto-login. Imagine, I steal the laptop, boot it up and now have access to the machine. I can now dial into your network and cause all sorts of havoc.

Win2K gives you the ability to encrypt all the data on the hard drive, so do it. Next, I would use a standard logon, say LAPTOP and give it a password. Whoever borrows the laptop would need to get the password from the admin department. After it gets returned, admin should change the password. Use random numbers, letters and punctuation as passwords.

Do not give the borrowers the Administrator login password! The generic LAPTOP user should have restrictive access to the computer. If you use a VPN, make sure that password changes with each connection as well.

 

[kippy13]

True,
My first option is not the most secure, which is why I advise ensureing that the rights and policys are greatly less powerful than a standard user.
The user should have their own access to the VPN anyway and this account should not have those privilages.
There is little need for the user password to change but if you put BIOS passwords on the machines it will ensure that the machine cannot be powered on let along gotten into without the BIOS password.
I believe though that the second option I provide above could be a viable alternative.
JP

 

[JonF2003]

Accessdabbler gave me the idea for generic naming.

Use Laptop as a log in, give it minimal permissions on the network, i.e. browse of intranet etc. Then when the staff member dials up they use there normal login.

 

[PiMMeL]

Hi,

I would just setup the "Default User" properly. Each user then gets all the Icons and setups you gave the default user.
Just create your user settings and desktop etc just as you want it.
Then copy this profile to the default user.
Each new user will then get exactly the settings as you wanted it or if they had a roaming profile they will get that ofcourse if they are in the office.

Find the site @ Microsoft on how to copy default user profile properly.

Pim

 

[wolluf]

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=KB;EN-US;q305709&