Startup panes

[Anthony Yates]

We have loads of PC's running with Active Directory. Most of them do not
display the notification pane in between the full screen "Starting Up......"
and the "Press Ctrl-Alt-Del to begin" screen. This is the pane that says:
"Windows is starting up"
"Applying computer settings"
"Installing managed software"
"Running startup scripts"

I can't find common thread to why most machines don't show it, but some do.
They are all built with the same OS images and have the same software
packages installed via Group Policy. Some are Win2000 SP4 and some XP SP2

Does anyone know where the setting is to display or not display this pane?

Thanks,
Anthony
(remove the bells from my e-mail address)

 

[Mark Renoden [MSFT]]

Hi Anthony

Could it be Computer Configuration -> Administrative Templates -> System ->
Remove Boot / Shutdown / Logon / Logoff status messages?

Kind regards
--
Mark Renoden [MSFT]
Windows Platform Support Team
Email: (e-mail address removed)

Please note you'll need to strip ".online" from my email address to email
me; I'll post a response back to the group.

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

 

[George Hester]

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/316243/EN-US/

 

[Anthony Yates]

Thank you both for your suggestions.
1) My policy for status messages is Not Configured. I can't see why some
machines would display them and others not. I have configured the policy to
Disabled, but it makes no difference.
2) The registry key for normal vs verbose messages (or disable messages) is
not set. The text for verbose messages says "highly detailed". I assume that
the normal meesage is less detailed, rather than nothing. I have tried
setting it to verbose, but again it does not explain the difference in
behaviour. What do you have with your default machines? Do you get these
status mesasges or not?
Thanks,
Anthony

 

[George Hester]

I enabled what you saw in that article but I'll be honest with you the
result wasn't all that verbose after all. Furthermore the messages can fly
by so fast what good is it? The option to write a btlog file at every boot
is also not very helpful. That just shows the drivers loaded or not as the
case may be it says nothing about these messages that we are talking about.

 

[Anthony Yates]

I agree, I don't think the verbose vs normal is the problem. The verbose
shows you slightly more messages, but my computers are not seeing the pane
at all.
I am thinking it might be something to do with:
- driver loading interfering with the display
- anti-virus scan on startup (no idea why it should)
- random bug in Explorer or IE

Anthony

 

[Mark Renoden [MSFT]]

Hi Anthony

At that point in time, explorer and internet explorer are not running. My
suggestion would be to troubleshoot this via a process of elimination.
Start by moving the computer object to a new OU with no group policy linked
to it and block policy inheritance. Reboot a couple of times and see what
happens. If the issue is still present, it probably isn't policy (unless
you have a GPO at the domain level set with no override).

At this point, I'd rebuild one client off standard installation media and
see whether it experiences the issue. If not, start installing components
that are included in your standard setup and see if you can locate the
issue. Given that this is across more than one operating system, look for
common components or changes in your configuration.

You might use gpresult /z (Windows XP) or gpresult /v (Windows 2000) to look
for the specific policy setting if you determine that the issue is policy
based.

Kind regards
--
Mark Renoden [MSFT]
Windows Platform Support Team
Email: (e-mail address removed)

Please note you'll need to strip ".online" from my email address to email
me; I'll post a response back to the group.

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

 

[Anthony Yates]

I am sure it is not Policy. All the PCs are in the same OU. No policy is
set, and the effective policy on each machine is Not Configured for the
policies relating to this.

All our machines are installed by RIS, and nearly all applications are
installed by Group Policy. All the machines show the messages when they are
being built, but at some point the messages stop. A wide range of machines
are fine: they just have nothing in common. It can't be the software, as its
the same software on machines that work as on the ones that don't.

It just seems to be a random bug.
Anthony

Hi Anthony

At that point in time, explorer and internet explorer are not running. My
suggestion would be to troubleshoot this via a process of elimination.
Start by moving the computer object to a new OU with no group policy linked
to it and block policy inheritance. Reboot a couple of times and see what
happens. If the issue is still present, it probably isn't policy (unless
you have a GPO at the domain level set with no override).

At this point, I'd rebuild one client off standard installation media and
see whether it experiences the issue. If not, start installing components
that are included in your standard setup and see if you can locate the
issue. Given that this is across more than one operating system, look for
common components or changes in your configuration.

You might use gpresult /z (Windows XP) or gpresult /v (Windows 2000) to look
for the specific policy setting if you determine that the issue is policy
based.

Kind regards
--
Mark Renoden [MSFT]
Windows Platform Support Team
Email: (e-mail address removed)

Please note you'll need to strip ".online" from my email address to email
me; I'll post a response back to the group.

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

I agree, I don't think the verbose vs normal is the problem. The verbose
shows you slightly more messages, but my computers are not seeing the pane
at all.
I am thinking it might be something to do with:
- driver loading interfering with the display
- anti-virus scan on startup (no idea why it should)
- random bug in Explorer or IE

Anthony






some
XP

 

[Mark Renoden [MSFT]]

Hi Anthony

If it were as common an issue across all Microsoft installations as it is in
your environment, it would have been reported to Microsoft and there'd be
more info in general. My suggestion would be to build a clean client off
installation media and confirm you have no problem. Once this has happened,
start introducing aspects of your environment to this client ... policy,
software etc and see what happens. This sounds more like a build problem
than anything else.

Kind regards
--
Mark Renoden [MSFT]
Windows Platform Support Team
Email: (e-mail address removed)

Please note you'll need to strip ".online" from my email address to email
me; I'll post a response back to the group.

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

I am sure it is not Policy. All the PCs are in the same OU. No policy is
set, and the effective policy on each machine is Not Configured for the
policies relating to this.

All our machines are installed by RIS, and nearly all applications are
installed by Group Policy. All the machines show the messages when they
are
being built, but at some point the messages stop. A wide range of machines
are fine: they just have nothing in common. It can't be the software, as
its
the same software on machines that work as on the ones that don't.

It just seems to be a random bug.
Anthony

Hi Anthony

At that point in time, explorer and internet explorer are not running.
My
suggestion would be to troubleshoot this via a process of elimination.
Start by moving the computer object to a new OU with no group policy linked
to it and block policy inheritance. Reboot a couple of times and see
what
happens. If the issue is still present, it probably isn't policy (unless
you have a GPO at the domain level set with no override).

At this point, I'd rebuild one client off standard installation media and
see whether it experiences the issue. If not, start installing
components
that are included in your standard setup and see if you can locate the
issue. Given that this is across more than one operating system, look
for
common components or changes in your configuration.

You might use gpresult /z (Windows XP) or gpresult /v (Windows 2000) to look
for the specific policy setting if you determine that the issue is policy
based.

Kind regards
--
Mark Renoden [MSFT]
Windows Platform Support Team
Email: (e-mail address removed)

Please note you'll need to strip ".online" from my email address to email
me; I'll post a response back to the group.

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

I agree, I don't think the verbose vs normal is the problem. The verbose
shows you slightly more messages, but my computers are not seeing the pane
at all.
I am thinking it might be something to do with:
- driver loading interfering with the display
- anti-virus scan on startup (no idea why it should)
- random bug in Explorer or IE

Anthony






I enabled what you saw in that article but I'll be honest with you the
result wasn't all that verbose after all. Furthermore the messages
can
fly
by so fast what good is it? The option to write a btlog file at every
boot
is also not very helpful. That just shows the drivers loaded or not
as
the
case may be it says nothing about these messages that we are talking
about.

--
George Hester
_________________________________
Thank you both for your suggestions.
1) My policy for status messages is Not Configured. I can't see why
some
machines would display them and others not. I have configured the
policy
to
Disabled, but it makes no difference.
2) The registry key for normal vs verbose messages (or disable
messages)
is
not set. The text for verbose messages says "highly detailed". I assume
that
the normal meesage is less detailed, rather than nothing. I have tried
setting it to verbose, but again it does not explain the difference in
behaviour. What do you have with your default machines? Do you get
these
status mesasges or not?
Thanks,
Anthony



http://support.microsoft.com/kb/316243/EN-US/

--
George Hester
_________________________________
message
We have loads of PC's running with Active Directory. Most of
them
do
not
display the notification pane in between the full screen "Starting
Up......"
and the "Press Ctrl-Alt-Del to begin" screen. This is the pane that
says:
"Windows is starting up"
"Applying computer settings"
"Installing managed software"
"Running startup scripts"

I can't find common thread to why most machines don't show it, but
some
do.
They are all built with the same OS images and have the same
software
packages installed via Group Policy. Some are Win2000 SP4 and some
XP
SP2

Does anyone know where the setting is to display or not display
this
pane?

Thanks,
Anthony
(remove the bells from my e-mail address)

 

[George Hester]

Anthony one thing I should point out about your messages you are receiving. I have never seen the one that says, "Installing managed software." Also I do not see this one, "Running startup scripts" the reason being I don't have any start up scripts. You might want to look at those. Finally this one, "Applying computer settings." That depends on how the system is used. If the system starts and stops using different profiles often then you can get that. Normally we see, "Applying security settings." When that happens it is usually a configuration change that is necessitated by an install in a previous session that needs to complete in a later session.

I suspect the reason why some systems show different sign on messages then other systems both falling under the same GPO is in how they are used.

 

[Anthony Yates]

I understand what you are saying, but I can't see how I would have time to
do this. It can't be a single component of the build, as everything we do
uses the same standard components (RIS, packages etc.) It could be a
_combination_ of components. e.g lets say it is related to the graphics
driver: then the problem might be related to the order of installation of
WinDVD, DirectX, reboots in between etc. But I would not have time to test
all the possible combinations.
What I would really like to know is: what is the Windows component that is
displaying the status messages; and what type of product might interfere
with the messages e.g we use Windows scripting and install scripten.exe on
all PC's. As I understand it, we should not need to do this now as the
components are included in IE6 SP1 and/or SP4, but we get an error running
wsf scripts unless we install Windows scripting, and I get the impression
that the components of scripting are not fully sorted in W2K. We do not have
to install Scripting on XP, and (I think) we don't get the error. Maybe the
startup panes are in some way related to scripting? It can't be a
straightforward error as we don't get it on all machines, but again it could
be related to the order of installation, e.g scipting before IE6 SP1 or
after.
Anthony

Hi Anthony

If it were as common an issue across all Microsoft installations as it is in
your environment, it would have been reported to Microsoft and there'd be
more info in general. My suggestion would be to build a clean client off
installation media and confirm you have no problem. Once this has happened,
start introducing aspects of your environment to this client ... policy,
software etc and see what happens. This sounds more like a build problem
than anything else.

Kind regards
--
Mark Renoden [MSFT]
Windows Platform Support Team
Email: (e-mail address removed)

Please note you'll need to strip ".online" from my email address to email
me; I'll post a response back to the group.

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

I am sure it is not Policy. All the PCs are in the same OU. No policy is
set, and the effective policy on each machine is Not Configured for the
policies relating to this.

All our machines are installed by RIS, and nearly all applications are
installed by Group Policy. All the machines show the messages when they
are
being built, but at some point the messages stop. A wide range of machines
are fine: they just have nothing in common. It can't be the software, as
its
the same software on machines that work as on the ones that don't.

It just seems to be a random bug.
Anthony

Hi Anthony

At that point in time, explorer and internet explorer are not running.
My
suggestion would be to troubleshoot this via a process of elimination.
Start by moving the computer object to a new OU with no group policy linked
to it and block policy inheritance. Reboot a couple of times and see
what
happens. If the issue is still present, it probably isn't policy (unless
you have a GPO at the domain level set with no override).

At this point, I'd rebuild one client off standard installation media and
see whether it experiences the issue. If not, start installing
components
that are included in your standard setup and see if you can locate the
issue. Given that this is across more than one operating system, look
for
common components or changes in your configuration.

You might use gpresult /z (Windows XP) or gpresult /v (Windows 2000) to look
for the specific policy setting if you determine that the issue is policy
based.

Kind regards
--
Mark Renoden [MSFT]
Windows Platform Support Team
Email: (e-mail address removed)

Please note you'll need to strip ".online" from my email address to email
me; I'll post a response back to the group.

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.



I agree, I don't think the verbose vs normal is the problem. The verbose
shows you slightly more messages, but my computers are not seeing the pane
at all.
I am thinking it might be something to do with:
- driver loading interfering with the display
- anti-virus scan on startup (no idea why it should)
- random bug in Explorer or IE

Anthony






I enabled what you saw in that article but I'll be honest with you the
result wasn't all that verbose after all. Furthermore the messages
can
fly
by so fast what good is it? The option to write a btlog file at every
boot
is also not very helpful. That just shows the drivers loaded or not
as
the
case may be it says nothing about these messages that we are talking
about.

--
George Hester
_________________________________
Thank you both for your suggestions.
1) My policy for status messages is Not Configured. I can't see why
some
machines would display them and others not. I have configured the
policy
to
Disabled, but it makes no difference.
2) The registry key for normal vs verbose messages (or disable
messages)
is
not set. The text for verbose messages says "highly detailed". I assume
that
the normal meesage is less detailed, rather than nothing. I have tried
setting it to verbose, but again it does not explain the

difference
in

behaviour. What do you have with your default machines? Do you get
these
status mesasges or not?
Thanks,
Anthony



http://support.microsoft.com/kb/316243/EN-US/

--
George Hester
_________________________________
message
We have loads of PC's running with Active Directory. Most of
them
do
not
display the notification pane in between the full screen "Starting
Up......"
and the "Press Ctrl-Alt-Del to begin" screen. This is the pane that
says:
"Windows is starting up"
"Applying computer settings"
"Installing managed software"
"Running startup scripts"

I can't find common thread to why most machines don't show it, but
some
do.
They are all built with the same OS images and have the same
software
packages installed via Group Policy. Some are Win2000 SP4 and some
XP
SP2

Does anyone know where the setting is to display or not display
this
pane?

Thanks,
Anthony
(remove the bells from my e-mail address)

 

[Anthony Yates]

Agreed, we only get the Installing managed software... message when we are
doing a software installation from Policy. We get Running startup scripts
every time, but we don't have a startup script. I thought computer and
security settings were just applying the various policies.
The problem we have is that most machines do not show the pane at all, just
a blank blue screen before the Ctrl-Alt-Del screen. Others show the sequence
of startup. This is particularly useful when we are doing a policy
installation, as it means users know that somehting is going on, and don't
just get frustrated and repower the machine.
Anthony



Anthony one thing I should point out about your messages you are receiving.
I have never seen the one that says, "Installing managed software." Also I
do not see this one, "Running startup scripts" the reason being I don't have
any start up scripts. You might want to look at those. Finally this one,
"Applying computer settings." That depends on how the system is used. If
the system starts and stops using different profiles often then you can get
that. Normally we see, "Applying security settings." When that happens it
is usually a configuration change that is necessitated by an install in a
previous session that needs to complete in a later session.

I suspect the reason why some systems show different sign on messages then
other systems both falling under the same GPO is in how they are used.