SBS 2008 and Outlook Autoconfiguration

We deployed a SBS 2008 server at a home network. The owner's home system is
domain-joined to said network, however he has an Exchange account at his
office which he wants to use on this system. The problem is that each time
we configure the Outlook 2007 client for his work Exchange account, as soon
as we reboot or relaunch Outlook, the local server has reconfigured the
settings to point to the local Exchange server. Obviously, this is an
incredible annoyance for him.

We've narrowed down that this is not caused with group policy, but more than
likely the client-side application that is installed when you join
workstations to a SBS 2008 network. However, even when we try to remove
that client software and restart, it is automatically reinstalled.

Does anyone have any suggestions on this? Thank you in advance.

Stephen

You'll have to go to the Control Panel to the Mail ICON and Profiles
Create two Profiles one Home, one work
Then set the profiles to prompt each time Outlook is started

I can't imagine why, if you're going to have an SBS 2008 Server at home, and
spend a 1000 bucks for software plus the cost of hardware, why you'd want
your "work " mail in your outlook.

Why not use OWA for "work" and Outlook for SBS 2008?

--
Cris Hanna [SBS - MVP]
Co-Author, Windows Small Business Server 2008 Unleashed
http://www.amazon.com/Windows-Small-...7269967&sr=8-1
------------------------------------
MVPs do not work for Microsoft
Please do not submit questions directly to me.

"Stephen Harrington" <> wrote in message
news:...
> We deployed a SBS 2008 server at a home network. The owner's home system
> is domain-joined to said network, however he has an Exchange account at
> his office which he wants to use on this system. The problem is that each
> time we configure the Outlook 2007 client for his work Exchange account,
> as soon as we reboot or relaunch Outlook, the local server has
> reconfigured the settings to point to the local Exchange server.
> Obviously, this is an incredible annoyance for him.
>
> We've narrowed down that this is not caused with group policy, but more
> than likely the client-side application that is installed when you join
> workstations to a SBS 2008 network. However, even when we try to remove
> that client software and restart, it is automatically reinstalled.
>
> Does anyone have any suggestions on this? Thank you in advance.
>
> Stephen

Hi Stephen,

Thanks for your post and Cris's input. Happy Holidays!

Actually if you use SBS 2003 which including Exchange Server 2003, you will
have similar issue because a logon script included with SBS2003 that
configures the client computers when the user logs on. The logon script
includes a reference to sbsdefault.prf, an Outlook profile file which
configures the user's Outlook profile automatically and sets the SBS
Exchange account to be the default email account.

However, in SBS 2008 which Exchange Server 2007 is installed. SBS Client
Side Extension(CSE) is used to deploy client settings when joining the
domain.

The SBS CSE is installed on every single client machine that joined to the
SBS domain. It is used to deploy certain applications and settings that
cannot be deployed through standard GPOs or methods. When the CSE is
running on the client machine, it will also be used to synchronize local
security groups as described in the administration module.

The CSE is installed by a script pushed down by the "Windows SBS CSE
Policy" GPO, the actual application name is clientagentx86.msi or
clientagentamd64.msi depending on the client architecture. The installation
happens during the workstation startup and it is silent.

The CSE is installed on the client to: C:\Program Files\Windows Small
Business Server\Bin\SBSCSE.DLL

If Outlook 2003 is installed, Copy SBSDEFAULT.PRF (Outlook 2003
auto-configuration profile), set outlook to import the PRF file (for every
user on the machine, only once) The profile can be found in the client in
C:\Program Files\Windows Small Business Server\Bin\sbsdefault.prf

Therefore, as Cris suggested, you may need to manually configure the
Outlook profiles and choose "prompt each time Outlook is started" to load
the profile you want.

How to create a new e-mail profile in Outlook 2007 and in Outlook 2003
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/829918/en-us


More related information:

The Exchange Server Account Gets Set as the Default Account
http://www.slipstick.com/problems/defaultacct.htm

Autodiscover and Exchange 2007
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/l.../bb232838.aspx

Customizing Outlook Profiles by Using PRF Files
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/or...402581033.aspx

Hope this helps. Also, if you have any questions or concerns, please do not
hesitate to let me know.

Thanks for your earlier feedback!


Best regards,
Robbin Meng(MSFT)

Microsoft CSS Online Newsgroup Support

Get Secure! - www.microsoft.com/security

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After searching around the internet for some time and finally discovering the solution by myself I'm posting back in this year old thread just because it's the first search result on google when searching for "sbs 2008 outlook profile autodiscover" ...

This worked for me, when I did not want SBS 2003 CSE to mess around with my locally configured Outlook profiles.


1) Go to \\mydomain.local\SysVol\mydomain.local\ClientAgent \user ("mydomain.local" should be replaced with the AD FQDN)

2.) Open the "sbsdefault.prf" file with notepad

3.) In the "[General]" section make the following changes (only change the parameters mentioned below)

[General]
DefaultProfile=NO
OverwriteProfile=Append
ModifyDefaultProfileIfPresent=FALSE

4.) Save the file

5.) Go to a client machine and logg off and on again (in our case this also brought back previously dissapeared profile settings).

6.) Solved

Peter