Administrators in control with NT registry tool, 05/10/99

Administrators in control with NT registry tool

By JOHN FONTANA
Network World, 05/10/99

Microsoft's Windows 2000 Beta 3 has finally made its entrance, but it's no secret that network administrators still need tools to get from here to there.

One vendor has set out to pave that path with a tool to ease management of both NT and Windows 2000 desktops. The tool provides a central location for managing the registry on NT, and eventually Windows 2000, desktops.

Eytcheson Software has begun shipping Version 3.0 of its Multi-Remote Registry Change, a tool that allows administrators to enter changes from a central location to the registry keys on one or more networked NT desktops. The registry keys control desktop configuration information for both hardware and software components, including supported services and wallpaper options.

The tool also works with Windows 2000 Beta 2 and Beta 3.

The tool is a giant leap beyond RegEdit32, the utility Microsoft includes with NT for remotely altering the registry. RegEdit32 allows the same sort of remote controls as the Eytcheson tool, but network administrators can work on only one desktop at a time.

"Multi-Remote Registry is a must-have tool. It cuts so much bull from my work," says Amnon Feiner, systems manager for Ladco Leasing in Thousand Oaks, Calif. "If you want to do desktop changes immediately, the way you do that is through the registry, and now I can centralize that work."

Feiner says his company recently deployed a new intranet site and he needed to set it as the default home page on browsers installed on 100 machines. "The process took 15 seconds using this tool," he says.

Feiner also recently used Eytcheson's software to update the scheduler feature on 2,000 desktops networked over a WAN, completing the process in less than four minutes. The scheduler is used to run maintenance utilities on the desktop at set intervals.

The newest version of Eytcheson's software includes the ability to change single registry keys. For example, administrators can set file/save op-tions and time zone settings and change start-up screen instructions. The tool also features controls on the security of remote registry keys. Administrators can add or remove users and groups from the access allowed, access denied and audit access control lists.

"Most security problems are users breaking things by changing settings or deleting system resources,"says Greg Eytcheson, president of Eytcheson Software. "If you block changes, you can save hundreds of hours of administration."

The tool also lets administrators remotely change user names and passwords used for remote services. Other features include search and replace, which allows administrators to do tasks such as search for drive maps and replace them with new ones after changing the name of a network server. The tool also has a drag-and-drop feature for copying values from one key to another or copying keys from one computer to another. Auditing and query utilities also are included.

Multi-Remote Registry Change 3.0, which can support up to 25,000 machines, is available now and priced at $35 per administrator and $2 per managed computer.

Eytcheson: (316) 332-4604

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