Upgrade from 2008R2 to 2012R2 - .NET 4 issue

M

Mike Wunderlin

Setup is VMWare 5.1 (yes, yes, I know) which is why we are stopping at 2012R2 until we get space on the VMWare 6.5 system to migrate. Original system was 2008R2, file server with 4 attached drives (D, E, F, V)

We FINALLY upgraded one of our last remaining 2008R2 servers today to 2012 R2 in our non-internet connected lab. However, we ran into an issue.

This was a file server. The upgrade, for the most part, went smoother than I expected. However, at the end, it got downright frustrating. Everything was going well, the server was up in 2012R2 GUI. Then we noticed the Software Center popup (notification stopped) and Server Manager wouldn't open. A quick Google search resulted in a combination of PowerShell and DISM commands to uninstall .NET 4 and reinstall it. Powershell - Remove-WindowsFeature, reboot, DISM /online /enable-feature /featurename:netfx4 followed by adding PowerShell, reboot, add the GUI back in and final reboot takes you back to 2012R2 Standard GUI... worked on 2 machines last week without issue.

This time, the enterprising admin couldn't get PowerShell to run and didn't think about running the command from another windows server. Instead, he ran 'dism /online /disable-feature /featurename:netfx4 /remove'

This not only uninstalled the feature, but removed the payload from the server. Several admins have tried to reload that feature with no luck. We have tried simply 'dism /online /enable-feature /all /featurename:netfx /source:c:\temp\install.wim:2', or with '/source:c:\temp\sxs'.. both failed with the same error 0x800f0907 (if I remember correctly. I'll look again in the morning and correct if it is wrong). This pointed to a missing or invalid source AND/OR the GPO not permitting any connections to WSUS. Found the GPO, changed it to allow an alternate location (wim:\\server\share\install.wim:2) (from the install media) and tried 'dism /online /enable-feature /all /featurename:netfx4 /limitaccess' and 'dism /online /enable-feature /all /featurename:netfx4' (with and without a source pointing to the alternate location) and received the same error as above. Changed the location in GPO to \\server\share\sxs (which has the sources\sxs folder from the install media) and tried again. same error.

Essentially we have 2012R2 core... but no one can figure out how to get this back to the GUI... at this point, I'd settle for being able to get the shared drives back online although I didn't spend much time trying to figure this out as much as getting the GUI back.

Everything I could find and read today said this process should work to re-enable .NET 4 on the server. Can someone tell me where I'm going wrong? (besides still having 2008R2 in the lab running 5.1 heheh)

Pointers, links, suggestions are all welcome! And thank you for reading this post.

Mike

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