Windows 7 - Direct access to domain network HELP

Hello all,

My cousin owns a title agency in Jacksonville. He knows I knows I did some IT work in the past so he decided to ask me for help. I can build computers and know some networking, and I am pretty familiar with getting around most software but i'm in need of help with this one.

This is essentially the email he sent me.
"Instead of having her do a remote connection to one of our desktops, its seems to me it would be more convenient for her for us to setup a workstation with direct access to our domain network in her office. She will also need a laser printer and a scanner on her end, and be able to send to ours on our end."

My question is what steps need to be taken to get her computer set up and running with direct access to their domain. She is running Windows 7 32bit.

Thanks,

Alex

Welcome Alex to the windows 7 forums.

A question back.
Are the workstations remote? Like at someone house.?
if so then I recommend that they run terminal services on their server
and use the built in Remote Desktop for these workstations as the local machine
drives and printers can be made available very easily.
There are VPN's that can be installed but that makes it more complicated.

If they are hard wired to the network, it might be a bit more complicated
as they would have to be built and windows 7 pro or greater installed, the they
would have to be plugged into the network and joined to the existing network
by someone with admin priv's on their server.

I do it all the time, build a machine in my basement for a client then take it to
their office and join to their domain. Piece of cake..

Rich

RichnRockville thanks for your reply.

The workstation she operates is located in an office, and they were pretty clear on the method they wanted to use. I can provide additional details on their end if necessary. I would just need to know what to ask Any help is greatly appreciated. Also, installing Windows 7 Pro would not be an issue. We were planning on building a new computer for her anyways.

Any additional information on the matter would be greatly appreciated.

First in order to eventually join the workstation to the domain, you will need to have administrator priv's on their server.

You can setup the individual machines with most of the software under the administrator account. I recommend a good local administrator password and then when you join the workstation to the domain, the programs will already be there for all users on the workstation.

Not knowing the domain security policy, The domain users might not have permissions to install printers and programs but that can be solved with the domain
admin userid on the local machine.

Installing printers and mapping drives to the new workstation, which bye the way must be windows 7 pro or higher. You can't join home versions to the domain.

Get an administrator account and password for the domain.

You can setup most everything before taking them to the office and joining to the domain.


Rich