I have a Windows network with a 2003 server as the PDC, and a 2008R2 server as a DC. We have used GPO sparsely when the majority of our workstations were WinXP, but now we have Windows 7 clients and we're having some issues with printer mapping.
I'm not quite sure how I would go about taking up GPP, would it involve shifting the PDC over to the 2008R2 server?
Any advice on what to do, and how to accomplish it would be very much appreciated.
Best Answer
Group Policy Preferences are a subset of GPO settings.
Think of it as an extension to the Policies that form the core of Group Policy.
Policies defines the outcome of built-in behaviors that the clients must adhere to, once set.
Preferences define settings that clients should implement if applicable (ie. an appropriate CSE installed)
The application of GPP's rely on a set of CSE's (Client-side extensions), most of which are included in Windows 7 and above. On older client operating systems, you can deploy the CSE's to get the preferences to work.
To get a better understanding of GPP, check out the Group Policy Preferences Getting Started Guide over at TechNet