Hi Dave, If you do go the path of machine based Group Policy Preferences, be aware that you must ONLY use Machine Group Policy Preferences. You cannot use both Machine and User based GPP's or Machine GPPs and User ADM's. Alan Cuthbertson Policy Management Software (Now with ADMX and Preference support):- http://www.sysprosoft.com/index.php?ref=activedir <http://www.sysprosoft.com/index.php?ref=activedir&f=pol_summary.shtml> &f=pol_summary.shtml ADM Template Editor(Now with ADMX support):- http://www.sysprosoft.com/index.php?ref=activedir <http://www.sysprosoft.com/index.php?ref=activedir&f=adm_summary.shtml> &f=adm_summary.shtml Policy Log Reporter - including Preference logging(Free) http://www.sysprosoft.com/index.php?ref=activedir <http://www.sysprosoft.com/index.php?ref=activedir&f=policyreporter.shtml> &f=policyreporter.shtml _____ From: gptalk-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:gptalk-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Alan & Margaret Sent: Saturday, 13 December 2008 2:17 PM To: gptalk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx Subject: [gptalk] Re: Screen Saver ADM feasibility Jamie is right. Group Policy preferences should work, but I have never tried this part of it. One problem you may have is if you have roaming profiles, the setting may not "disappear" when they move to another machine that doesn't have the policy. Group policy Preferences can be defined to delete the key when the policy is not applied, so if you were using Group Policy preferences to create the Policy key it may delete it when you move to another machine, so the user would then get their own screen saver. However, I think GPP will only delete the key from the User registry when the machine no longer receives the Policy, not when the user moves to another machine that does not receive the policy. Of course if you want to enforce one screensaver on some machines and enforce a different screen saver on the rest, GPP should work. ADM templates won't work because (as you said) Machine ADM templates only apply to the machine registry. You only other option is Loop Back processing. turn it on for the machines you want and create a single policy entry in the User part of the policy for those machines. Why don't you want to turn it on? The other way is to use Site policies. Provided all of your machines are in a particular IP range, you can define that as being a particular Site and then attach the GPO to activate the screen saver. Alan Cuthbertson Policy Management Software (Now with ADMX and Preference support):- http://www.sysprosoft.com/index.php?ref=activedir <http://www.sysprosoft.com/index.php?ref=activedir&f=pol_summary.shtml> &f=pol_summary.shtml ADM Template Editor(Now with ADMX support):- http://www.sysprosoft.com/index.php?ref=activedir <http://www.sysprosoft.com/index.php?ref=activedir&f=adm_summary.shtml> &f=adm_summary.shtml Policy Log Reporter - including Preference logging(Free) http://www.sysprosoft.com/index.php?ref=activedir <http://www.sysprosoft.com/index.php?ref=activedir&f=policyreporter.shtml> &f=policyreporter.shtml _____ From: gptalk-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:gptalk-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Nelson, Jamie Sent: Saturday, 13 December 2008 8:49 AM To: gptalk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx Subject: [gptalk] Re: Screen Saver ADM feasibility You might look at using Item-level targeting in Group Policy Preferences to populate the registry key. Actually, there is a control panel\desktop key for the computer, but I believe that controls the wallpaper you see when no one is logged on. Jamie Nelson | Operations Consultant | BI&T Infrastructure-Intel | Devon Energy Corporation | Work: 405.552.8054 | Mobile: 405.200.8088 | http://www.dvn.com <http://www.dvn.com/> From: gptalk-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:gptalk-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of David Cliffe Sent: Friday, December 12, 2008 12:53 PM To: gptalk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx Subject: [gptalk] Screen Saver ADM feasibility Hi all, Having never written an ADM before (note: Win 2003/XP env), I was wondering about feasibility of writing custom ADM to apply a screen saver to computer side of a GPO so that we can target computer objects. - We don't want to turn on loopback for standard end user machines - We can't use the user side of the policy because client only wants it applied to certain machines (but large groups of them) :- ( I'm guessing the tough part (maybe impossible?) is specifying the end user's registry key. I imagine there's no such thing as the "Control Panel\Desktop" subkey for computers right? Anybody else been down this road? I'm already primed to tell customer to adjust their expectations :-) Thanks! -DaveC _____ Confidentiality Warning: This message and any attachments are intended only for the use of the intended recipient(s), are confidential, and may be privileged. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any review, retransmission, conversion to hard copy, copying, circulation or other use of all or any portion of this message and any attachments is strictly prohibited. If you are not the intended recipient, please notify the sender immediately by return e-mail, and delete this message and any attachments from your system.