Sometimes you need to restart a server automatically, e.g. some time in the early hours of the morning.
The best way to do this is using the “Task Scheduler” within Windows.
1. Open Task Scheduler and click on the “Task Scheduler Library” in the left hand pane.
2. Click “Create Task…”
3. On the “General” tab enter the following information:
Name: Restart Server
Description: This script restarts the server.
Security Options: Set the “Run whether the user is logged on or not” and ensure the tick box for “Do not store password…” is NOT ticked. But DO tick the “Run with highest privleges” box.
4. The “Configure for” dropdown box should be set to “Windows 7, Windows Server 2008 R2”
5. On the “Triggers” tab set the time you want it to occour.
6. On the Action tab enter the details as shown in the screenshot below. The command is: shutdown -r -f /t 10
But you should put the arguments into the arguments box instead.
7. Click okay to save, you may also want to configure the user that the job runs under, normally this would be the local administrator of the server. This is all set on the “General” tab using the “Change User or Group..” button under the “Security Options” settings.