kcnychief

I'm running Windows Server 2003 in a small environment, and had a few questions.

1. I'm questioning if my GPO is running, I tried to do both a "gpupdate" and a "gpupdate /force" but neither does anything. The CMD window just sits there. Of note, I am doing this over a remote connection, would or should that effect it?

2. A few of the computers take a long time to logon to the domain, they are virus free (fresh installs of windows) and the network is 100mb speed. I haven't yet, but have already planned on trying enabling NETBIOS over TCP/IP, any other suggestions for speeding up logon?

I only have one GPO running, so I don't think that would slow it down.

madmatt

Have you tried running 'dcdiag' and 'netdiag' to check for errors in your DC/etc.?

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kcnychief

Yup, ran both and passed with flying colors. Nifty tools though, thanks

Mainer82

Also, what OS are the clients running?

From one of the XP SP2 (if applicable), log on as the domain admin and run GPRESULT. This will tell you the applied policies.

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kcnychief

As of right now there is only one client, as we are doing a test on the environment before the upgrade. Site only has 23 machines. The machine is running WINXP with SP2.

I know the policy is running, because Folder Re-direction is working fine.

kcnychief

A couple more things I just tried....

• While the server points to itself for DNS, the clients were pointing outbound. I changed the client to point to the Server for DNS, then used a lookup zone to get out.
• Also, found this on the net.. "Slow domain logons are usually due to a couple of possible conditions. One of the most common reasons, especially in XP, is the use of asynchronous networking. You can disable this feature in Group Policy, under Computer Configuration | Administrative Templates | System | Logon. Change "Always wait for the network at computer startup and logon" to "Enabled"

Have to wait a few hours to test it because the machine is in use, but will report back

Mainer82

You should not need to enable NetBIOS over TCP/IP as SMB handles all of that in an AD domain with 2000/XP clients.

I know you said you have one machine in your test environment, but is it possible to see if a Windows 2000 machine has this issue? Have you tried enabling / disabling fast boot for XP? What about disabling the Win Firewall?

Run kerbtray.exe and see what the auth server is.

edit: Forgot to mention the DNS that you just mentioned. Also, try disabling the Asyncronous logon policy.

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madmatt

Was there a specific reason you decided to go with Windows Server 2003, Enterprise Edition? Just curious?

Are you running DHCP? Just curious, again.

Are there any errors or warnings on the server after a reboot under File Replication Service or Directory Service?

Do you have more than one Domain Controller?

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Electronic Punk

Enterprise version just allows for more memory and CPUs doesn't it?

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madmatt

Clustering.

I love my Exchange Cluster.

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Electronic Punk

ahh yeah, we haven't deployed that yet, our next move is going from AD2k to 2k3 - aswell as exchange 2k to 2k3.

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madmatt

We always get off topic but Exchange 2003 is awesome compared to 2000. I just finished rolling out my Exchange Cluster on 2003. It's amazing. The new OWA is awesome.

I am running seven servers. All of which are 2003 SP1 except my mail scrubber (still on Windows 2000 Server).

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Electronic Punk

We have 1 2K3 SP1 machine at the moment
About 75 servers in total.

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madmatt

Well you have much more to worry about than I do. Seven servers, 50 clients, and one IT guy (me).

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Electronic Punk

15 DCs, means we do have to move slowly...

I don't know why group policy wouldn't be picked up.
Does the default domain policy have no override? (hope not) Is the PC in the correct OU?

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NetRyder

Damn it. I can't wait to get Exchange 2003 installed. My MSDNAA subscription was temporarily disabled when the quarter ended, so I had to wait. Hopefully I'll have it done sometime in the next couple of weeks.

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madmatt

You should also make certain that the "ENTERPRISE DOMAIN CONTROLLERS" group has read access to all GPO's.

This is very easy to do through the Group Policy Management snap-in.

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserv...c/default.mspx

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madmatt

Are you doing a fresh install on a new server or are you migrating?

EP: See, we really do need a Server discussion forum!

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Electronic Punk

it is close
I am not quite done being lazy for a bit yet.
Need to go scrim with some clan mates

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NetRyder

Fresh install, new server. I'll start a thread before I get around to it. Don't have access to the ISO's yet.

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