Slow Browsing in 2000 Domain.

[bleedingeyes]

Problem: I can view the entire network via network neighborhood real fast; however, once I click on any computer it takes 15 seconds before it views the content. This exact time is from any computer to all other computers. The only exception is clicking on the local computer. Also the computers take between 10 to 30 minutes to boot up and login in.

Network Layout:
PDC not running DNS or WINS
additional 2000 advance server now running DNS
15 various computers running 2000 Pro

Tried fixes:
Installed WINS on PDC
Installed WINS on other server
Installed DNS on PDC
Installed DNS on other server

Other interesting test:
pinging computer ip is <10ms and no wait
pinging computer name is <10ms but 15 second delay for the first result.
net view \\computername is zero wait

 

[Beboen]

I assume you're running only NT4 DC's and thus no AD.
What do you mean by &quot;pinging computer name&quot;? Is this the netbios name or the FQDN?

Is your PDC configured as master browser? Is your DNS an NT4 or W2K server (and not AD integrated)?

Hmmm, problem might be with DNS. On your NT4 DC, did you add a DNS suffix in the network properties of your NIC? Do you have your DC to register itself with the DNS server?

 

[bleedingeyes]

Beboen: Thanks for the reply.
The PDC is a Windows 2000 Advance Server running AD. I currently do not have DNS or WINS running on this machine.
Here is the nbtstat -n output from the PDC named TITAN
NetBIOS Local Name Table

Name Type Status
-------------------------------------------
INet~Services <1C> GROUP Registered
IS~TITAN.......<00> UNIQUE Registered
TITAN <00> UNIQUE Registered
TITAN <03> UNIQUE Registered
TITAN$ <03> UNIQUE Registered
SNOWCO <00> GROUP Registered
SNOWCO <1C> GROUP Registered
TITAN <20> UNIQUE Registered
RUSS <03> UNIQUE Registered
SNOWCO <1E> GROUP Registered
IWAM_TITAN <03> UNIQUE Registered
SNOWCO <1D> UNIQUE Registered
..__MSBROWSE__.<01> GROUP Registered
SNOWCO <1B> UNIQUE Registered

SNOWCO is the Domain name. Clicking Control Panel/Network Identification/Full computer name = titan.SnowCo.net and the Domain = SnowCo.net

The other windows 2000 advance server is not a member server at this time. Here is it's (ATLAS) ntbstat information:
NetBIOS Remote Machine Name Table

Name Type Status
--------------------------------------------
ATLAS <00> UNIQUE Registered
SNOWCO <00> GROUP Registered
ATLAS <03> UNIQUE Registered
ATLAS <20> UNIQUE Registered
ATLAS$ <03> UNIQUE Registered
SNOWCO <1E> GROUP Registered
INet~Services <1C> GROUP Registered
IS~ATLAS.......<00> UNIQUE Registered

What I mean by pinging the computer name is from TITAN command prompt I type ping ATLAS. It took 30 seconds and then I got 4 successful returns time<10ms TTL=128. When I ping atlas's ip address, it is perfect.

BTW: TITAN boots fairly quickly while ATLAS takes around 30 minutes. Atlas is currently running the DNS service and there are several LAN computers using it for their primary DNS and they can successfully surf the internet. Also, another bit of info: I use a router to connect to WAN, the router has DHCP that feeds all computers except the servers.

 

[wbg34]

The PDC is a Windows 2000 Advance Server running AD. I currently do not have DNS or WINS running on this machine.

Where is your DNS Server. AD cannot run without DNS so you either had to designate a different DNS server during the setup or the PDC setup DNS for you. Have a look at the following FAQ faq96-3017 and verify whether or not your win2k server has dns running. You may only need to add your servers ip address as the primary dns on your routers dhcp settings to take care of the slow browsing.

 

[bleedingeyes]

Ok I have reconfigured the DNS.
TITAN (192.168.1.103) has a DNS running
ATLAS (192.168.1.102) has a DNS running

All lan clients are using the local 192.168.1.102(ATLAS) as PRIMARY and 192.168.1.103(TITAN) as secondary DNS via Obtain DNS setting automaticly.

All computers are successfully accesing the internet but it still takes 45 minutes for the computers to log in. I believe that they are having a hard time finding TITAN (The PDC). Also it take exactly 15 seconds to browse a computer from any other computer. What should I try next?

 

[GlenJohnson]

Check your server for a nic going bad. See if it's sending, (Or recieving), bad packets. Also, take a test machine, and throw a hosts file on it and see if that speeds things up. Good luck.

Glen A. Johnson
&quot;Fall seven times, stand up eight.&quot;
Proverb

Want to get great answers to your Tek-Tips questions? Have a look at FAQ219-2884

 

[Beboen]

What do you mean: &quot;Ok I have reconfigured the DNS.
TITAN (192.168.1.103) has a DNS running
ATLAS (192.168.1.102) has a DNS running&quot;

Normally you should let AD setup configure DNS because it is in AD integrated mode (is this also with your current config?) but most important is that it makes several entries in DNS to the DC, KCC,.... so clients know where to look for their DC.

If you have setup AD, what did you do with the original DNS?

You mention your router is also DHCP. Hmmm, I'd go for Windows DHCP because it can register clients immediately in DNS.

I hope both DNS servers don't point to each other for primary DNS. Let one be the master and the other 2nd DNS. For example TITAN has 1st DNS 127.0.0.1 and 2nd DNS ip of ATLAS. ATLAS has 1st DNS TITAN and 2nd DNS 127.0.0.1 or nothing.
To be honest I'd throw out one of the DNS servers to start with and configure all your clients to use TITAN. Afterwards, when everything works fine, you can implement a 2nd DNS server.

If you don't know how to configure the settings of your DNS, I recommend installing a new testdomain with standard setup, look for all the DNS entries and make analog entries in TITAN. Your TITAN DNS zone is AD integrated I hope.

 

[wbg34]

Bleeding,
On Titan can you run an ipconfig /all and post the results. Also run an ipconfig /all on one of your workstations and post the results.

Thanks

 

[bleedingeyes]

I beleive that the major problem has been resolved! After reinstalling and configuring the DNS on TITAN and setting the primary DNS on TITAN to TITAN (That was the problem!) the system is working fine. I have all LAN clients set to use primary DNS ATLAS and secondary DNS TITAN. This way I hope that a large part of network traffic will be sent to ATLAS as I use TITAN for my desktop. If you can add any other suggestions, I appreciated it.

Thanks for the great tips, it steered me in the right direction.

 

[bleedingeyes]

I still have a DNS problem. I ran netdiag and here is the error message.
<start of netdiag information>

DNS test . . . . . . . . . . . . . : Failed
[WARNING] Cannot find a primary authoritative DNS server for the name
'titan.SnowCo.net.'. [RCODE_SERVER_FAILURE]
The name 'titan.SnowCo.net.' may not be registered in DNS.
[WARNING] The DNS entries for this DC are not registered correctly on DNS se
rver '192.168.1.103'. Please wait for 30 minutes for DNS server replication.
[WARNING] The DNS entries for this DC are not registered correctly on DNS se
rver '192.168.1.102'. Please wait for 30 minutes for DNS server replication.
[FATAL] No DNS servers have the DNS records for this DC registered.


Redir and Browser test . . . . . . : Passed
List of NetBt transports currently bound to the Redir
NetBT_Tcpip_{C5B53F85-A025-4AD1-A36B-18FDE4824134}
The redir is bound to 1 NetBt transport.

List of NetBt transports currently bound to the browser
NetBT_Tcpip_{C5B53F85-A025-4AD1-A36B-18FDE4824134}
The browser is bound to 1 NetBt transport.

<END> of netdiag information

If I insert a new zone in the DNS server on TITAN, then one error message : &quot; [WARNING] Cannot find a primary authoritative DNS server for the name
'titan.SnowCo.net.'. [RCODE_SERVER_FAILURE]
The name 'titan.SnowCo.net.' may not be registered in DNS.&quot; goes away but the other warning remain.
Any ideas?

 

[Beboen]

There sure is an issue with your DNS server as I can read from the earlier posts in this thread.

So please answer on this question: What did you do with the original DNS server that was installed with AD? Did you remove it?

Problem is that AD relies heavily on DNS, not only for lookups for computers, but also for services like DC, KCC,...

It is possible to build an AD DNS server from scratch but it's rather labor intensive. I recommend you to install a testdomain (eventually snowco.net but then it may not be connected to the network) and check the DNS settings from the testdomain with your production domain.

You need to make sure that settings as DC, GC,... are correctly configured in your DNS server, otherwise your problems will remain. Be sure to have this DNS scope set to AD integrated mode.

 

[bleedingeyes]

&quot;So please answer on this question: What did you do with the original DNS server that was installed with AD? Did you remove it?&quot; I'm not realing sure because I have tried so many things over the last month. I do know that I have deleted the machine TITAN in the DNS console on the TITAN machine. I have also added it back and configured the DNS server as per other threads on this web site. That is what got the DNS server working for the LAN clients and what stopped my real long login times. I am currently installing AD on another server 2000 box for a new domain named office. I plan to review the settings in the DNS console and modify the existing one on TITAN to reflect. What are your thoughts?

 

[Beboen]

Your domain &quot;office&quot; should be in a different forest too to reflect a clean DNS config for AD. Then I'd check all the entries in &quot;office&quot; which rely to AD services and make analog entries in your &quot;snowco&quot; domain.

 

[bleedingeyes]

I completed the new domain/forest and AD on computer ZEUS. I changed a few settings on TITAn to mirror ZEUS's DNS settings. (mostly forwarding) I'm still getting the message:
DNS test . . . . . . . . . . . . . : Failed
[WARNING] The DNS entries for this DC are not registered correctly on DNS se
rver '192.168.1.103'. Please wait for 30 minutes for DNS server replication.
[FATAL] No DNS servers have the DNS records for this DC registered.

I thought it would resolve my problem too. I ran the netdiag on ZEUS and beleive it or not, I recieve the same FAILED test. There must be something that we are not seeing here. I also played around with removing the &quot;.&quot; from the titan.snowco.net.
Question: should i change all entries that read &quot;titan.snowco.net.&quot; to &quot;titan.snowco.net&quot; ?