Freeware for NTP time synchronization under Windows?

[Chaos Master]

Hello people.

I am looking for a freeware Windows program to synchronize PC' clock over the
Internet, using the NTP (Network Time Protocol) protocol

Q: Do you know of any good program for time synchronization using the NTP
protocol? I'd like to synchronize time, say, once I day.

[]s
--
Chaos Master®, posting from Brazil.
"I'd rather be hated for who I am, than loved for who I am not." -- Kurt Cobain

Evanescence: http://marreka.no-ip.com | Lies: http://tinyurl.com/46vru |
/dev/null: http://renan182.no-ip.org

 

[Chaos Master]

Quoting Chaos Master [spammers.****@spam.com.INVALID], that posted to
alt.comp.freeware on Mon, 18 Oct 2004 00:09:14 -0200 under article

Hello people.

I am looking for a freeware Windows program to synchronize PC' clock over the
Internet, using the NTP (Network Time Protocol) protocol

Q: Do you know of any good program for time synchronization using the NTP
protocol? I'd like to synchronize time, say, once I day.

I found Automachron, http://oneguycoding.com.

After adding an NTP server that is located in Brazil to the list, it seems to
be working perfectly.

[]s
--
Chaos Master®, posting from Brazil.
"I'd rather be hated for who I am, than loved for who I am not." -- Kurt Cobain

Evanescence: http://marreka.no-ip.com | Lies: http://tinyurl.com/46vru |
/dev/null: http://renan182.no-ip.org

 

[Kerodo]

Hello people.

I am looking for a freeware Windows program to synchronize PC' clock over the
Internet, using the NTP (Network Time Protocol) protocol

Q: Do you know of any good program for time synchronization using the NTP
protocol? I'd like to synchronize time, say, once I day.

The best one is probably Dimension 4.

http://www.thinkman.com/dimension4/

 

[Kerodo]

Quoting Chaos Master [spammers.****@spam.com.INVALID], that posted to
alt.comp.freeware on Mon, 18 Oct 2004 00:09:14 -0200 under article

Hello people.

I am looking for a freeware Windows program to synchronize PC' clock over the
Internet, using the NTP (Network Time Protocol) protocol

Q: Do you know of any good program for time synchronization using the NTP
protocol? I'd like to synchronize time, say, once I day.

I found Automachron, http://oneguycoding.com.

After adding an NTP server that is located in Brazil to the list, it seems to
be working perfectly.

Yep, Automachron is very good also. The only trouble I had with
Automachron is that when it failed to get the time it wouldn't retry
until it got it. It would just wait until the next sync time.
Dimension 4 will retry every xx seconds until it succeeds. Otherwise
Automacron is very good..

 

[BarryTone]

I am looking for a freeware Windows program to synchronize PC' clock over the
Internet, using the NTP (Network Time Protocol) protocol

Q: Do you know of any good program for time synchronization using the NTP
protocol? I'd like to synchronize time, say, once I day.

http://nettime.sourceforge.net/

 

[technomaNge]

Go to the source:

http://www.boulder.nist.gov/timefreq/service/its.htm

There are freeware versions and instructions for Winders
flavors and Mac.

technomaNge

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Milosevic not yet convicted - good...
Saddam turned over for trial - bad...

Ahh, it's so confusing!

 

[ArjanDotOrg]

Hello people.

I am looking for a freeware Windows program to synchronize PC' clock
over the Internet, using the NTP (Network Time Protocol) protocol

Q: Do you know of any good program for time synchronization using the
NTP protocol? I'd like to synchronize time, say, once I day.

[]s

Neutron


Overview :

Neutron is a very simple and small time synchronizing program that
retrieves the accurate time from one of several specialized time servers
on the Internet. Once the network time has been retrieved the program can
set your computer's clock to match it. Options in the program enable you
to automatically obtain the time from the time server and set your clock
appropriately at program startup. It is also possible to have the program
automatically exit after the time has been set and so is ideal for
placing a shortcut in your Startup folder to sync your clock when your
computer is started. Neutron uses the standard Time protocol (TCP or UDP
port 37). See RFC 868 for more details. The time retrieved from the
network time server is given as the number of seconds since midnight on
January 1st 1900. Since the protocol only allows accuracy down to the
second you may not get the most accurate time possible but it is usually
good enough to always be within about half a second of "true" time.
Network latency is accommodated in the calculations involved in setting
your computer clock. Clicking the setup button ">>" shows you the program
options. Clicking the same button will hide the options. The setup
options allows you to choose the time server that is used by selecting
from a preset list in the dropdown list. You may prefer to use one that
is located nearer your computer for faster responses. Choose TCP or UDP
for the Time protocol to be used. UDP is recommended because of the lower
network communications overhead. Select whether you want the program to
automatically obtain and synchronize to the network time when you start
the program by clicking in the "Auto sync at program startup" checkbox.
Select whether you want the program to exit after it has synced your
clock time by clicking in the "Exit after time has been synced" checkbox.
If you have this option set, the next time you start the program you can
prevent the program from exiting by de-selecting this same checkbox.
Homepage: http://keir.net/neutron.html

For more system maintenance tools, check out: http://www.arjan.org/#
1.2.80


Kind regards,

 

[Doc]

Neutron

http://keir.net/neutron.html

Its a beauty, I have been using it for over a year. And only 6kb ....
yes, thats right six kilobytes. No registry entries either.

 

[scootgirl.com]

Hello people.

I am looking for a freeware Windows program to synchronize PC' clock over
the
Internet, using the NTP (Network Time Protocol) protocol

Q: Do you know of any good program for time synchronization using the NTP
protocol? I'd like to synchronize time, say, once I day.

[snip]



....only for winNT+ but I like http://argosoft.com/timesync/ a lot since it
runs as a service. Plus, I install the time synch program and time server
program on one PC and then install only the synch service on all my other
PCs to synch from the 1st PC - works great! I like it better than the one
built-in XP Pro.

Karen
http://scootgirl.com/

 

[syho]

Hello people.

I am looking for a freeware Windows program to synchronize PC' clock over the
Internet, using the NTP (Network Time Protocol) protocol

Q: Do you know of any good program for time synchronization using the NTP
protocol? I'd like to synchronize time, say, once I day.

[]s

http://www.itoolpad.com/products/timesync/

 

[Steve Kostecke]

I am looking for a freeware Windows program to synchronize PC' clock over the
Internet, using the NTP (Network Time Protocol) protocol

There is a free Windows port of NTP available. Please visit
http://ntp.isc.org/Main/ExternalTimeRelatedLinks for the links.

I'd like to synchronize time, say, once I day.

Your system clock will drift between these daily corrections.

ntpd continuously disciplines your system clock, by making very small
adjustments, to keep it correct all the time.

YMMV

 

[Bob Adkins]

I found Automachron, http://oneguycoding.com.

After adding an NTP server that is located in Brazil to the list, it seems to
be working perfectly.

Agree on Automachron!

What I like the most is its unobtrusiveness. I set it to load and get the
time with Windows start. It does so quietly and closes itself, completely
removing itself from memory.

-- Bob

 

[Dick Hazeleger]

The best one is probably Dimension 4.

http://www.thinkman.com/dimension4/

Agree absolutely with Dimension 4 as being the best, I tried a lot of
these programs, but I'll stick with D4!

Dick

 

[David Woolley]

I am looking for a freeware Windows program to synchronize PC' clock over the
Internet, using the NTP (Network Time Protocol) protocol

What do you mean by Windows? For any Windows system bought new in the
last two or three years, you should use the reference NTP implementation,
which is, I believe, the only NTP implementation - all the others are,
at best, SNTP. (If you don't mind a broken SNTP for Windows XP, Microsoft
supply one built in - net time/sntp.)

All products branded as Windows NT, Windows 2000, or Windows XP are NT
family systems and will run the full software.

I think a lot of the replies that you are getting are from people who
are used to answering this question for Windows 3.1 through Windows ME.
At least one of the proposals doesn't even make use of NTP servers
(although, as noted below, you may not be able to benefit from their use).

Q: Do you know of any good program for time synchronization using the NTP

As far as I know, the reference implementation is the only one that implements
NTP. I don't believe there are are any NTP implementations (only SNTP) for
DOS derived Windows (3.1, 95, 98, and ME).

protocol? I'd like to synchronize time, say, once I day.

NTP isn't really suitable for this, it uses adaptive polling intervals,
but these don't normally exceed 1024 seconds. You will need a program
that calculates and applies corrections to the clock frequency for even
SNTP to be worthwhile with a 24 poll period, as many PCs will drift
more than a second in this time. Without frequency correction, you will
probably find it just as accurate to use the Date headers on your ISP's
web pages as to use a protocol which is capable of making millisecond
(over dialup) accuracy measurements.

As such, why are you specifying NTP? My guess is that you don't really
want NTP.

 

[Tapio Sokura]

What do you mean by Windows? For any Windows system bought new in the
last two or three years, you should use the reference NTP implementation,

There is at least one problem with using ntpd (as in www.ntp.org)
especially in laptops and other computers that are not always connected
to an IP-network and/or change IP-addresses frequently. Because ntpd
expects to always have network connectivity and it doesn't handle IP
addresses changing under it while it is running, it is not rare to have
ntpd fail in circumstances where a simple(r) client achieves
synchronization.

With simpler I mean an SNTP client that uses DNS to resolve the server
IP address, opens a socket, sends a query & receives a response, closes
the socket, steps the clock and then goes to sleep for x minutes after
which the cycle is repeated. Naturally the result is not as accurate as
can be achieved with ntpd, but often in the case of workstations
(sub)second time accuracy is not that essential anyway.

I included DNS lookup in the loop above because I have noticed that some
(S)NTP clients never use DNS for looking up the server address, unless
the user specifically requests to do so. In my opinion if the user
enters a DNS name for the NTP server address, the client should
automatically re-resolve the name every time the client software is
started/first queries a server. Resolving the server name before sending
each individual query could result in needless clockhopping. Perhaps a
good compromise would be to do a DNS lookup at every client software
startup and after that periodically, like after running continuously for
a week, as well after a server is unreachable for a certain period of
time. But I'm getting sidetracked here..

What I meant to say is this: ntpd is excellent for servers and
workstations that are always connected to an IP network with a stable IP
address, but not optimal for "road warriors".

Tapio

 

[Thomas A. Horsley]

Well, I'll chime in with my NTPTime client:

http://home.att.net/~Tom.Horsley/ntptime.html

--email: (e-mail address removed) icbm: Delray Beach, FL |
<URL:http://home.att.net/~Tom.Horsley> Free Software and Politics <<==+

 

[Steve Kostecke]

There is at least one problem with using ntpd (as in www.ntp.org)
especially in laptops and other computers that are not always
connected to an IP-network and/or change IP-addresses frequently.
Because ntpd expects to always have network connectivity

ntpd is intended to be used in conjunction with a source of time (e.g. a
local reference clock, remote time servers).

[ntpd] doesn't handle IP addresses changing under it while it is
running,

It is true that ntpd does not currently detect interface address
changes. One solution, which is trivial to implement on an OS which
provides decent scripting facilities, is to this is to restart ntpd when
your interface address changes.

In my opinion if the user enters a DNS name for the NTP server
address, the client should automatically re-resolve the name every
time the client software is started/first queries a server. Resolving
the server name before sending each individual query could result in
needless clockhopping.

This is exactly what ntpd does; all DNS queries are performed at
startup.

What I meant to say is this: ntpd is excellent for servers and
workstations that are always connected to an IP network with a stable
IP address, but not optimal for "road warriors".

ntpd may not be the best solution for everyone. But there is no
requirement that you have a static IP address to use it. With a bit of
work you can use ntpd on systems with dynamic IP addresses, too.

 

[bassbag]

Its a beauty, I have been using it for over a year. And only 6kb ....
yes, thats right six kilobytes. No registry entries either.

Thirded
me

 

[David Woolley]

ntpd may not be the best solution for everyone. But there is no
requirement that you have a static IP address to use it. With a bit of
work you can use ntpd on systems with dynamic IP addresses, too.

Moreover, if you are using ADSL or cable ("always on") services, the
only reason that your IP address might change is because your ISP has
deliberately broken DHCP for commercial reasons (to allow them to
charge more to let you run servers). For always on systems, DHCP
should renew your leases so that the address never changes, and should
reserve it across reasonable amounts of disconnected time.

 

[Terje Mathisen]

[ntpd] doesn't handle IP addresses changing under it while it is
running,

It is true that ntpd does not currently detect interface address
changes. One solution, which is trivial to implement on an OS which
provides decent scripting facilities, is to this is to restart ntpd when
your interface address changes.

I do this with a perl script running as a service on my laptop.

Yeah, I know this is horrible overkill for something that could have
been handled with a 2KB asm program, but it was _very_ quick to write &
test.

ntpd may not be the best solution for everyone. But there is no
requirement that you have a static IP address to use it. With a bit of
work you can use ntpd on systems with dynamic IP addresses, too.

Right.

Terje