Joining domain: Network path cannot be found

[Guest]

Hi all,

I have the following problem: With my Laptop running Win XP Pro SP1, I would
like to join our network's domain "foo-bar.local" on a Win2k domain server.

Now, every time I try to join the domain, I receive the error message that
the network path could not be found. The weird thing is that before the
message appears, I both get an assurance that an account for my client was
found, and I am asked whether I want to use this account. If I say yes, I
furthermore get a login window where I can enter my domain-login/password,
which are both accepted.
Strangely enough, other Win XP Pro clients can be added to the domain
without any problems, we do it all the time.

I remember having had the same strange problem once before and somehow
having solved it by pure accidence. I found only a single description of the
problem on the net, and cannot find it again. It must have something to do
with a problem occurring when you rename your computer. Then the necessary
RPC (remote procedure call) for Active Directory resolution does not work
properly anymore or the like. The solution once was something similar to
turning on TCP/IP NetBIOS Helper Service on the server side and NetBIOS on
the client side and after a single startup, the client could be connected to
the domain and NetBIOS could be disabled on both sides again.

Some more information:
- I have turned off firewalls on client machine (Win XP firewall is disabled
anyway).
- I can ping the DNS server from client side, and I assured that the correct
DNS entries are set. I can also ping the Client from the server side.
- Don't know much about the usage of nslookup, but I used it to check
whether the SRV-entry "_ldap._tcp.dc._msdcs.foo-bar.local" on the server
exists, which seems to be fine (otherwise I could not add ANY client to the
domain anyway, if I am not mistaken).
- Don't know much about usage of ldp.exe neither, but I can access the
Active Directory through it and browse the entries, after I specified
Server-IP, Server-Port, and given Login/Password.

Has anybody encountered this already?

 

[David Sherman]

Try this:
On the Windows 2000 server, delete your computer.

then try to re-join the domain.