Problem migrating local profiles to domain profiles on XP

  • Thread starter Thread starter JonathanL
  • Start date Start date
J

JonathanL

I've run into a problem migrating local profiles to domain profiles.

I'm doing it by what I consider the standard way. In System Properties,
Advanced Tab, User Profiles section. I select the local profile and tell it
to copy over the domain profile (created by logging on and off one time).
Things seem to copy okay but when the user then logs in with their domain
account, the theme looks like a "classic" ala 2000 scheme and the left side
of the Start Menu is completely blank. Also, users cannot even add networked
printers.

The user accounts (both local and domain) are NON-admin accounts and that's
how they need to be. If I give the domain account admin rights on the PC,
then the theme is the proper XP Luna theme and all of the Start Menu shows up
and they can add networked printers (also local printers).

If I create new domain accounts without admin rights on the local machine,
everything is as it should be theme-wise and with the ability to add network
printers.

I've gone through the registry of the domain profile on the machine and
found some entries that pointed to locations in the local profile. I changed
these to the correct domain profile location.

Also, there are NO roaming profiles so that is not an issue. The PC is XP
SP3 and the domain is at 2003 level.

Anyone have any ideas on how to fix the problem? Why can't the migrated
profile work right unless it has admin rights on the PC?
 
Jonathan,

Have the profile folders been given their domain logon permissions to their
own profiles? Are they inherited permisions or just on the profile folder?
Is the administrator still the owner?
 
If your first questin refers to the domain profile folders, the answer is yes
they always have FC of their profile folder.
None of the profiles, local or domain, have inherited permissions.
Individual permissions are set on each profile folder.
The local Administrator account is indeed the owner of all profile folders.

One thing I have noticed when migrating profiles in this way is that there
are registry entries in the domain profile (after migration) that don't get
properly updated. Some entries still point to folders in the old local
profile. This means I have to go through the registry, find the entries, and
update them.

But even with updating these registry entries, the migrated profile still
doesn't work right (see below symptoms) unless it has local administrative
rights on the PC. And as I said, this is not an acceptable solution. So
something is not happening correctly during the migration and I wish I knew
what it was.

Jonathan
 
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