Profile takes ages to load

[Ian Henderson]

Hi folks.

I'm running a mini-network of the following specification:

Server
Compaq Proliant 800 series, Intel Pentium 2 chip running at 400 Mhz, 5 Gb SCSI system volume, running Windows 2000 Advanced Server, with Active Directory and DHCP activated.

Client
Self-build system, AMD Athlon XP 3000 running at 2.16 Ghz, 40 Gb system volume (brand new drive), running Windows XP Professional.

Both the Server and the Client tell me that they're communicating at 100Mhz, which I've got no reason to doubt. The problem is that when I log the Client into the Domain, it can take as much as 5 minutes to load 8Mb worth of profile from the server. The profile is as thin as possible, with no synchronisation set up, and nothing large sitting on the desktop. I don't understand why the profile takes as long to load up, given that my office PC (running Windows 2000 Pro and connecting to a Windows 2000 AS domain) loads up 20Mb of profile in a fraction of the time.

Any suggestions? I'm wondering if perhaps switching DHCP off and assigning static IP Addresses would solve the problem.

TIA


Ian Henderson

 

[Danny Sanders]

The most common cause of the slow logons is improperly configured DNS.
AD MUST have a DNS server for AD. Do you have a DNS server set up on the Win 2k server?

Basically point the DNS server to itself in the properties of TCP/IP for DNS, point all AD clients to the AD DNS server ONLY. For Internet access configure your AD DNS server to forward requests and list your ISP's DNS servers as the forwarders.
See:
How to: Configure DNS for Internet Access In Windows 2000

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;300202

Setting Up the Domain Name System for Active Directory

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;237675

hth
DDS W 2k MVP MCSE

Hi folks.

I'm running a mini-network of the following specification:

Server
Compaq Proliant 800 series, Intel Pentium 2 chip running at 400 Mhz, 5 Gb SCSI system volume, running Windows 2000 Advanced Server, with Active Directory and DHCP activated.

Client
Self-build system, AMD Athlon XP 3000 running at 2.16 Ghz, 40 Gb system volume (brand new drive), running Windows XP Professional.

Both the Server and the Client tell me that they're communicating at 100Mhz, which I've got no reason to doubt. The problem is that when I log the Client into the Domain, it can take as much as 5 minutes to load 8Mb worth of profile from the server. The profile is as thin as possible, with no synchronisation set up, and nothing large sitting on the desktop. I don't understand why the profile takes as long to load up, given that my office PC (running Windows 2000 Pro and connecting to a Windows 2000 AS domain) loads up 20Mb of profile in a fraction of the time.

Any suggestions? I'm wondering if perhaps switching DHCP off and assigning static IP Addresses would solve the problem.

TIA


Ian Henderson