Roaming login on XP professional

[Pingle]

I have a computer at home running XP professional, and at college I have a
roaming account on a Windows 2000 PC.

I would LOVE to be able to login at home using my college roaming account.
However, I can't figure out how to. All the documentation says it's easy,
just set a user profile to be roaming by selecting "Roaming profile" from
Control panel -> system -> advanced -> Settings under "user profiles" ->
change type.

BUT "Roaming profile" is grayed out and I can't select it.

I KNOW that this is because the existing user profiles at local profiles. My
question is, HOW do I set up a ROAMING profile?

Maybe I need to be part of a domain not a workgroup? If so, think I need to
connect my VPN to be allowed the domain server at college. BUT, I can't
start my VPN until I have logged on!! So a second question, is how can I do
this?

 

[GTS]

You would have to be a domain member to use a roaming profile. You cannot
join both of these machines to the same domain login. What VPN are you
talking about? A connection from home to your school machine? If so, using
a remote control program like vnc might be an option to remotely use your
school PC. I'd be surprised if your school is configured to allow this
though.

 

[Malke]

I have a computer at home running XP professional, and at college I
have a roaming account on a Windows 2000 PC.

I would LOVE to be able to login at home using my college roaming
account. However, I can't figure out how to. All the documentation
says it's easy, just set a user profile to be roaming by selecting
"Roaming profile" from Control panel -> system -> advanced -> Settings
under "user profiles" -> change type.

BUT "Roaming profile" is grayed out and I can't select it.

I KNOW that this is because the existing user profiles at local
profiles. My question is, HOW do I set up a ROAMING profile?

Maybe I need to be part of a domain not a workgroup? If so, think I
need to connect my VPN to be allowed the domain server at college.
BUT, I can't start my VPN until I have logged on!! So a second
question, is how can I do this?

Roaming profiles are only available when a workstation is part of a
domain. Think about it - there has to be a central server on which the
profile is stored.

I very much doubt that your college will allow you to access their
system from outside unless you are a professor. If you are, then talk
to the college's IT Dept. about what you need.

Is what you really want to do is control the college computer from home
(remote desktop)? Again, I very much doubt your college will allow
that. It would be a huge security risk. Tell us what your goal is
regarding exactly what you want to accomplish from home.

Malke

 

[jobs]

You would have to be a domain member to use a roaming profile. You cannot
join both of these machines to the same domain login. What VPN are you
talking about? A connection from home to your school machine? If so, using
a remote control program like vnc might be an option to remotely use your
school PC. I'd be surprised if your school is configured to allow this
though.

You can't on XP Home.

 

[Pingle]

Thanks both for your responses.

I believe that as a grad student I am allowed to do this. Not from the whole
of the Internet, but when I connect to the collect using the VPN, which
college have set up.

I found that once connected to the VPN, logged on as an administrator, I
could do change the computer to be part of the college domain instead of a
workgroup. What was not obvious to me was that this domain is a full DNS
domain. Then the logon window changed to from the "XP style" to the
"standard/classic style", including the option to logon to a domain, and
also, which is just what I wanted, to check a box and be able to connect to
the VPN _before_ logging on.

However, I can't say whether it actually works or not because after an hour
of waiting for the profile to load this way, ie., remotely over the VPN
(even though it's ADSL), I gave up and pressed the reset button. My guess
is that this is because of the size of my roaming profile.

 

[Pingle]

Reading this again it's not clear that what I meant is that I was logged in
to my home (ie. local) computer as an administrator. This allowed me to
change the computer name.

This is XP Professional, like it says in the topic title.

Thanks both for your responses.

I believe that as a grad student I am allowed to do this. Not from the
whole of the Internet, but when I connect to the collect using the VPN,
which college have set up.

I found that once connected to the VPN, logged on as an administrator, I
could do change the computer to be part of the college domain instead of a
workgroup. What was not obvious to me was that this domain is a full DNS
domain. Then the logon window changed to from the "XP style" to the
"standard/classic style", including the option to logon to a domain, and
also, which is just what I wanted, to check a box and be able to connect
to the VPN _before_ logging on.

However, I can't say whether it actually works or not because after an
hour of waiting for the profile to load this way, ie., remotely over the
VPN (even though it's ADSL), I gave up and pressed the reset button. My
guess is that this is because of the size of my roaming profile.

 

[Pingle]

That is, I logged on to my home computer as an administrator, and changed it
to be part of the college domain using the full DNS name of the domain. I
had to be connected to the VPN for this to work, I believe, because it
needed to find the domain server (or is that "active directory"?).

Then, having done this, I logged off, and I found that the logon window had
changed so that I was able to supply the domain name as well as the username
of my roaming account (or profile?), and to check the box which allowed me
to connect to the VPN.

However, as I said earlier, it took so long to load the profile - I guess
because it is too big - that I had to reset the computer, and so I can't say
whether it actually really works.

 

[Malke]

That is, I logged on to my home computer as an administrator, and
changed it to be part of the college domain using the full DNS name of
the domain. I had to be connected to the VPN for this to work, I
believe, because it needed to find the domain server (or is that
"active directory"?).

Then, having done this, I logged off, and I found that the logon
window had changed so that I was able to supply the domain name as
well as the username of my roaming account (or profile?), and to check
the box which allowed me to connect to the VPN.

However, as I said earlier, it took so long to load the profile - I
guess because it is too big - that I had to reset the computer, and so
I can't say whether it actually really works.

Thanks for clarifying your situation. I think the most efficient thing
for you to do is to talk to your IT Dept. about the problem you had
connecting and let them t-shoot it. Since it's OK with them to do this,
they will know how to make it work.

Cheers,

Malke

 

[GTS]

The problem loading the profile is very possibly an issue of trying to use
the Win 2K based profile on your XP Pro machine. Microsoft's documentation
on this is ambiguous - 'Roaming works best when users travel between
client computers that use the same version of the same operating system,:"
This implies it might work otherwise, but I've seen problems with 2K/XP
before.

In any case, I concur with Malke re. that you should consult the IT people.
--

Thanks both for your responses.

I believe that as a grad student I am allowed to do this. Not from the
whole of the Internet, but when I connect to the collect using the VPN,
which college have set up.

I found that once connected to the VPN, logged on as an administrator, I
could do change the computer to be part of the college domain instead of a
workgroup. What was not obvious to me was that this domain is a full DNS
domain. Then the logon window changed to from the "XP style" to the
"standard/classic style", including the option to logon to a domain, and
also, which is just what I wanted, to check a box and be able to connect
to the VPN _before_ logging on.

However, I can't say whether it actually works or not because after an
hour of waiting for the profile to load this way, ie., remotely over the
VPN (even though it's ADSL), I gave up and pressed the reset button. My
guess is that this is because of the size of my roaming profile.