Time Drift

[Thom Paine]

Several XP workstations have developed a time drift problem. I have them on
a domain, and I was under the impression that GP would automagically keep
them in check with the server.

I can't run a time sync command from the login script, as the users don't
have admin rights to do so.

Anyone have an idea on where I should start checking this?

Thanks.

-=/>Thom

 

[Florian Frommherz]

Howdy Thom!

Several XP workstations have developed a time drift problem. I have them on
a domain, and I was under the impression that GP would automagically keep
them in check with the server.

What do you mean by "time drift"? How many minutes do the times differ?
The time correction is not done by the Group Policy but by the netlogon
service, I think. The time gets checked every startup and - if it
differs (I think by a default of 300 minutes) it gets corrected (it
actually depends on how the time differs. It then gets either set
directly or the system's time gets slowed down until it matches the
server's time). Anyway, the clients will query their domain controller
for the time - and the domain controllers will query the domain
controller holding the PDC-FSMO role. So you might want to check whether
there is a bug or a mis-configured time.

Check out the following articles:
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;224799
http://technet2.microsoft.com/WindowsServer/en/library/71e76587-28f4-4272-a3d7-7f44ca50c0181033.mspx

I can't run a time sync command from the login script, as the users don't
have admin rights to do so.

Have you tried using a startup script, as this will be run under the
SYSTEM context? But I'd recommend that you check out why your times run
out of sync, as this should work automatically...

cheers,

Florian

 

[Thom Paine]

What do you mean by "time drift"? How many minutes do the times differ?

I mean that a workstation and the server are not set to the same time. The
one workstation I noticed it on was over 15 minutes. Other workstations are
2 to 5 minutes.

The time correction is not done by the Group Policy but by the netlogon
service, I think. The time gets checked every startup and - if it differs
(I think by a default of 300 minutes) it gets corrected (it actually
depends on how the time differs. It then gets either set directly or the
system's time gets slowed down until it matches the server's time).
Anyway, the clients will query their domain controller for the time - and
the domain controllers will query the domain controller holding the
PDC-FSMO role. So you might want to check whether there is a bug or a
mis-configured time.

Check out the following articles:
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;224799
http://technet2.microsoft.com/WindowsServer/en/library/71e76587-28f4-4272-a3d7-7f44ca50c0181033.mspx


Have you tried using a startup script, as this will be run under the
SYSTEM context? But I'd recommend that you check out why your times run
out of sync, as this should work automatically...

Thanks Florian. I'll check the script that gets run under system and see if
that fixes it.

-=/>Thom

 

[Florian Frommherz]

Howdy Thom!

I mean that a workstation and the server are not set to the same time. The
one workstation I noticed it on was over 15 minutes. Other workstations are
2 to 5 minutes.

15 minutes? That's too much.. strange...

Thanks Florian. I'll check the script that gets run under system and see if
that fixes it.

You're welcome. But before you're using this script on every startup,
I'd check if I could handle the problem with the Group Policy settings
(for the clients) at the Windows Time Service.

cheers,

Florian

 

[Guest]

An alternative might be to run a local timeserver on your fileserver, and
have the Windows Time process (running in Admin or System space) get its time
from this. There are plenty of free timeserver applets.