Windows Time Service Policy not being applied -- going crazy!!!

[morjo619]

Hello All,

I've been trying to setup a Windows Time Service policy in Win2003
environment for the last day or so and I seem to be having some major issues
on getting it applied correctly. Here's the background I need to shrink the
Poll interval on a few member servers from the default 8 hrs. after a machine
has successively Polled the time server (our PDC) 3x -- we have some machines
drifting way to far.

Policy I modified:
Computer Config > Adm Temp > System > Windows Time Service > Time Provider >
Configure Windows NTP Client > Left all settings default except for
SpecialPollIntervall = 900

Next, I created a test OU and I added 2 test machines into it. Linked my
Time Service GPO to it and added the 2 machines into the Security Filtering
field...all is good so far.

Next, I went to my test machines and ran, "gpupdate /force" and then did a
"gpresult" -- the policy shows being applied sucessfully. But, when I open up
gpedit.msc and go to Windows Time Service policy, it still shows "Not
Configured".....when it should be Enabled and greyed out. I've tried
rebooting the machines....gpresult always shows the policy being applied
sucessfully. What gives?!?!

Your help would be much appreciated.

Thanks,
Josh

 

[Florian Frommherz [MVP]]

Josh,

Next, I went to my test machines and ran, "gpupdate /force" and then did a
"gpresult" -- the policy shows being applied sucessfully. But, when I open up
gpedit.msc and go to Windows Time Service policy, it still shows "Not
Configured".....when it should be Enabled and greyed out. I've tried
rebooting the machines....gpresult always shows the policy being applied
sucessfully. What gives?!?!

You need to open a registry tool to see the changes domain GP does.
Domain Group Policy is processed by client side extensions that write
changes to the registry. That's where they go. Local Group Policy
(configured using gpedit.msc) doesn't directly look at the registry but
a .POL file where local GP settings are stored (that's a rough breakdown
of it). Anyway, to be sure whether the policy is applied, check
gpresult, rsop.msc and the registry of the machine in question. The
registry is (for "Administrative Templates") the authoritive place to
look at (as that's where the setting gets changed effectively).

cheers,

Florian