Networks

I don't know about your gateways, IP and other stuff so right now I can say only one thing check your firewall rules on both side.

Good Luck.

I can ping from moundserv(DC) to sqlserv, but not from sqlserv to moundserv. The wired connections look ok, and I've tried it with the secondary NICs disconnected with no change.

The TCP/IP settings are:
Moundserv
Address: 10.10.10.10
Subnet Mask: 255.255.255.0
Default Gateway: 10.10.10.1
DNS Server: 10.10.10.10

SQLServ
Address: 10.10.10.11
Subnet Mask: 255.255.255.0
Default Gateway: 10.10.10.1
DNS Server: 10.10.10.10

There are no firewalls active on either server.

DNS shows some class C values duplicating our class A values (i.e. gdc) probably from the second NICs which are disconnected from the switch, but even with these values removed I don't get ping working in both directions.

In DNS I have two entries for forward lookup zones: _msdcs.MBGC.local and MBGC.local (which contains an msdcs object). I only set up MBGC.local. Do I need both?

i would hunt this down by looking in the event log on the servers. then you can hunt the error at support.microsoft.com www.eventid.net
you are saying all these servers on on 2003?

Yes, both servers are new 2003 version installations.

This morning my dns events log showed an error (116 which knowledge base suggests is an AD startup problem at bootup. The actual log entry says "dns server could not signal the service NAT"

I'm tracking that one down now, but this is a critical "get it running" issue. All suggestions welcome.

Are you trying to ping by hostname, or by IP address? If you can ping by IP address but not hostname, your problem is a DNS issue. If you cannot ping by either, I would check to ensure that the unpingable machine is set up to reply to ICMP packets. Even without a firewall installed or active, it may simply not be replying on purpose. Another question: are there services other than ping which are not working? Can they see each other over SMB? Try turning IIS on the "unpingable" machine, and telnet'ing to it via port 80 by IP address and hostname to see if you get through.

J.Ja