I’m sure this will have been asked before but I cannot find it…
We have a number of Windows 9x, 2000 and XP clients. We have a Windows 2000 DC that is providing DNS and DHCP.
The XP machines currently on the network all have static IP addresses (they are IT computers and I prefer it that they don’t use DHCP – yes I know I could use reservations to make sure they get the same IP each time but for the numbers concerned it simply doesn’t make a difference).
All computers can logon to the network, use shares, printers and access the internet as rules allow.
Now to my problem; I have a new batch of PCs’ that are all XP, they are going to be client machines and I want them to use DHCP. When I log on locally to the PCs’ and view the IPConfig I do not get an IP lease until about 20-30 seconds after logon. When I logon as a network user it is using cached information, as it is not receiving an IP in time for the logon process. As I understand it XP does not use NetBIOS / NetBEUI to obtain a lease as 9x and 2000 do so I’m pretty sure that is why I don’t have a delay in 9x and 2000 but I do with XP.
If the user has not previously logged on to the PC it is not recognising them and is not allowing them to connect.
I?ve done a quick search in the usual places and as a result have enabled the “Always wait for the network at computer startup and logon” policy; but this shouldn?t make a difference as the description tells you that by default it will wait for the network if it is an unknown user that is trying to connect anyway.
All works fine when I assign a static IP.
Does anybody know what I?m missing? And, is there any way for me to speed up the DHCP process for XP?
Cheers.
