Joining into domain fails

My DC is a windows 2000 Server . When I try to join an XP machine into the domain , I dont get any error message and is able to join it to the Domain . But for a Windows 2000 Professional or a Windows 2000 Server Machine , When I try to join it to the domain , I get an error message “The network path could not be found” . I make host file entries but that also doesn’t solve my problem . When I try to ping the domain controller , It gives me a reply . Can somebody suggest me a solution for this .

Rabindra