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No Domain Controller Available on WAN

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by bradq 1 view

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We have one main office with a Windows 2000 Server and Active Directory to validate logins.

There are 3 small remote offices (2-3 pc's in each location) that are connected by Cisco routers (128k lines) to the main office. We are able to ping between all offices and connect to resources.

I added LMHOSTS files on the pc's in the remote offices so that they could access resources by computer name. Everything is working fine except when their pc's boot up and they enter their username, password, and domain. When they enter their password and press "enter" they get a message saying "No Domain Server Available to Validate Your Request. You may not be able to gain access to some network resources". It seems as if its not going to connect but then you press "Ok" on the error message and then it logs you in fine and maps the network drives and you get in like you should have. I tried adding a WINS server in the main office but it didn't have any difference.

The Windows 2000 Pro clients log in fine. Its just the 98 clients that are affected. Does anyone know why you get that message and how to get rid of it?

They cant afford to have BDC's in the remote offices.

10 replies

by joshua1

Do you have the \0x1C entry in the LMHOSTS in the 16th position pointing to your domain name? Also, there's some big differences in 98's networking abilities (lack of). You could enable a machine as a Wins Proxy (NT or 2k Pro). That should help.
Article Q163949 has more info about logging in to a domain across a WAN with LMHOSTS.

by bradq

Here is what the LMHOSTS looks like. I noticed I had an \0xlb instead of \0x1b. Could that be the problem?

192.168.1.9 hocnr #PRE #DOM:HEMATOLOGY-ONCO
192.168.1.9 "HEMATOLOGY-ONCO\0x1b" #PRE

by stillatit

In your lmhosts entries, you should have the #PRE and #DOM: tags on the entry for the domain controller. Note that these are case sensitive. The #PRE tag specifies pre-load the entry into cache, and the #DOM: tag specifies that this entry is a domain controller for the specified domain.

Good luck.

by bradq

Here it is:

192.168.1.9 hocnr #PRE #DOM:HEMATOLOGY-ONCO
192.168.1.9 "HEMATOLOGY-ONCO\0x1b" #PRE

by frobo

The reason is very simple, each W2k Domain has some Roles and they are repsented only once per Domain. Unlikly you have only one PDC-Emulator, this is the first installed Server of your W2k Domain in your central office. The authentication process over WAN-links causes this problem, your win9x client doesn't reaches the PDC-Emulator in right time and run's in an timeout. Their is nothing you could do about, you can only upgrade this win9x client to w2k Pro. Another solution is to place a new Domaintree in every branch office, so you have a PDC-Emulator on Place. To dig in the area of nameresolution didnot realy solve your problem, you will see that the Problem is jumping around your win9x clients. Sorry so far.

Regards

Frobo

by joshua1

RE: I noticed I had an \0xlb instead of \0x1b

You need \0x1C, not "b". This is from the MS article I mentioned in the previous post:

Example LMHOSTS File
In the following example, each IP address is either the PDC or a BDC of MYDOMAIN. The first entry lists a Domain Controller not by its machine name, but by its domain name with a <1C> in the sixteenth position indicating a domain controller. Each subsequent line lists an additional Domain Controller by its computer name, with a #DOM entry that links it back to the 1C entry. All lines must have the #PRE entry to preload them into the NetBIOS name cache.
123.45.101.20 "MYDOMAIN \0x1C" #PRE #Domain Name

123.45.101.21 "A-THIRD-DC" #PRE #DOM:MYDOMAIN #Domain Name

123.45.220.15 "ANOTHERDC" #PRE #DOM:MYDOMAIN #Domain Name

by bradq

I finally got it to work. I had to use the \c entry you mentioned as well as the \b I had previously. Thank you very much.

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