New User Created in Active Directory, Can't Connect to Exchange 2003

[medens]

Hello,

I am experiencing a very frustrating issue right now where I create a new user in Active directory, as normal and when I go to set them up to communicate with our exchange server in Outlook 2003, it won't let me establish the connection. I go through Control Panel, Mail, Email Accounts, add a new email account, exchange server and so on. I type in our exchange server address and the name of the new user. If I click on Check Name, I get a message that says "the action could not be completed. the connection to the microsoft exchange server is unavailable. outlook must be online or connected to complete this action." If I skip hitting check name and hit next it says "mail from this exchange server account will be delivered to the existing personal folder on your local computer. if you wish to keep your mail on your server, you must change the default delivery location using the email accounts command from the tools menu. do you wish to continue?" I finish and close and open Outlook to where I imediately get the message "the connection to the microsoft exchange server is unavailable. outlook must be online or connected to complete this action." This happens with any new user I set up in Active Directory!! Please help!!

 

[medens]

Any ideas if you are thinking it isn't a RUS issue? I did run the rebuild by the way and it didn't seem to help at all.

 

[Zelandakh]

It sounds like a replication issue but on a single server that isn't possible.

 

[medens]

I know, it is frustrating, I really have no idea why it is doing this but it is definately giving me grief.

 

[Zelandakh]

What happens when you send an email to the new user from your machine? Do they appear in the GAL beforehand?

Can you get to their mailbox in OWA?

 

[medens]

They do appear in GAL but since I can't get them to connect to the exchange server I can't recieve them obviously, I imagine it is out in their mailbox somewhere. What do you mean by OWA?

 

[medens]

if you are referring to Outlook web access, we actually have email pulling in via pop3 from godaddy.

 

[Zelandakh]

If you are pulling in via POP, where does Exchange come in?

 

[medens]

well, it stores our profile so if we need to use a different machine it will all pull in properly, plus the global address list an so forth, it definately serves a purpose.

 

[people3]

Hi,

A couple of quick questions.

When you log the user into the PC, are you logging into the domain (does the drop down box say the domain name or the name of the Pc, Are the pc added to the domain?)

What is the Ip address of your server and what is the Primary and secondry DNS IP addrerss on the server?

Can you access files on the server fine, without entering a username and password each time.

Cheers

 

[medens]

yes, we are logging onto a domain and yes we can access files on the server fine. I would prefer not to share the ip address of my server, no offense.

 

[people3]

HI,

Its only the internal ip of the server were after not external

To me it sounds like dns or AD is not quite right. so i was just doing a crude check to see how your DNS is configured.

 

[medens]

oh ok
192.168.2.3 is the server's ip

primary 216.165.129.158
secondary 216.170.153.146

 

[58sniper]

If your domain controller is your DNS server, then the primary DNS server configured in the NIC properties of the DC should be itself. The DC should look locally before going outside.

The public DNS servers should be configured as forwarders in DNS, not as DNS servers on the DC's NIC properties.

Pat Richard MVP
Plan for performance, and capacity takes care of itself. Plan for capacity, and suffer poor performance.

http://www.ucblogs.net/blogs/exchange/

 

[medens]

I changed it to have the primary as 192.168.2.3 and secondary as 216.165.129.158, flushed the dns on the server as well as the workstation and still no go. One thing I did notice however...one of the first things I tried was to give another user local admin rights on my machine, when I went in to do this, it did have the domain in the "From this location" field when I was trying to enter the name of the user I wanted to add as a local admin, it said that either the user didn't exist or the domain wasn't available. I closed it out, went in to try it again and it was back to how it has been for a while where it has the name of the local machine in the "From this location" field and when trying to add a user, goes to a "name not found" screen because it is only looking on the local machine. Definately something fishy going on.

 

[people3]

HI,

Have you tried removing the pc from the domain and re adding it?

also its best practace to do as Pat said, the external DNS servers should be added as forwarders.

 

[medens]

so what should be used as my secondary dns? am I wrong to have an external as secondary and the server as primary? I haven't tried removing the pc from the domain and re adding it primarely because it isn't limited to one machine, it is a problem with any new profile created in AD so I figured it wasn't a machine issue.

 

[58sniper]

Only internal DNS servers should be configured as primary and secondary DNS on any domain joined machines, including workstations, member servers, and domain controllers.

Pat Richard MVP
Plan for performance, and capacity takes care of itself. Plan for capacity, and suffer poor performance.

http://www.ucblogs.net/blogs/exchange/

 

[medens]

So what would you recommend I set my secondary DNS on my server to? That is our only server.

 

[58sniper]

Then you leave it blank.

Pat Richard MVP
Plan for performance, and capacity takes care of itself. Plan for capacity, and suffer poor performance.

http://www.ucblogs.net/blogs/exchange/

 

[medens]

ok, I will, could you see this causing me some of the issues I've been having? Thank you, by the way, for your help.