server does not appear in browse list

[iamnotageek]

I ran into an interesting situation and wonder if anyone knows how to fix it...

We recently swapped out a customer's SBS2k for a new SBS2003. To make things easier for the vertical market specialty software that they use, we named the new server the same as the old one, took the old one offline and used an external hard drive to copy the data over.

All worked well except that the server does not show up in the workstations' browse list, either from the GUI or command line. I can however use net view on the workstations to list the directories of the shared folders on the server, and can map drives using the net use command.

The other odd thing is that none of the workstations or the server itself show up when doing 'net view' from the server command window.

I suspect that although the server name is the same, there is a SID or equivalent stored in the workstation registry that is causing the server to not be visible in the list from the workstations, and possibly this also causes the server and workstations to not appear in the server's net view list.

Anyone know which registry hack could possibly straighten this out?

 

[Roadki11]

Are these workstations domain members of the sbs2k server? if they are you cant just take the old server offline and bring in a new one, same name or not, there is a method to the madness.

RoadKi11

 

[iamnotageek]

Yes, they are domain members, and other than this anomaly, everything works, even though it might not have been the approved method. The migration had to be done in one day and they had to hit the ground running the next. I read through the migration doc that MS makes available and it seems to require having both servers on the network at the same time, hence they cannot be named the same, so we didn't use their method.

Any ideas on the registry hack?

 

[Roadki11]

No idea on a registry hack. only way i know to fix this is to remove each pc from the old domain and join them to the new domain manually.

RoadKi11

 

[iamnotageek]

The domain name is the same on both the old and new servers. I tried taking a workstation out of the domain (e.g. assigning it to a workgroup) and then adding it back into the domain, but the server still did not show up in the network list.

The other problem with that method is that the machine gets automatically added into the managed computers group, which gives the user a default desktop, programs are missing and no access to their Outlook accounts/email (they aren't using Exchange). I had to remove the machine from the managed computers list and use system restore to recover from that.

 

[schtek]

try this, if there is a second nic on the server connect it, then see if you can see all workstations & server????
i had this on a server...
ps keep the first nic running.

Stand up wherever you are, go to the nearest window and yell as loud as you can, 'I'm mad as hell, and I'm not going to take it anymore.'

http://www.schtek.co.uk

 

[ADB100]

Is NetBIOS disabled on the server? Type the following command at the comand prompt:

nbtstat -n

This should list the local NetBIOS Name Cache on the server, there should be several listed. Personally I have disabled NetBIOS on all my Servers & Workstations and publish shares via AD. The downside of this is absolutely NO Browse list.....

HTH

Andy

 

[iamnotageek]

Schtek - yes, it has 2 NICs, but since we/they are running ISA server, that won't work (MS networking is disabled on the WAN NIC).

ADB100 - if you mean NetBIOS over TCP/IP, I looked just now and this was disabled for some reason (default = enabled). I enabled it and now the server and workstations show up when doing a net view on the server. I'll have the customer check later today to make sure that the server is now showing up when doing net view from the workstation.

Even though that likely fixed the main issue, I see that there are Netlogon 5513 events showing up in the server event log, complaining about a broken trust relationship caused by an incorrect SID. To fix this, I suspect that I may have to leave/rejoin the domain on each of the workstations, capture the new SID, do a system restore to get the user's settings back and then patch in the new SID, using something like this...

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/sysinternals/utilities/NewSid.mspx

 

[ADB100]

If you look at the various Server hardening recommendations, one of the big ones seems to be to disable NetBIOS over TCP/IP. As you have seen though this removes some functionality, however most features are not essential and there are workarounds/alternatives.

There is a good article here:

http://www.windowsitpro.com/Articles/Index.cfm?ArticleID=21537&pg=1

You can also use the NetDom.exe and Nltest.exe tools to check domain connectivity with your workstation's account.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/216393/

HTH

Andy

 

[iamnotageek]

ADB100 - agreed, NetBIOS over tcp/ip should be disabled on any external-facing interface, and it is disabled by default on the WAN/internet NIC on a win2k/SBS2003 server that has ISA installed.

I remember now how it got disabled on the LAN interface in this instance. SBS200x has this goofy requirement that the NIC(s) be connected to a hub, as it won't let you proceed without an active link. When mucking around with this, I originally had the NICs swapped with respect to LAN/WAN assignment... sigh.

The first article that you cite seems to have some valid counterpoints in the comments section. Since this is a very small shop, I'm going to let it be, as it makes it easier for the novice sysadmin to add shared printers, etc later on.

With respect to the other article, at this point, I just want to synchronize the SID. As I said in the original post, when I leave and rejoin the domain on the workstations, the server puts the machine into the managed workstation bucket, which causes the MS Outlook account to go away, along with everything else associated with that user's original profile.

 

[tfg13]

I'm going to ask, did you also move over the message store from the old Win2k SBS to the Win2k3 SBS? I'm talking about the Exchange messages stores. This would have solved the "MS Outlook" issue you seem to be having.

Have you looked at the various migration tools that are out there for moving accounts? Including the one from Microsoft? This would solve the "user's original profile" issue.

This is probably already realized, but the method you took for doing this migration was not the best planned out attack. Did you think about creating another domain, with a trust between the 2 until you figured out all this other stuff?

 

[iamnotageek]

tfg13 - they were not using Exchange, so there were no message stores to migrate. I did install Exchange on the new server, just in case they go to that, but they are using all local .pst folders. In this situation, when a workstation leaves and rejoins the domain, it gets thrown into the AD managed workstation bucket, a new user profile folder gets created, and when you launch Outlook, it has no recollection of the account and so the new account wizard launches.

Yes, I looked at the migration tool/method referenced in their migration document. One problem with that approach is that MS says to allow 4 days for the process, which would have been 3 days too long for this customer. They had to jump through hoops just to get a day during which they did not have to do their usual business. Any additional downtime would have meant many thousands of lost revenue, in addition to the headaches it would have created for their customers, since it is a due-date driven business involving a large number of entities on each deal.

The MS tool/method also requires both servers on the network at the same time, which means that they could not have the same name. This would have caused big headaches with the 3rd party vertical market software that their business depends on. Under the circumstances, it was the best plan of attack, even though it was not the approved method, and it worked out pretty well.

 

[Roadki11]

For the profiles i use an old registry trick. if you go to:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\softeare\microsoft\windows nt\currentverion\profilelist

the key you want is "profileimagepath"

you will see a list of all profiles on the pc and where the profiles are mapped to. once you remove the pc from the domain and readd it back to the domain and login with the user it will create a new key here. if you change the profileimagepath back to the old profile path when the user logs back into the new domain they will load their old profile. things you run into with this approach is permission issues so the user needs to be a member of the local admin group or you need to reset the permissions on the old profile for the new user sid.

RoadKi11

 

[iamnotageek]

Roadkill - I tried it here in the shop before trying it at the customer location, but it didn't work. Here is what I did.

- fresh install of xp pro, non-domain (workgroup)
- created local admin user account named test
- logged onto local machine as test, which created \D&S\test, changed desktop, installed MS Office, created email account in Outlook & tested
- created a domain user account named test on our sbs2003 server
- rebooted xp, logged onto sbs2003 domain as test, which created \D&S\test.domain_name and watched personal settings go away
- rebooted, logged on as domain admin, used regedit to change profile path to point to \D&S\test instead of \D&S\test.domain_name
- went into permissions for \D&S\test and added test@domain_name to the permissions list and gave full control

I then rebooted, logged in as test and during the initial display of 'applying personal settings' the non-default background was there but by the time the login was complete, all of the personal settings had disappeared. Start - Run - cmd shows that the working user dir is \D&S\test. I went into the server and removed the machine from the managed client computers, but no joy.

If I logoff the domain and logon to the local machine as test, all of the personal settings come back.

What am I missing?

 

[rbrown0123]

I have a similar problem.

We had to rebuild a dying 2003 SBS Server. Some machines were left on and I simply connected the new rebuilt Server and they have everything except remote. I cannot connect to any workstation that re-connected this way.

However those that required me to disconnect the Domain, join a Workgroup and rejoin the domain have the problem with Outlook you mention. In fact it is all settings they previously had. They show on all lists though.
It's a simple fix on the Outlook and Settings. If you simply Right Click Start and Explore, you will see the new profile under Documents and Settings that it has created. Note the "old" profile. Log in as desktop level as admin, change the "new" profile to sameuser.servername.002. Change the "old" working profile to whatever the "new" profile was called. I would guess it would be along the line of sameuser.servername.000.
Reboot and loging to Domain.

I do have to keep in mind there could be things that you've done that I've missed here that could complicate what I just told you.



Rodney

 

[iamnotageek]

Ok, problem solved with respect to leaving a domain controlled by the old server and rejoining the domain controlled by the new server (same domain name and server name).

The missing pieces are here...

http://www.mrp3.com/windows-user-setting-fix-procedure.html

While it does appear that in some cases it is only necessary to edit the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\software\microsoft\windows nt\currentverion\profilelist to point to the 'old' user settings and change the permissions of that user folder to allow full control to the 'new' user (new SID), that did not work in my test setup.

To recap:

- joined domain on SBS2000 server
- logged in as user, created Outlook account and personalized desktop settings
- recorded user dir and SID
- logged off, logged on as domain admin and moved ws from domain to workgroup
- rebooted, switched network cable to hub with sbs2003
- added ws to AD on SBS2003 (unmanaged)
- login as local admin, join domain
- reboot, logon to domain as user
- recorded user dir (new) and SID (new)
- reboot, login as domain admin, set explorer to show all files
- make a backup copy of user dir
- from permissions menu on old user dir, delete old user, add new user, give full control over the folder and all child objects, etc.
- edit registry profile list to point new user SID to old user dir
- change profile list for old user SID to point to new user dir (not sure if this is necessary)
- select HKEY_Users key
- File - Load Hive and browse to old user dir and load ntuser.dat
- name it temporary
- from permissions dialog, delete old user SID and add new user, giving full control, etc as before over entire hive with temporary hive still selected, File - Unload Hive
- exit regedit
- logoff and logon to domain as user

Previously, I had omitted the hkey_user procedure, and this would get the user profile into a wierd state where no settings were migrated, nothing would show on the left side of the Start menu, Outlook would launch setup instead of acting on outlook.pst, and Outlook setup would fail with a wierd error.