Unable to load profile - personal settings

[MikeNH]

Hello, here is the scoop.

Upgraded a WinNT server to Win2k SP3. Upgrade appeared to load no problem. This server lives on a domain. You can log in locally (as administrator) but cannot with any domain admin account (even if profile existed pre-upgrade).

All old profiles were then removed. During some fluke, I was able to login and create a new profile. No one has since been able to do this. If I take a copy of the administrator profile and rename it to the domain admin user, then they can login.

Created a new Default User profile folder using the local administrators profile (thinking Default User was corrupt). That changed nothing.

Here is what happens when someone attempts to login to the domain. It begins login process, but never gets beyond the Loading Personal Settings. Left server for over an hour, no change.

Strange thing is that the profile does get created, although the user can never really login.

We are on an NT domain. This server did not change names. Next step, I am going to run a Repair. Any ideas? Thanks.

Mike

 

[iNfAmOuSeNiGmA]

Check your routing i know this sounds weird but i had a simalir problem once before and i turned out to be routing.

 

[MikeNH]

Thank you for your reply.
Do you mean local routing (host file, Route Table) on the local server or the routing on our core switch?

 

[LonC25]

I just had this issue exactly.

My problem was DNS. When I tried to ping my DNS server it was coming back with a public ip from a second nic that was installed. I disabled the second nic. Logged on locally and did the ipconfig /flushdns and then the /release and /renew.

Logged in as the user and it worked.

 

[MikeNH]

Checked the local route table and host files. They were correct. The server has a static IP address and static WINS/DNS entries. So, DNS is correct. Our second nic was already disabled. Just tried reinstalling the OS and that changed nothing. It's not something we are looking forward to doing, but looks like a clean install of the OS is in order.

 

[CitrixEngineer]

Create a fresh default user profile by creating a folder of the same name. Expand ntuser.dat from the Restore folder and everything should work again.

You might find that, unless you've been right through and changed all permissions on all files - including ntuser.dat, that users can't use copies of the Admin's files.

Hope this helps CitrixEngineer@yahoo.co.uk

 

[MikeNH]

Can't seem to find a "restore" folder. Found ntuser.dat in a "repair" folder though. However, there is no expand feature for that file. Look on the Win2k cd as well.

 

[CitrixEngineer]

Sorry, I was away from my servers, so guessed locations of files. It's also been a long time since I had to do this!

ntuser.dat should be sufficent to copy into the existing Default User profile folder from the repair folder. CitrixEngineer@yahoo.co.uk

 

[MikeNH]

Unfortunately, none of the suggestions have provided a fix. I appreciate all the help. The orginal engineer that was working on this issue has opened a case with Microsoft. I'll post either what the fix is or what our resolution came out to be. Thanks.

 

[CitrixEngineer]

Try running Filemon or Regmon from

http://www.sysinternals.com

as a user tries to log in - many times these programs have helped me fix profiles issues.

Hope this helps CitrixEngineer@yahoo.co.uk