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help, cannot add PC to domain but domain exists.

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nahmus

Member
Joined
Apr 5, 2002
Location
Sailing the Azure seas
Hi all,

I got called in to look at a win2003 server. It is a domain controller and the domain is called [ practical.local ]. I looked at the other machines in the office and they all log into the domain practical.local When i go to add the laptop (running xp profesional) to the domain it tells me that the domain practical.local does not exist. I can ping the server. I can connect to it through the run box, map network drives and printers but I can't add the laptop to the domain.

When i go into computer management it appears that the DC is named [ practical.local ] Are there any utilities that can check to see what the DC thinks it is? Could there be invisable characters in the domain name that are not being displayed (i see this in unix once in a while). Is there something that I can run on the laptop to see what domains it sees on the network?


There are known problems on this server. The consultant that loaded the software did not provide them with the original disks. I'm not sure how legal this install is. One of my jobs is to check on this and if its not a legit copy then I've been given to budget to purchase the software and do a re-install. The problem is that this is a production server and I'm afraid that if i contact microsoft or use that authentication program on the web it will come up as invalid and they will freeze the server. I want the time to properly plan the migration.
If this is a bad install could I just install the new legit copy over the bad copy to make it legit without doing a massive migration?

I've found "warez" programs that have been installed that they thought were legit and paid for that still have their crak programs in the directory!

Consultants like this last one really give us all a bad name.

I'm more comfortable with unix and have only been trouble shooting windows for the past few years. I'm hoping that someone here with more windows experience can point me in the right direction. I'm sure i can figure this out in time but there concerned about their business and would like to get everything sorted out quickly.

thanks for any help!
 
I've had an similar issue when the laptop computer name had already exsisted in the domain. Go into the active directory users and computers( assuming your using active directory) and check to see if the name of the laptop is in there. If so delete it, then wait a few minutes(5 or so) and then try to readd to the the domain from the laptop. This worked for me, hope that it works for ya! :)
 
I thought about that. the laptop name did exist so itried doing it under a new name. I did not however delete the old one. I will try that later.

thanks
 
If the laptop is running a firewall try disabling it and then try to join the domain. If that works then you need to put in place the proper exceptions so the laptop stays secure away from the office.

You mention XP Professional which could mean that you do not have SP2 installed. Personally I would install it and setup the Windows Firewall for the apps & access that it needs.
 
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