New 2003 Setup Woes - Help !

[crazycucumber]

Ok ,I was thrown in the deep end , now I am geting ill due to stress from this , so any help appreciated

 

first off is there a step by step guide to a simple school install ?

 

I have 1 2003 DC and 12 Comp suite XP clients , and 5 office staff type machines.

 

I setup user accounts , and gave them separate Containers Pupils and staff ,and containers for the computers too pupilscomputers and staffcomputers.

 

I only have 4 users setup for the suite. class1 , class2 etc etc so the whole suite will log on as class1 if they are indeed from that class.

 

the only policies I have setup are folder redirection on my docs and a desktop background.

 

I Just wonder if there is a default setup I could follow , as things don't quite work how they should . I am getting profile errors on some machines and others are fine , they are all identical builds. I have a printer connected via USB , I have shared it but none of the other machines can see it.

 

And the internet seems really slow to respond , downloading once connected is quick, but it seems slow to resolve.

I am using the 2 nics on the server with an internal range and external range .

 

Its all just weird and I am out of my depth here a bit ! Any pointers to other posts or helpful articles / people woudl be great.

 

THANKS

[SC-UK]

This might not be a great deal of help but it certainly sounds like a DNS related problem that you are having. Are you sure that the DNS is set up correctly?

 

Tom

[crazycucumber]

No Idea , I set it up on an internet connection I have at work ,it seemed to work ok, I then changed the IP of the second nic to match that of the range they needed in the school to access the internet.

 

Do the education authority normally provide a setup routine for the broadband ? as I had to guess the IP range from other machines on the previous peer 2 peer workgroup type network.

[superfletch]

You can get your definate IP range and I'd expect some setup guidance from your ISP. I'd make them your first port of call for any broadband queries before the LA.

 

Depending on what kind of support your LA offer for school IT then there may or may not be some guidance notes available from them, or you may be able to buy a technicians time to help. In my experience a setup guide isn't something offered as standard because all schools implement their networks differently.

 

You'll get good help from people on here, edugeek is indeed a lifeline but otherwise you're out on your own.

 

Uncle Google is also your friend!!

 

 

"I have a printer connected via USB , I have shared it but none of the other machines can see it."

 

Does the Windows Firewall of the machine with the printer attached allow File and Printer Sharing?

Edited September 2, 2009 by superfletch

[SC-UK]

How do your client machines obtain their IP addresses? Do you use DHCP from your Server 2003 box?

 

If you do then the server should be handling the external DNS and the workstations should be referring back to it. You should not have an external IP address as a DNS server on your workstations.

[cookie_monster]

I would download and run DCDiag and NetDiag on your DNS server, output the result to a text file and post here if you need help.

 

DCDiag Tutorial Examples. Check your Windows Active Directory (+ Free Download)

 

NetDiag Tutorial. Check Server Network Connections. Free Download Support tool

 

Also have a read of this Microsoft KB article it will tell you if you have your DNS setup correctly.

 

How to configure DNS for Internet access in Windows Server 2003

[crazycucumber]

Cool thanks for the info , I will be re visiting this tonight as it is not my full time job , I have to do it after hours !

 

I have however jsut been given the IP ranges and DNS settings to use Internally and Externally at the school , where I was under the impression as long as external was correct I could use any range , so internally I was using the 192.168.1.254 range. where as now I have been advised to use

 

Internal

 

IP - 10.13.82.254

Subnet - 255.255.255.0

Gateway - Blank

DNS 10.13.82.254

 

External

 

IP - 10.9.82.254

Subnet - 255.255.255.0

Gateway - 10.9.82.1

DNS1 - 10.15.48.4

DNS 2 - 10.15.48.5

 

So now I will have to change the IP on each Nic and change the DHCP scope to refelect this . Lets hope that is straight forward too !

 

I will also run the NetDiag stuff and post it here for you guys to cast an eye over .

 

Thanks again for the help , its a lonely place in a server room in a school at 10pm at night with nobody to ask but Uncle google !

[superfletch]

You are right in that the IP range internally could be whatever you wanted but seing you have been given one to use you should take advantage of it. It "should" make it easier if in future if you need to make any outward facing machines.

 

If you run the two lines below in a .bat script, they should change your network adapter (so long as it is called "Local Area Connection") to use DHCP for both IP Address and DNS.

 

 

netsh interface ip set address "Local Area Connection" dhcp

netsh interface ip set dns "Local Area Connection" dhcp

 

 

Keep the Server IP address static.

Gateway should be your router (so the .254 of the supplied range).

 

The Server should be setup as a DNS Server for your domain,

DNS on the Server should forward queries to the 10.15.48.4 & 5 addresses.