Re: XP in an NT Domain Issue - policy problems and drive mapping issues

From: Tony R. (tonyr_at_mitchellair.com)
Date: 07/06/04 

Date: 6 Jul 2004 06:37:31 -0700

Well, I was able to move a little further on this issue. This is what
I did to get around my problem.

1.)In NT I created a blank policy withing Policy Editor and saved this
blank policy into its own directory.
2.) After this I then edited the XP machines registry (using MS KB
Q274478 Group Policies for Windows 2000 Professional Clients in
Windows NT 4.0 Domain or Workgroups) and changed the network path that
XP looks for policies to my new directory.
3.)I then also changed the Update mode from a 1 (automatic mode) to a
2 (manual mode). This forces XP to find the policy where I specified.
4.) I rebooted the XP machine to use the new policy (wiping out all of
the NT policy).
5.) After the policies were wiped out, I changed the update mode from
2 to 0 now which is System policies are disabled.
6.) Now I can make whatever changes are needed to get my drives to
map, etc.

Hope this helps someone else!

tonyr@mitchellair.com (Tony R.) wrote in message news:<b2bd6e81.0407010657.43f7185f@posting.google.com>...
> I'm pulling my hair out trying to figure out this problem! Below
> you'll find the best description of my problem. Any help would be
> greatly appreciated! Thank you in advance! Feel free to e-mail me at
> tonyr@REMOVEmitchellair.com with any problems. Just remove the REMOVE
> when e-mailing.
>
> 1.) I started with a fresh machine installed with XP
> 2.) Trying to integrate this machine with an NT domain that uses a
> simple login script and also a few different policies (ntconfig.pol).
> 3.) Here's what happens:
> a. Join XP machine to NT domain DOMAIN
> b. Reboot
> c. Logon with credentials
> i. XP runs parts of the NT logon script ? I know this because I see at
> least one program run that is included in the script.
> ii. XP discovers the ntconfig.pol file and tries to load it, but only
> loads part of the default user policy. There are other policies that
> are supposed to be initiated after this (i.e. ? Default user settings
> are in place but if they are part of XYZ group then those settings are
> applied also).
> iii. XP after finishing trying to run the script and policy proceeds
> to the desk top where immediately an error balloon pops up stating
> "Could not reconnect all network drives. Click here to open My
> Computer and see the status of your network drives"
> iv. In My computer drives showing are local hard drive (C:\), the
> user's personal shared directory (p:\) shown as username$ on ?Primary
> Domain Controller' and the main shared directory (s:\) shown as shared
> on ?Primary Domain Controller'. There is an additional drive that
> shows as disconnected (I'm assuming this is what is causing my error
> from iii) which is shown as sharename on ?Primary Domain Controller'?
> v. Now in the NT policy there are several drives that are supposed to
> be mapped automatically. This is not done through a login script. In
> the current machine that I'm working on there should be 7 drives
> mapped including the shared and personal drives mentioned in iv. So
> essentially, I'm only showing 2 of my 7 drives that I need to map to.
> At first I though fine, I'll just manually map the drives not big
> deal. So I went to My Computer -> map network drives and proceeded to
> try and map a drive. Here's what I get
> 1. All the drives that should be mapped are already displayed in this
> window ? but don't show up in My Computer, Windows Explorer, etc. I
> also cannot access these drives by typing the drive letter in an
> address bar or run box (i.e. typing G: would open the ?G' drive)
> 2. The Back and Finish buttons are both grayed out.
> 4.) Now this is my history. I need to figure out the following to
> ensure this user (and others) are up and running the same as they were
> with their NT machines.
> a. I am assuming that the grayed out buttons and the fact that
> everything is already listed there and I can't change it is being
> pulled from an NT policy. Is there a way to
> disable/ignore/bypass/anything the NT policy in XP? I'd rather just
> create a Group Policy in XP and use that as a master to copy to new XP
> machined until we actually get Windows Server 2003.
> b. What is the best way to have my XP machines integrate well into my
> NT domain?
> c. Anything else anyone can think of!