Windows Server

tim@nativemode.com · Guest

Hello,
So I am having a problem with DFS. Ill go ahead and explain the
problem, then talk about my environment.

What I appear to be seeing is that if the connection to the DFS target
is lost and then restored, the client cannot connect back to the dfs
target unless a reboot is performed. The error message recieved when
trying to go back to the source is "\\servername\sharename is not
accessible. You might not have permissions to use this network
resource. Contact the administrator of this server to find out if you
have access permissions. The network name cannot be found." I have
verified that the actual dfs target is still available by typing in the
UNC path to the actual share (\\servername\share). This comes up fine.

Now for the environment:
This is a stand alone DFS root on a 4 node cluster. The cluster was
needed to make the dfs root fault tolerant, and stand alone was
selected due to the number of links projected. Right now though there
is only one link in DFS. I will say though that this happened in
testing as well when the setup was not clustered. The disconnect
happens when one cluster node fails over to another, which is basically
the same as rebooting the link server. All permissions appear to be
correct, as it all works fine prior to the server reboot. All cluster
resources are active, and I can find no event viewer events related to
this on the client or server. No replication of any kind is setup.

The server is Win2k3 Enterprise Server, the client is XP Pro SP2.

I have tried to add the registry key "EnableDfsLoopbackTargets" to the
client registry, but this changed nothing. I have tried logging off of
the workstation, but this does not change the problem. Only a reboot of
the workstation corrects connectivity.

I have seen a hand full of references to this same problem, but no
solid fix action.

Any suggestions?

Thanks,
Tim

tim@nativemode.com · Guest

I will reply to myself.

I have originally constructed my dfs namespace using netbios names
(\\servername\sharename).

It appears as though if i redo my links using dns names
(\\servername.domainname.com\sharename) it works after a server
failure.

I am still working on this though.

Tim

tim@nativemode.com · Guest

Ill reply again.

I had thought that using DNS resolved the issue, however I jumped to
soon.

What appears to have fixed is is disabling the Windows XP SP2 firewall
service. Not just turning it off in the network connection properties,
but actually disabling the service and rebooting. I cannot pinpoint why
that fixes it at this point, as the firewall was turned off on the NIC.

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