MSCE needed ASAP!!!!

[Paladin]

Ok, here's one for any of you that are MSCE's. There has to be at least one...it's Moore's Law on websites, any website that hosts it's own servers will eventually attract a MSCE or force one into being.

ANYWAY...

We have a server at work. It's running Windows Server 2003. It's IP address is 192.168.1.1. It has 2 dial-in RRAS ports. Both work. Both assign in-domain IP addresses to the clients. The dial-in clients can also browse the internet successfully through them, indicating that the DNS server information and default gateway are being passed to the clients. Finally, the server hosts our e-mail system, running Eudora Worldmail Server 2.0. SMTP port is 25 and POP3 port is 110. Secure connection is not required.

Everything works fine for all our PC's on the LAN, and all our dial-up clients except one. That one has me ready to load the laptop onto a skeet trap and shout "Pull".

The laptop in question is running Windows 2000. It dials up and connects fine, as far as I can tell. There are no login errors on the server. The user is able to browser the internet fine through this connection. He is assigned an IP address in the network (192.168.1.204 this evening). But when he tries to send/receive e-mail, he gets a server not found error. We've been through his configuration backwards and forwards...his user name and password are right. We've tried connecting to the server by name (both fully qualified domain name, as well as the server's Netbios name). We've tried setting the servers to the IP addresses as well, both internal and external. I even sent him a custom LMHOSTS file tonight, and sent and received mail from my office PC fine using only it...no DNS servers set at all. Hell, I mailed the LMHOSTS file to him using that configuration. We've verified that the LMHOSTS settings successfully preloaded into the cache. All the configurations seem to be correct...he can even ping the server successfully by IPs and names! When he tries to send or receive mail, nothing. We even set up Outlook Express as well, and got the same errors.

This is the only laptop doing this. It's also the only one using Windows 2000. All the others are XP or 98, we even have one or two using XP Home. We've checked and he has no antivirus software installed, so that isn't the cause (we had 2 laptops that the owners just installed Norton AV 2003, and the e-mail protect borked the send/receive until we disabled it.

[Phanataz]

Sounds almost exactly like this guy's problem. Read his post and the answers that folllow carefully.

http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&threadm=buYOa.19989%24EQ5.9504%40twister.nyroc.rr. com&rnum=1&prev=/groups%3Fq%3D%2522server%2B2003%2522%2B%2522email% 2522%2B%2522server%2Bnot%2Bfound%2522%26hl%3Den%26 lr%3D%26ie%3DUTF-8%26oe%3DUTF-8%26selm%3DbuYOa.19989%2524EQ5.9504%2540twister.ny roc.rr.com%26rnum%3D1

[Creeper]

I've found pouring coffee into computers makes them go faster.

[Paladin]

Sounds almost exactly like this guy's problem. Read his post and the answers that folllow carefully.

http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&threadm=buYOa.19989%24EQ5.9504%40twister.nyroc.rr. com&rnum=1&prev=/groups%3Fq%3D%2522server%2B2003%2522%2B%2522email% 2522%2B%2522server%2Bnot%2Bfound%2522%26hl%3Den%26 lr%3D%26ie%3DUTF-8%26oe%3DUTF-8%26selm%3DbuYOa.19989%2524EQ5.9504%2540twister.ny roc.rr.com%26rnum%3D1

Good lord the way that message board threads stuff is confusing! I like this one's method much better.

Anyway, I read through them all. It doesn't look like the answer works for me, my DNS and server IP's are already the same. However, even if that was wrong, the LMHOSTS file I sent him should have fixed it. As I said, I tried it on this PC last night before I sent the file to him. With no DNS servers configured on it at all, I was still able to send and receive mail fine using just LMHOSTS. I'm going to download a port checker this morning and next time he dials in, I'll verify that he doesn't have 25 and 110 blocked somehow on his machine.

Another point, we've tried sending mail when he dials in to our server directly, and also when he's connected to the internet via AOL or his cell phone. Both of the latter should have bypassed any internal configuration problems...but didn't.

[SoBeiT]

If he's still getting paid and not producing work....maybe IT IS WORKING just fine :p

Ok..back to the problem :bash:

[Play]

Mabye you should try using a HOSTS file instead of the LMHOSTS. Windows 2000 predominantly rely on DNS to resolve name instead of LMHOSTS, unless it's going making a NetBIOS call, i.e. authentication, but that depends on if you're on an AD or NT4.0 domain. In this case, since you're using POP3, it looks like you're trying to resolve a FQDN DNS name instead of a NetBIOS name. Also, keep in mind that dial-up users do not receive the domain name suffix, which was conveniently left out in the PPP RFC. You can do an "ipconfig /all" at the CMD prompt to verify whether or not the RAS server populated the domain-name suffix field. When you ping the server by name, does it come back with a FQDN or just the server name? For example:

[NetBIOS resolution]
Pinging MyServer1 [192.168.0.10] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 192.168.0.10: bytes=32 time=1ms TTL=127

versus

[DNS FQDN resolution]
Pinging MyServer1.mynetwork.com [192.168.0.10] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 192.168.0.10: bytes=32 time=1ms TTL=127

Manually entering your network's DNS domain-name suffix on the dial-up laptop usually resolve most issues with dial-up users and name resolution. If that doesn't work, try using a HOSTS file.

HTH,
Play

[Paladin]

With the LMHOSTS file I sent last night, it comes back without the suffix. Before that, pings returned the number only. Pinging by FQDN resulted in unable to locate host.

That said, we've tried having Outlook (and Outlook Express) reference the server by IP only (both LAN IP and the IP of our Cisco router, which forwards to the mail server). Can ping both fine. No mail.

We went through his Event Viewer this morning and found some errors. Most seemed to relate in one way or another with it using cached credentials to log on to the domain (though how that would affect anything when he's using AOL and trying to send/receive via the internet I don't know). I'm hoping he'll be able to download and install SP4 tonight to fix those issues.

[Phanataz]

Stupid question, but you have you tried to telnet into the mail server? A connection refused message will tell you that the port is closed on the laptop (or the mail server is refusing it). If you get a prompt, then there is something wrong with the configuration of the mail application you are trying to use.

telnet MailServerAddress 110


Also, how many dialup configurations are there now in the TCP IP properties?

[Paladin]

We think we have it fixed (not solved, just fixed).

I researched some of the error codes in his event viewer, ones related to RAS or netlogon, and the general concensus was that for whatever reason, his Windows 2000 was using cached credentials for logon. So he spent a little over an hour installing SP4, and is now (so far) able to send and receive again.

Keeping our fingers crossed that this fixes it.

[Paladin]

We think we have it fixed (not solved, just fixed).

I researched some of the error codes in his event viewer, ones related to RAS or netlogon, and the general concensus was that for whatever reason, his Windows 2000 was using cached credentials for logon. So he spent a little over an hour installing SP4, and is now (so far) able to send and receive again.

Keeping our fingers crossed that this fixes it.

Nope. Emailability died again. We're now at the "Go buy XP Pro and install it" step.

The step after that is "accidently" dropping the laptop into a chrome plating bath.