Using laptop at work (on a domain) and at home (as a local user)

  • Thread starter Thread starter Rick Fears
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Rick Fears

I have a problem that is similar to others in this group, but I cannot
believe there is no solution to it.

The laptop (WinXP SP2) belongs to a domain, which is fine when I am at
work. When at home and not connected to a network I can log in to my user
account on the laptop and work with no problems. As soon as I plug in to
any kind of network (I have a home machine running Internet Sharing and
connected via an Ethernet network, and more recently a WiFi network with an
ADSL router), the system takes forever to do simple things like a context
switch, start an application, etc.

I therefore created a "local" user, gave access rights to the relevant
files and applications, even reconfigured Outlook to us my domain account
mailbox. This also all works fine when not connected but grinds to a halt
as soon as a network is present.

I assume that XP is trying to connect to the domain controller at every
possible opportunity, and this is what is causing the problem (no response,
wait for a timeout period, try again....)

Now in this world of home-working I cannot believe that it is not possible
to create a user account on a laptop which will appear to be a local
account, will have access to all appropriate data on the laptop and can
also connect to relevant networks.

I've looked in KB without much luck. ANy help gratefully appreciated

Rick.
 
Rick said:
I have a problem that is similar to others in this group, but I cannot
believe there is no solution to it.

The laptop (WinXP SP2) belongs to a domain, which is fine when I am at
work. When at home and not connected to a network I can log in to my
user account on the laptop and work with no problems. As soon as I
plug in to any kind of network (I have a home machine running Internet
Sharing and connected via an Ethernet network, and more recently a
WiFi network with an ADSL router), the system takes forever to do
simple things like a context switch, start an application, etc.

I therefore created a "local" user, gave access rights to the relevant
files and applications, even reconfigured Outlook to us my domain
account mailbox. This also all works fine when not connected but
grinds to a halt as soon as a network is present.
Click to expand...

From MVP Lanwench:
Note - you don't need to change to a workgroup just to access resources
on it. You shouldn't play with your laptop's network settings at all.
Once you've logged in using your domain account (using cached
credentials), and have an IP address on the home network, you can map
drives, use printers, whatnot, very easily - one way, in a command
line:

net use x: \\computername\sharename /user:computername\username <enter>

More:

MS KB article about the Net Use command - http://tinyurl.com/3bpnj

Managing One Windows XP-based Laptop for the Office and Home by MVP
Charlie Russel
http://tinyurl.com/cpy9q

http://winhlp.com/wxdomainworkgroup.htm - MVP Hans-Georg Michna

Malke
 
<Snip>

From MVP Lanwench:
Note - you don't need to change to a workgroup just to access resources
on it. You shouldn't play with your laptop's network settings at all.
Once you've logged in using your domain account (using cached
credentials), and have an IP address on the home network, you can map
drives, use printers, whatnot, very easily - one way, in a command
line:

net use x: \\computername\sharename /user:computername\username
Click to expand...
More:

MS KB article about the Net Use command - http://tinyurl.com/3bpnj

Managing One Windows XP-based Laptop for the Office and Home by MVP
Charlie Russel
http://tinyurl.com/cpy9q

http://winhlp.com/wxdomainworkgroup.htm - MVP Hans-Georg Michna

Malke
Click to expand...

Malke

yes, indeed I have mapped drives,printers, etc. The problem is not that
it doesn't work, it just works too damn slow - at every opportunity the
system grinds to a stop (presumably waiting for the domain controller
which isn't there).

Will check out the other links just in case


Thanks for the rapid reply

Rick.
 
<snip all the stuff in my first post>

Having connected the laptop at home and run ipconfig/all I find that the
DNS settings are pointing to the domain DNS rather than the ISP DNS.

I'm trying to find fixed IPs for the ISPs DNS servers, once I have those
("BTYahoo policy is not to release IPs of DNS servers as these might
change...") I'll try hard coding these into the wireless network
settings.

This probably explains why it grinds to a halt whenever an application
needs a DNS resolution! Now strangely enough once IE has deigned to load
(about 3 minutes if I'm lucky) DNS services appear to be available
because web browsing is not (often) plagued with slowdowns.

This still begs the question of why it is so difficult to configure a
laptop (portable - can be used at home as well as work, also in a hotel
with a random hotspot ISP, etc) once it is attached to adomain - surely
something Microsoft should be investigating?

Rick
 
Most networks use DHCP and then the computer will use whatever DHCP server
is available to obtain proper network configuration. If your computer uses a
static IP configuration as shown via ipconfig /all that can explain your
problems. If you are using DHCP you can try ipconfig /release and then
ipconfig /renew after changing networks though I am not sure offhand if you
can use that if you are not a local administrator. --- Steve
 
Rick Fears said:
<snip all the stuff in my first post>

Having connected the laptop at home and run ipconfig/all I find that the
DNS settings are pointing to the domain DNS rather than the ISP DNS.

I'm trying to find fixed IPs for the ISPs DNS servers, once I have those
("BTYahoo policy is not to release IPs of DNS servers as these might
change...") I'll try hard coding these into the wireless network
settings.
Click to expand...

Steven's reply ought to help....although ipconfig /release ..../renew ought
to do the job for you if there's an available DHCP server.
This probably explains why it grinds to a halt whenever an application
needs a DNS resolution! Now strangely enough once IE has deigned to load
Click to expand...

I'd just like to thank you personally for using the word "deigned" in a
newsgroup post. Oh, and also for snipping appropriately.

(about 3 minutes if I'm lucky) DNS services appear to be available
because web browsing is not (often) plagued with slowdowns.

This still begs the question of why it is so difficult to configure a
laptop (portable - can be used at home as well as work, also in a hotel
with a random hotspot ISP, etc) once it is attached to adomain - surely
something Microsoft should be investigating?
Click to expand...

I have plenty of users with laptops who work all over the place - on the
domain, off the domain. As long as there's a DHCP server, they're OK. Of
course, with WiFi, they need to know the encryption key (if any....) and
even with Ethernet, as I prefer they work at 100/full by default on the LAN,
they sometimes need to select 'autosense'. This is a minor annoyance.
 
Steven's reply ought to help....although ipconfig /release ..../renew
ought to do the job for you if there's an available DHCP server.
Click to expand...

Damn - should have thought of that myself, will try it next opportunity -
thanks Steven and Lanwench
I'd just like to thank you personally for using the word "deigned" in
a newsgroup post. Oh, and also for snipping appropriately.

!Blush!


I have plenty of users with laptops who work all over the place - on
the domain, off the domain. As long as there's a DHCP server, they're
OK. Of course, with WiFi, they need to know the encryption key (if
any....) and even with Ethernet, as I prefer they work at 100/full by
default on the LAN, they sometimes need to select 'autosense'. This is
a minor annoyance.
Click to expand...

My WiFi router is configured as a DHCP server, and indeed quite happily
provides relevant IP / DNS / Gateway settings to my Win98SE desktop and a
Win2K laptop. It's just my domain connected laptop that I have problems
with in that it seems to refuse to accept the given DNS address - it gets
the IP address OK. I'll try Steve's suggestion and report back in due
course.

Rick
 
To all who helped, many thanks.

The basic problem appears to have been that the wireless side of the
network was keeping the Primary DNS setting from its last connection. As
this was in the office, connection to the domain, I was still getting the
domain dns address (I'm not sure I understand why the domestic WiFi router
DNS was not being accepted by the laptop, possibly something to do with the
WiFi not being enabled when first logging in, or some such). As suggested,
an application of "ipconfig/release ... ipconfig/renew" solves the problem.
I should really have thought of this myself, must be getting old.

Cheers

Rick.
 
Glad you got it resolved and the wireless adapter was a complication of the
problem. I doubt you are as old as me. Sometimes we all tend to
overcomplicate problems as in always check that car has some gas in the tank
before you believe it is a problem with the electronic ignition or fuel
injectors.

Quick story. My son and a few of his brainy coputer geek friends could not
get my son's car to start [Honda Civic] and they all had some opinion of
some failed technology. I knew that they had recently put a new stereo in
his car and that they had disconnected the battery in the process a few days
ago. I said did you check the battery cables?? They all scratched their
heads and had not thought of that and were skeptical. Well you know what
happened next. I grabbed my trusty rusty adjustable wrench and tighten the
cables that I could feel were not well tightened and voila she started right
off and I said to them let this be a lesson for all of you to always check
the most likely cause first. --- Steve
 
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