Ok, Weird one here! I have a single domain in AD Win2k3 serving a small network. All WinXp clients. Server: 192.168.1.10 Router: 192.168.1.254 (dsl router) Workstations are assigned IP via DHCP on Server (Router has been verified not serving dhcp) DHCP has only two options set (both in Scope and server options, (I know not necessary, but did it to test theory) settings are Router 1.254 and DNS 1.10 Everything works GREAT..... except. My workstation (and others I have found randomly) nearly all decide they don't like the DNS server address dished out by the DHCP Server and change it to 1.254! When I notice this on my machine (mainly because AD tools stop working). I /release /renew and I have the correct DNS server setting again, and all is fine until it changes again.... DNS Server has a forwarder set to DNS to ISP's DNS server. No where can I find the reason why the workstation is changing the DNS only setting to the router. This can happen several times a day. When I release/renew, it works fine again for a while.. Win2k3 has all latest upgrades and sps.. New server, all updates were put on before any configuration was done. Any Ideas? Thanks in advance. Couple of dumb questions answered up front! *********** -=>by router you mean gateway right? No, I mean Router, at least being totaly correct, option 002 in DHCP Settings (192.168.1.254 is the Router, even though the most common term people use is Default Gateway). -=> u should exclude .254 from the scope .254 is not in my address pool, it's just used in the settings of both the Scope and server options as the Router. -=>if you shutdown the server do pcs get a ip address? No. This was one of the first things I checked. -=>this isp dns server is listed in the forwarders tab not the forward lookup zone correct? Of course! ********************* Anybody else????????? Jay MCSE NT4-2000, A,and my wife says I am good too... on the computer only though.

On my W2K3 server the option 002 is Time Offset. Option 003 is Router.

You do realize that although I am sure you had the best of intentions when you pointed out a very minor flaw in my post.... That once a reply is made, people pretty much of stop looking at it. Or at least the people that I would like some help from. When I want to help out, I look for the onest that haven't been replied to yet. Just a thought for next time. Jay MCSE NT4-2000, A,and my wife says I am good too... on the computer only though.

Totally off topic, since I don't know how to fix your problem... but how do you setup a forwarder in Server 2003's DNS? Since obviously my computers use the local DNS server, I want it to forward requests for certain domains to a DNS server offsite instead of trying to handle them itself.

All domains that can not be resolved by the local DNS-Server will be forwarded to the configured DNS-Servers in the forwarding list in the DNS-Management Console on the local DNS-Server.

Ah very very helpful!! The forwarding option only shows up when you have the server selected, it's not in the navigation list on the left. That's why I didn't see it before. Sooo one more problem. I want my internal domain (call it abc.net) to match my external so that I can route AD traffic over the internet... so DCPromo automatically creates forward and reverse lookup zones for abc.net Only problem is I have off-site DNS hosting for abc.net so something like xyz.abc.net will not resolve because there is no entry in the local DNS for xyz (and yes, I know I could add it, but I am trying to avoid that). So My thought was I can add a forward that forwards all requests for abc.com to the offsite DNS... but then I get: "The server forwarders cannot be updated. The zone already exists". Which makes perfect sense because I already have a zone for abc.net.... So then I thought maybe I could just point xyz.abc.com to the offsite DNS server. Only problem is I get the error message: "The server forwarders cannot be updated. A zone configuration problem occured." So I guess my question is... if I delete the abc.net zones from DNS, will active directory still continue to operate properly? When I click delete it says: "Warning, this is an Active Directory-integrated zone....... If you want to delete this zone from AD and DNS, click yes...." Any help?

If your Domain e.g. abc.com can be resolved from the internet, that's all you need, because first the public DNS searches for who is responsible for the .com (top level) domain. Then this responsable DNS server is looking, who is responsible for the .abc domain inside the top level domain .com an forwards the request to that DNS server. So if your DNS server is a public DNS server, your DNS server gets the request. Everything else must be managed by your DNS server. If you don't have your own public DNS server, that's a problem. In that case, your can use services like NO-IP.COM or DYNDNS.ORG Let's say you're using DYNDNS.ORG and you created a domain named abc.dyndns.org. Now you can access your server from the internet by abc.dyndns.org. If you try something like yourftp.abc.dyndns.org, the request will be forwarded to your server as well and you have to configure, what show happen, when someone tries to access yourftp. I don't know whether that helps, but it isn't clear whether your DNS is a public DNS and whether you have a fixed IP, that is needed therefor. .