Hi i am wondering if someone can help me set up my server. I am a newbie with Windows Server 2003 and im having some problems to get the Domain Controller (Active Directory) working. My current configuration is as follows... Cable Modem > Hardware Firewall (Smoothwall Express) running (DNS and DHCP) > Netgear Switch > Server (Static Ip out of DHCP range) and Xp pro clients. Now i have set up my domain controller and have created accounts on the server but i cannot log on to it using these accounts that i have created from the xppro clients. But if i log on to xppro client computer account i can browse the shares on the server. I was reading around abit and also i was reading that you got to have a host DNS on your 2003server and u then configure the clients to point to this as their primary.. If i was 2 do that then i would loose the DNS from my firewall that the clients get via (DHCP) and therfore no internet.. Anyhelp would be great.. if you cannot help would anyone at least know a good guide somewhere on the internet for WinS2003 or to set up Domain Controllers properly... i might be right if i follow some instructions.... thanks guys...

You do need to have the clients using your domain controller as their dns server. In the properties of your dns server you need to set your isp dns servers as forwarders. Then everything will work fine.

The current DNS server now is on my hardware firewall and that is Smoothwall Express 2.0.. (UNIX) the web interface for the box doesn't have a option to configure DNS servers? how else can i do it?

You need to have your clients pointing to a DNS server that understands AD. And you need to have a DNS server that understands DNS. Smoothwall will not work for that. Install DNS on your DC. Point your client computers to the DC for their preferred DNS. In the properties of DNS on the DC, enable Forwarding to point to your Smoothie, or better yet, directly to you ISPs DNS server. The only thing your clients should need to point to the Smoothie for is their default gateway. If the option to enable Forwarding on your Windows 2003 server is disabled, you will need to delete the root zone, called ".", in your Windows DNS server and then restart the service. Good luck. Glen

Ok.. i will try that and get back to this post with the results.. Thanks...