I have WinNt 4.0 Domain name Maincontroller. This is the only server I have in the Network.The Machine Name is Mainserver. I have a small network that connect all PC through Dell Manage Switch. I never had problem login in to Server from my Win98 machines. Whenever Login Box appear all I do is just Type Server user account name and server user passowrd and it log me in to SERVER. Second If do Browse Network neighborhood It browse all computers that are in Workgroup call Maincontroller. Now, I bought 8 new WinXP Pro machines and hook up into same network. All machines I created One user who is going to use those machines. I kept the users name same as my WINDOWS NT server users and same passwords. Now all these Winxp machines has one user each machine. All users of each machine has administrative rights to loin to local machines. Offcourse these administratives rights are only suppose to be for Local machines. But these users account name and passwords are same as their NT login and passwords. They shouldn't be able to administrative rights on WINT NT SERVER resources but work normal according to their permission and rights on server. I CAN'T REGISTER WINXP TO MAINCONTROLLER. IT IS NOT LETTING ME DO IT. I LOGED INTO WINXP MACHINE WITH ADMINISTRATIVE PRIVILAGES THAN I OPEN SYSTEM PROPERTIES. WHERE I CLICKED (CHANGE) WHICH I WANTED TO DO BECAUSE IT WAS WORKGROUP BEFORE. SO I HIT CHANGE. I GAVE NEW COMPUTER NAME AND UNCHECKED WORKGROUP AND CHECKED DOMAIN. I PUT THE MAINCONTROLLER AS A DOMAIN AND HIT OK. I GOT THIS ERROR MESSAGE. A DOMAIN CONTROLLER FOR THE DOMAIN MAINCONTROLLER COULDN'T BE CONTACTED. ENSURE THAT THE DOMAIN NAME IS TYPED CORRECTLY. IT LOOKS TO ME DNS QUERY FOR DOMAIN RETURED ERROR. WHY? NO CLUE. SO I LEAVE IT AS A WORKGROUP. I CLICKED ON VIEW WORK-GROUP COMPUTERS UNDER (NETWORK TASK) OPTIONS. I CLICKED MICROSOFT WINDOWS NETWORK UNDER(OTHER PLACES) HURRA!!!!!!!!!!!!! IT DISPLAYED ME MAINCONTROLLER BUT DON'T REALLY KNOW IF IT IS DISPLAYED AS DOMAIN OR WORK-GROUP. THERE IS A POSSIBILITY THAT IT IS DISPLAYED AS WORKGROUP BECAUSE MY WIN98 MACHINES ARE HOOKED UP AND THEY HAVE THEEIR WORKGROUP ASSIGNED MAINCONTROLLER. WHAT SURPRISE ME AT THIS POINT WHEN I CLICKED AT MAINCONTROLLER (THE ICON WAS DISPLAYED AS A THREE COMPUTER TREE) IT DID DISPLAYED ME (MAINSERVER) WHICH IS MY WINDOWS NT SERVER. IT ALSO DISPLAYED ME ALL MY OTHER WINDOWS 98 MACHINES. VERY IMPORTANT IT DID NOT DISPLAYED ME WINXP MACHINE. AND I KNOW IT IS NOT REGISTER UNDER MAINCONTROLLER DOMAIN SO IT WON'T. WHEN I CLICKED ON MAINSERVER IT OPEN'S UP A LOG ON SCREEN???????? ASKING ME CONNECTING TO MAINSERVER USER NAME PASSOWRD HURRA !!!!! I USED NT USER EO AND HIS PASSWORD AND IT SHOWED ME ALL THE SERVER SHARES AND RESOURSES. SUCESS!!!!!! BUT STILL CONFUSE. WHY IT PROMPTED ME FOR USER NAME AND PASSWORD? I AM LOGED IN LOCAL MACHINE WITH SAME USER NAME AND PASSWORD AS IT USED ON SERVER. WHEN I LOGIN TO MY WINDOWS 2000 PRO MACHINE UNDER LOCAL MACHINE ACCOUNT OF LOCAL MACHINE WHICH IS SIMILAR ON NETWORK SERVER IT NEVER PROMPTED ME FOR CONNECTING TO MAINSERVER AGAIN BUT DISPLAYED THE RESOURCES. HOW DO I REGISTER THIS MACHINE UNDER WIN NT DOMAIN. HOW DO I AVOID THESE PROBLEMS. What necessary changes do I do to run everything smothely. Any help will be highly appericated thanks Kas

I have had the same problem. winnt server does not require that you add your computer to "Domain park". While computers based on NT technology do. Even if you have the same username and password on the client like you do on the server and computer is member of a workgroup you will always be prompted to enter user and pass to open shared folders as long as you donīt logon to the PDC. windows NT is a secure operating system. It protects its resources by controlling access to them. It requires each user to have a unique username and password to log on to the computer. Windows NT supports a mandatory logon process, winlogon, that requires a user to provide username and password. The logon process is mandatory and cannot be disabled. Another security feature supported by windows NT is the "Access Token" .The "Access Token" contains pertinent information about the user, such as the username and workgroup the user belongs to. When a user is logged on to a windows NT server, the security subsystem creates an access token. It is assigned to the user for the period for which the user is logged on. Access to an object is controlled through an Access Control List (ACL) That list contains the user and group accounts that have access and permissions to the object. NTDS provides users with a single username and password, and access to resources throughout the network. Users log on to the domain and not to the indiviual servers in the domain. Before a computer can join a domain, a computer account must be created in the domain, ( check so that the name of the computer you are trying to join is not already in the park, if it is, delete the computername). A computer account can be created from either a domain controller or windows Nt workstation-based computer (such as Win XP). To create a computer account from a domain controller, members of administrators, domain admins or account operators use the server manager at the PDC. You would use use the "Add to domain" menu item to add the computer account to the directory database in the domain. A user would then use the network option in the control panel window to join the domain without specifying an administrative account. Adding a computer to a domain can be done from a windows NT workstation. Using the network option in the control panel. If the computer account is not already created, the create computer account in the domain options need to be enabled. When the computer is reinstalled or needs to rejoin a domain the computer account needs to be deleted and recreated at the domain controller. These pieces are very importent when rejoining a PDC with a new or reinstalled computer. Try this iīm sure it would help you! Godd luck! /Lanke