Windows 7 dropping connection to local DFS root

[David Smith]

Hi there. We are a small organisation with 2 sites; these sites are
connected via a VPN through WatchGuard boxes. We run Windows 2003 R2 servers
and use DFS2 to create organisation wide access to data. This namespace
contains about 5 shares which are then mapped using logon scripts to drive
letters. This has worked fine for over 3 years using a majority of XP Pro
clients and 3 Vista Business clients. However I have replaced some of the
older systems with 6 new systems running Windows 7 Professional and it is
these that are experiencing issues. The problem seems to be that staff using
these systems will suddenly say their system is running slow when accessing
shares and what appears to have happened is that the PC has dropped the link
to the local (site) based server DFS root and has instead connected to the
remote site's DFS root (indeed you can see this by looking in the new style
Windows Explorer at the properties of the mapped drive letter and choose the
DFS tab). Indeed it would appear that these systems cannot even connect to
the local DFS root at all - they cannot resolve the servers name to a valid
IP address. So RUN -> \\server1\ produces nothing whereas \\10.0.0.x\
instantly shows the shares\printers hosted by that server.
Therefore I don't know whether this is a DFS issue, a DNS issue or something
specific to Windows 7; all the PCs are DHCP based and seem to pick up all
relevant DHCP provided information and, once re-booted, instantly work fine.

Has anyone any thoughts please?
with kind regards in advance


David N Smith


Has

[unknown]

David

I have seen DFS problems with Windows 7 when accessing a DFS root with multiple roots. Sometimes shares are not accessible anymore when using FQDN names and/or Netbios names (when the problom occurs which is around 1 time per day over 600 workstations, sometimes none work, sometimes one is working the other is not working). We used a work arrount to point directly to one of the root servers instead of the DFS root. This always works but you are not redundant anymore.

We have issued this to Microsoft however no solution yet



David Smith wrote:

Windows 7 dropping connection to local DFS root
29-Jan-10

Hi there. We are a small organisation with 2 sites; these sites ar
connected via a VPN through WatchGuard boxes. We run Windows 2003 R2 server
and use DFS2 to create organisation wide access to data. This namespac
contains about 5 shares which are then mapped using logon scripts to driv
letters. This has worked fine for over 3 years using a majority of XP Pr
clients and 3 Vista Business clients. However I have replaced some of th
older systems with 6 new systems running Windows 7 Professional and it i
these that are experiencing issues. The problem seems to be that staff usin
these systems will suddenly say their system is running slow when accessin
shares and what appears to have happened is that the PC has dropped the lin
to the local (site) based server DFS root and has instead connected to th
remote site's DFS root (indeed you can see this by looking in the new styl
Windows Explorer at the properties of the mapped drive letter and choose th
DFS tab). Indeed it would appear that these systems cannot even connect t
the local DFS root at all - they cannot resolve the servers name to a vali
IP address. So RUN -> \\server1\ produces nothing whereas \\10.0.0.x
instantly shows the shares\printers hosted by that server
Therefore I do not know whether this is a DFS issue, a DNS issue or somethin
specific to Windows 7; all the PCs are DHCP based and seem to pick up al
relevant DHCP provided information and, once re-booted, instantly work fine

Has anyone any thoughts please
with kind regards in advanc

David N Smit

Has

Previous Posts In This Thread:

On Friday, January 29, 2010 9:17 AM
David Smith wrote:

Windows 7 dropping connection to local DFS root
Hi there. We are a small organisation with 2 sites; these sites ar
connected via a VPN through WatchGuard boxes. We run Windows 2003 R2 server
and use DFS2 to create organisation wide access to data. This namespac
contains about 5 shares which are then mapped using logon scripts to driv
letters. This has worked fine for over 3 years using a majority of XP Pr
clients and 3 Vista Business clients. However I have replaced some of th
older systems with 6 new systems running Windows 7 Professional and it i
these that are experiencing issues. The problem seems to be that staff usin
these systems will suddenly say their system is running slow when accessin
shares and what appears to have happened is that the PC has dropped the lin
to the local (site) based server DFS root and has instead connected to th
remote site's DFS root (indeed you can see this by looking in the new styl
Windows Explorer at the properties of the mapped drive letter and choose th
DFS tab). Indeed it would appear that these systems cannot even connect t
the local DFS root at all - they cannot resolve the servers name to a vali
IP address. So RUN -> \\server1\ produces nothing whereas \\10.0.0.x
instantly shows the shares\printers hosted by that server
Therefore I do not know whether this is a DFS issue, a DNS issue or somethin
specific to Windows 7; all the PCs are DHCP based and seem to pick up al
relevant DHCP provided information and, once re-booted, instantly work fine

Has anyone any thoughts please
with kind regards in advanc

David N Smit

Has


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