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Accepted
Mike Hagstrom
Asked: 2011-11-22 06:53:56 +0800 CST

Group Policy Settings Not Applying

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I have Microsoft Small Business Server 2011 and when creating a GPO for my SBSComputers the settings do not apply.

For instance I have enabled Verbose vs normal status messages in the Group Policy Management Editor in the Windows SBS Client Policy.

However, when logging onto one of my client computers and looking at the local group policy this setting is not enabled.

Why would that be?

EDIT:

Ah it looks like I just had the basic concept wrong, running gpresult /H did indeed show that the policy's are in effect on these machines.

Thanks!

group-policy windows-sbs

4 Answers

  1. We've had situations where policies weren't "taking" properly; usually running (as administrator at the prompt on the client) "gpupdate /force" would refresh the policy.

    It can also depend on how long your refresh period is as to when the client got the updated policy off the server.

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  2. Best Answer

    Group Policy may not have refreshed yet. It is not an instantaneous process, the clients have to actually check for new policies, which happens at an interval that is defined in the Default Domain Policy.

    Even if the interval period has passed, some settings are not applied until the computer starts up, or a user logs in. You can check the policies that are applied to a machine by running gpresult /H. This should give you some hints about whether or not the policy is applied and the machine just needs a reboot, or if it isn't applying and you need to either run gpupdate /force or look at the event logs for errors.

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  3. You can use the gpresult command to output the policies that are being applied to a user/computer. One of the sections lists the policies that were either successfully or unsuccessfully applied. Generally it will have a brief error message (i.e. Permission Denied) next to the policies not applied. Try that and see if it sheds any light. It's also useful because it drills down and tells you every rule that is currently in place, so it's easy to see what's working and what's not. Good luck!

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  4. I had the same issue at first. It was because DNS was not properly set up. Config your DNS Server, point the client DNS to the DNS Server's Static IP Address... Make sure the client pc's have the internal DNS server, NOT an internet DNS service or ISP. Once you've done that, do a "gpupdate /force" to update the local policy.

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