Questions[w32time](server)

I have synced the time of my server to time.nist.gov. This server communicates with a client’s server which is also synced with time.nist.gov.

After noting that we seemed to be out of sync with the time server even after explicit syncing, I set up an hourly batch job to see if my hypothesis is correct and what is our time difference.

I set up the job on Friday and it has already checked the time 50 times. When I first checked on Friday, w32tm utility showed a difference of less than 10 milliseconds. The last check, a couple of hours ago, shows a difference of 20 second.

There have also been 9 cases (in 50 attempts) of error: 0x800705B4 which is a timeout error. The time difference seems to be increasing at the rate of 1 second every hours since Friday, 1/6/2012 5:35 PM EST

I have a Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition set up as a VMWare VM, the timezone is EST. Here’s my w32tm and DOS command that log the sync difference:

w32tm /stripchart /computer:time.nist.gov /samples:1 /dataonly >> D:\timedump.txt

Here are the last 4 entries:

Tracking time.nist.gov [192.43.244.18].
Collecting 1 samples.
The current time is 1/8/2012 10:35:00 AM (local time).
10:35:00, +20.3387625s

Tracking time.nist.gov [192.43.244.18].
Collecting 1 samples.
The current time is 1/8/2012 11:35:00 AM (local time).
11:35:00, +20.4854414s

Tracking time.nist.gov [192.43.244.18].
Collecting 1 samples.
The current time is 1/8/2012 12:35:00 PM (local time).
12:35:00, +20.6239407s

Tracking time.nist.gov [129.6.15.28].
Collecting 1 samples.
The current time is 1/8/2012 1:35:00 PM (local time).
13:35:00, error: 0x800705B4

I have updated a W2K3 settings according to the steps shown here:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/816042#LetMeFixItMyselfAlways2

The peers list I use is:

0.asia.pool.ntp.org,0x1 1.asia.pool.ntp.org,0x1 2.asia.pool.ntp.org,0x1 3.asia.pool.ntp.org,0x1

I did a

net stop w32time && net start w32time

to restart the service.

How do I check the settings? How do I know it's working?

When I try the following:

w32tm /monitor

The response I get looks like the time sync goes to the local computer (the DC)

C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator>w32tm /monitor
    OptiDC.opti *** PDC *** [192.168.0.2]:
    ICMP: 0ms delay.
    NTP: +0.0000000s offset from OptiDC.opti
    RefID: 'LOCL' [76.79.67.76]

• is that what the answer should be?
• Shouldn't I see something that has one of the NTP servers from the peers list?

In a Windows 2003 domain, I have 7 members servers that are Windows Server 2008 R2. I need to make it so that they sync time with the PDC emulator at least every 15 minutes or less if possible. Is this possible?

I've just noticed that one of our clients SQL servers are syncing against time.microsoft.com, the rest of the domain is looking at ntp.[clients.domain].co.uk, so our SQL servers are about 3 minutes fast.

My argument is that we need to stop all SQL services, on both servers at the same time, update the time service to the domain one and then restart all the SQL services >no less< than 3 minutes later to avoid duplication of timestamps in the databases.

the other argument I've had is 'go on, I'm sure it will be fine'.

Am I being over cautions here? I'm not the SQL admin and in fact the clients SQL servers host a variety of third party DB's so getting reliable answers from them could take some time. Unfortunately this is knocking off the reporting for the call centre out as the DB entries no longer ties up with the phone system, so I'm getting heat from the Call Centre manager and her boss.

I realise that this might be a case of 'it entirely depends on the nature of the databases that you are using' but if thats the case, just some friendly advice?

Thanks, Patrick

I found this KB artice: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/816042

But it involves a bunch of manual registry hacks. I was hoping to find something buried in Administrative Tools somewhere that allowed me to do this.

I'm using Windows Server 2003.