How to setup Time Synchronization in Windows 2003/2008 AD domain on VMware Guest
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On Primary domain controller (PDC Emulator) disable VMware Tools Time Sync and use only Windows Time server. Setting up Time sync design is the important part, the first issue to address is finding someone to synchronize with. Each Windows machine needs to sync with another machine to get its time. To do this efficiently and automatically in a virtualized AD environment, w32time uses the domain hierarchy created with the domain itself. In the simplest frame of mind, a domain consists of the following distinct entities (aka computers):
• Exactly one primary domain controller (or PDC-emulator)
• Zero or more replica domain controllers (DCs)
• Zero or more member computer (either server or workstations)
Setting up Time Sync on Windows 2003/2008 VMware Active Directory PDC Emulator
1.First set the external Time source on master Time server which is PDC Emulator. For setting NTP server on Windows 2003/2008 PDC Emulator running as VMware Guest modify the registry settings.
HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\W32Time\Parameters
2.In Parameters Change the
REG_SZ value from NT5DS to NTP
3.For NTP external source on PDC Emulator change following key to your reliable time source and replace time.windows.com,0×1 to an external stratum 1 time source:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\W32Time\Parameters\NtpServer
time.windows.com,0×01 time.nist.gov,0×01 my.time.server.com,0×02
Now let’s take a look at the flags. We have 4 possible flags.Genreally 0×01 and 0×02 is used in Production Windows 2003/2008 environment:
• 0×01 SpecialInterval
• 0×02 UseAsFallbackOnly
• 0×04 SymmatricActive
• 0×08 Client4. Lastly change the AnnounceFlag REG_DWORD from 10 to 5
Change AnnounceFlagsREG_DWORDfrom 10 to 5.
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