Can you help me troubleshoot why I'm having trouble seeing shared resources?

I have a Windows 2000 domain for 20 Windows 2000 desktops and laptops. I am having no problems with users logging onto the network directly and accessing resources. However, when the same laptops try to access the network via dial-up networking, only about half of the connections can access server mapped folders or check our Exchange 2000 server for mail.

I have both the TCP/IP and NetBEUI protocols installed. All laptops are able to log on to the RAS server successfully, can access the Internet via the dial-up connection and even download from external Internet e-mail accounts. They just can't get to or even see the shared resources on the server. If I disable TCP/IP and leave just NetBEUI, they can see network resources, but can't access the Internet.

Technical Information: I have DHCP setup on the server (Range: 192.168.1.100 to 200) and Dynamic DNS is also setup, as well as WINS. Laptops are issued IP addresses (confirmed via IPCONFIG) but they don't show up in DNS, or the WINS listing, after they have logged on via RAS.

Two interesting items: When the laptops log onto the network directly (via Ethernet) the gateway address is correct: 192.168.1.1. When they log on via RAS the gateway is their DHCP assigned IP address. If I try to manually assign an IP address to the laptop, the server rejects it via dial-up, whether or not it is within the above allowed range.

I suspect I am missing a setting in the DNS, but can't seem to figure out what it is. I'd appreciate any help you might be able to give.

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The gateway setting for a dial-up client will always be the dial-up interface. This tells the client, "If you want to get to the network, use this interface." So, you're okay there. The inability to see shared resources is a browser issue. The inability to connect to a shared resource is probably a name resolution issue. Windows 2000 RRAS does not pass DHCP configuration information out to the clients, so they might not be seeing the DNS and WINS server configuration information. Use IPCONFIG /ALL at the client to see if a DNS and WINS server is specified and if it is correct. If the addresses are correct, then the clients should be able to ping the flat name of a server as well as its fully qualified DNS name. Try this to see what happens.

This was first published in January 2002

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