You Cannot Connect to Domain-Based DFS Root When You Log on with Cached Credentials

After you log on to a Windows 2000-based computer with cached credentials, and then you connect to a network (either by using remote access or by re-attaching the network cable) while you attempt to connect to a domain-based Distributed File System (DFS) root, you experience the following symptoms:

• You receive one of the following error messages:
  • A Duplicate Name Exists on the Network
    The Network Name could not be found
• The domain DNS name for your computer and the NetBIOS name for your computer may not match. For example, the DNS name may be Name1.company.com, and the NetBIOS name may be Name2.

In addition, if you attempt to use the "net use" command from a client computer to connect to a DFS share on a Windows NT 4.0 domain, you may receive one of the following error messages, depending on the version of Windows that is running on the client computer:

Windows NT 4.0 client

Windows 2000 client

This problem is caused by the following two conditions:

• The domain DNS name and NetBIOS name are not the same. For example, the DNS name is Name1.company.com and the NetBIOS name is Name2).
• The client does not have any cached DFS information because the network was connected and initialized. The client will attempt to fill this cache every 15 minutes. To view this cache, use the DFS utility, DFSutil.exe, from the Windows 2000 Resource Kit.

When these two conditions exist, and you attempt to connect to the DFS shared folder, \\Name1.company.com\public, the Server service resolves the name to Name2. Because the Server service is not listening for Name2, it rejects the client.

To work around this problem, make the NetBIOS and DNS name of your domain the same. For example, if the DNS name is Name1.company.com, then make the NetBIOS name Name1 as well.

Microsoft has confirmed that this is a problem in the Microsoft products that are listed at the beginning of this article.