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  1. On the domain controller of the root forest , you may follow the steps to configure the Windows Time service to sync time with the authoritative time source.

a. Open a Command Prompt.

b. Type the following command to display the time difference between the local computer and a target computer, and then press ENTER: (without quotation mark)

"w32tm /stripchart /computer: time.windows.com /samples:5 /dataonly”

Please note:

The Microsoft time server (time.windows.com) uses NIST, the National Institute of Standards and Technology, located in Boulder, Colorado, as its external time provider. NIST provides the Automated Computer Time Service (ACTS), which can set a computer clock with an uncertainty of less than 10 milliseconds. The U.S. Naval Observatory (USNO) Time Service Department in Washington, D.C., is another source for accurate time synchronization in the United States. Many other sites exist throughout the world that you can use for time synchronization.

c. Open UDP port 123 for outgoing traffic if needed.

d. Open UDP port 123 (or a different port you have selected) for incoming NTP traffic.

e. Type the following command to configure the PDC emulator and then press ENTER: (without quotation mark)

“w32tm /config /manualpeerlist: time.windows.com /syncfromflags:manual /reliable:yes /update”

  1. The computers that are joined to a domain are configured to synchronize from a manual time source. Please use the following procedure to configure a client computer that is currently synchronizing with a manually specified computer, to automatically synchronize time with the domain hierarchy.

You may follow the steps to configure a client computer for automatic domain time synchronization

a. Open a Command Prompt.

b. Type the following command and then press ENTER:

w32tm /config /syncfromflags: domhier /update

c. Type the following command and then press ENTER:

net stop w32time

d. Type the following command and then press ENTER:

net start w32time

You may also use Group Policy to make all the domain clients to sync time with PDC emulator in the domain.

You may find the Group Policy settings used to configure W32Time in the Group Policy Object Editor snap-in in the following locations:
Configure Global Configuration Settings here
Computer Configuration\Policies\Administrative Templates\System\Windows Time Service

Configure Windows NTP Client settings here
Computer Configuration\Administrative Templates\System\Windows Time Service\Time Providers

More reference:

How to configure an authoritative time server in Windows Server 2003

Windows Time Service Best practices
http://technet2.microsoft.com/windowsserver/en/library/517e74d7-40e9-41bd-93aa-48b610b936321033.mspx?mfr=true

25 Spice ups
2

its the important HOW TO for windows time synchronization!!

3

Thanks much, Milankumar! Very timely as we’ve been getting some NTP errors on our PDCs.

4

Great writeup. Thanks!

5

great…
Too much helpful for me…

6

Nicely written how to!

Great stuff

7

Excellent writeup
Thank you very much!

8

A better source for time is pool.ntp.org, which provides a round-robin pool of available NTP servers. There are regional sites such as us.pool.ntp.org as well.

9

Also, if you have virtual guests or hosts, read this blog entry: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/virtual_pc_guy/archive/2010/11/19/time-synchronization-in-hyper-v.aspx

10

thx for share

11

I was having a lot of problems with the time sync. When I switched to NTP.ORG servers, the time stayed on target better. It seems time.windows.com has some reliability issues. You may want to look at this article from NTP.ORG:

http://support.ntp.org/bin/view/Support/WindowsTimeService

12

I’m having lot problems right now with time sync. Server’s time is going fast while clients time is bit late. I’d like to correct the servers time first and then sync the clients. I’m not very expect on the server time settings so please help guide me where to look into first.

Thanks,

13

we were just having this problem and part of it was from having virtual DCs. We solved it by making sure our physical PDC was syncing to pool.ntp.org. Turned off the time synchronization in the integration services of the virtual DCs.

That way the PDC sync with ntp.org, the DCs all synced with the PDC, and then all the workstations and member servers (including the Hyper V hosts) synced with the authenticating DC.