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W32time, Event ID 50, Time Service detected a time difference of greater than 5000 milliseconds...

Question

Thursday, December 11, 2014 3:01 AM

Hi There,

We seem to be seeing the following error intermittently come up across our Windows 2003 server fleet:

Event Type: Warning
Event Source: W32Time
Event Category: None
Event ID: 50
Date:  11/12/2014
Time:  1:15:13 PM
User:  N/A
Computer: Computer-Name

Description:
The time service detected a time difference of greater than 5000 milliseconds  for 900 seconds. The time difference might be caused by synchronization with  low-accuracy time sources or by suboptimal network conditions. The time service is no longer synchronized and cannot provide the time to other clients or update  the system clock. When a valid time stamp is received from a time service  provider, the time service will correct itself.  

For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.

One of the servers in question is a virtual running Windows Server 2003 R2 Standard Edition.

The time-source inside the network is our primary domain controller which is a Windows Server 2008 R2 virtual machine.

In order to rectify this, I've attempted as follows, which fixes the problem. as far as I can see, however I see things re-occur just the next day.

1) Open command prompt.

2) Type in w32tm /resync /rediscover /nowait.

3) Restart the time service.

4) Type in 'net time' to ensure the source has changed to our site's primary domain controller.

Is there any alternate way you can suggest to resolve this so we don't have to go through and manually do this on all of our Windows 2003 servers?

SB.

All replies (3)

Monday, December 15, 2014 9:23 AM ✅Answered

Hello,

in addition please see http://blogs.msmvps.com/mweber/2010/06/27/time-configuration-in-a-windows-domain/ about time in a domain and how to configure it.

Best regards

Meinolf Weber

MVP, MCP, MCTS

Microsoft MVP - Directory Services

My Blog: http://blogs.msmvps.com/MWeber

Disclaimer: This posting is provided AS IS with no warranties or guarantees and confers no rights.

Twitter:  

Monday, December 15, 2014 11:22 PM ✅Answered

Hi Meinolf,

Thanks very much. The commands I was looking for were in your blog:

to configure a domain computer for automatic domain time synchronization, run:

w32tm /config /syncfromflags:domhier /update

After that you have to run:
net stop w32time
net start w32time

I didn't believe it was anything we needed to configure on the domain controllers as they didn't seem to have an issue but this way worked out a lot better.

Thanks again!

SB.

Sunday, December 14, 2014 12:07 PM

Hi SB,

We can configure DC to synchronize with an external time source.

To synchronize the domain controller with an external time source, please follow the steps below:

  1. Click Start, and then click Command Prompt.

  2. In the Command Prompt window, type the following line, where peers is a comma-separated list of IP addresses of the appropriate time sources, and press ENTER:

    w32tm /config /manualpeerlist: peers /syncfromflags:MANUAL

    The time sources you choose depend on your time zone. For example, if your domain controller is located in the Pacific Time zone, this line might read:

    w32tm /config /manualpeerlist:131.107.1.10 /syncfromflags:MANUAL

    In this example, the IP address of the timeserver is used instead of the fully qualified domain name for security purposes.

  3. Press ENTER. You should get a message that the command completed successfully.

  4. Type w32tm /config /update

  5. Press ENTER. You should get a message that the command completed successfully.

    W32time uses a variable poll interval based on the quality of timesync with the server. On DCs, this interval defaults to between 64 and 1024 seconds.

  6. To immediately synchronize with the external time server, type w32tm /resync and press ENTER. You should get a message that the command completed successfully.

  7. Type Exit and press ENTER.

For detailed information, please refer to the link below,

Configure the Time Source for the Forest

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc794937(v=WS.10).aspx

Best Regards.

Steven Lee Please remember to mark the replies as answers if they help and unmark them if they provide no help. If you have feedback for TechNet Support, contact [email protected].