How To Set Date And Time Through Group Policy

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Hi,

I need to enforce the policy wherein on client machine date and time settings are restricted. Also I want all the client machine on the same time zone i.e. Pacific time.

Any ideas?

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12 Replies

Craig M

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Jul 16, 2010 at 16:02 UTC

I can't remember where the setting is, but you will want to set the NTP sever in GP for all your clients. I think by default, they will look at your main Domain Controller (which ever DC has the schema role).

Tim with IT

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Jul 16, 2010 at 16:03 UTC

If you're running server 2008 DC your can use Group Policy Preferences. If you're running an earlier version DC, you could run a startup script which sets the time zone in the registry settings. The time zone settings should be in HKLM\CurrentControlSet\Control\TimeZoneInformation

Craig M

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Jul 16, 2010 at 16:03 UTC

Look at here, about half way down on the page.

sundrift

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Jul 16, 2010 at 17:55 UTC

I am using server 2008 and Windows Vista and Win 7 boxes..

where to find the policy settings?

For restricting time changes should be: Computer configuration\Security Settings\Local Policies\Change the system time

For time zone I think you will need to use something similar to the following in a login script :

Control.exe TIMEDATE.CPL,,/Z (GMT-08:00) Pacific Time (US & Canada); Tijuana

or:

RUNDLL32.EXE SHELL32.DLL,Control_RunDLL TIMEDATE.CPL,,/Z (GMT-08:00) Pacific
Time (US & Canada); Tijuana

Where '(GMT-08:00) Pacific Time (US & Canada); Tijuana' is the timezone to be set.

Your NTP server should be your PDC Emulator.

Jose Franco

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Jul 16, 2010 at 20:30 UTC

You can do it also, it will apply to all computers joined to the AD.

1.- Date and time settings restiction: go to Administrative tools - Domain Settings Policy - Change the system time - and just define the policy settings when the administrator or another goup can change it.

2.- Same time: by default all clients joined to the domain will have the server time, just the change the time setting in the server.

I have my server go out and get time from one of the global time keepers, then I have all clients in the domain get the time from the server.

I set the server up at:
Computer Config > Admin Template > System > Windows Time Server

And I believe I set client System Time at:
Computer Config > Windows Setting > Security Setting > Local Policies > User Rights Asignments > Change System Time

Of course, this is Windows Server 2003 and also, I posted this from notes.

Good luck.

I have Windows Server 2008:

I believe this is what you meant.

Computer Config > Admin Template > System > Windows Time Service>Configure Windows NTP Client.

By default, the NtpServer has a value of "time.windows.com,0x9". If I want the client PC's to synchronize with Server 2008, should I replace it with the address of the Windows 2008 server?

We are running 40 laptops. About 25% of them have dead internal batteries, and we couldn't afford to buy new computers at this time. Every time when they are booted up, their date / time went back to factory date (1/1/2009).

All of those workstations are already part of our domain. They joined the domain WHILE their dates and time were correct. Now, how do I get their date/time to stay in sync with our DC by more than 2 years?

Thanks,

Scott

How to enable the Date and time Link? also, my pop up window stopped working for the date and time too

TIA

Phenix51

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Jun 25, 2018 at 15:41 UTC

for those of you that are still having this issue and haven't been able to resolve your Time/Date issue, this link will make things pretty clear for you(it has pictures!).

https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/nepapfe/2013/03/01/its-simple-time-configuration-in-active-direc...

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