Montana State University Customer Support -- Tech Note #4

Network Installation Guidelines:
Windows XP Professional

Applies to: Windows XP Professional.
Last updated: Friday May 09, 2008.

SUMMARY

This will be a basic guideline for installing network connectivity on your Windows XP Professional desktop.

Note: You will need to contact your network administrator for more site specific information.

PROCEDURE

For the duration of this guide it is assumed you are a member of the MSU domain and have a valid username, nodename and IP Address. Pretend you were assigned nodename.msu.montana.edu with an IP address of 153.90.111.222, so you are in the 111 Subnet with a unique IP of 222. If you do not know what these values are contact your network administrator for help. Assuming that you have installed and correctly configured a network interface card in your PC, click on Start then Control Panel then Network Connections then right click on the Local Area Connection icon and select Properties.
If you want to see if you have network activity on your Local Area Connection check "Show icon in notification area when connected". Highlight the Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) component and click on Properties.
Enter the IP Address assigned to you substituting your building Subnet for the 111 and your unique IP for the 222. The subnet mask will be 255.255.255.0 unless you have more than one Subnet in your building then you would use 255.255.254.0. If you are not sure what to use ask your network administrator. Enter 153.90.111.254 for your Default Gateway replacing 111 with your buildings Subnet. Remember to change the Subnet of the Gateway to the larger number if you have more than one Subnet in your building. For example if your building was assigned Subnets 111 and 112 you would use a subnet mask of 255.255.254.0 and a Gateway of 153.90.112.254. Enter the Preferred and Alternate DNS server as they appear on the right. If your building is serviced by a DHCP server all of these settings will be taken care of for you. Contact your Network Administrator if you are not sure of your configuration. Click on the Advanced button.
Select the DNS  tab. Click in the Append these DNS suffixes (in order) radio button and  type msu.montana.edu then click Add Add any other suffix's that you need for your area such as coe.montana.edu. NOTE: Be sure to uncheck the box next to "Register this connection's addresses in DNS" otherwise it will put an undue burden on our DNS server.
Select the WINS  tab  and enter 153.90.2.160 for the Primary WINS Server and 153.90.2.87 for the Secondary WINS Server. Check "Enable LMHOSTS Lookup" and "Enable NetBIOS over TCP/IP".
Insure that TCP/IP filtering is not enabled. Click OK to return to the Network properties window.
If you are not going to share files on your hard drive or local printers uncheck "File and Printer Sharing for Microsoft Networks". You have completed this portion of the  network installation. If you have any problems along the way contact the Help Desk at 994-1777. Click on Close and return to your desktop.
To add your computer to the MSU Domain, click Start then right click on My Computer and select Properties.  Under the Computer Name tab click on Change... then verify that the Computer Name and Domain are correct. Click on More to find the primary DNS suffix and NetBIOS name. These settings are entered at the time of the Operating Systems installation or from the previous modification to the network settings above. If you need to change these settings to join a domain you will need to contact the Help Desk at X1777 and request they add your Computer Name to the domain.
If you try to change the Computer Name without having the Help Desk add your computer name to the domain, you will  get a dialog box asking for a name and password of an account with domain administrator permissions to rename the computer in the domain. You will have to contact your Network Administrator at that point. You can change yourself to become a member of  a Workgroup until the problem is resolved.