Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Microsoft Genius: An error occurred while Windows was synchronizing with time.windows.com


.. or time.nist.gov, etc.


To see the error, double the clock in the systray, select the third tab which is labeled 'Internet Time', and try the 'Update Now' tab.
You will get the "An error occurred while Windows was synchronizing with time.windows.com" message. Try a different server, then 'update now'. Still get the error?

I did a little research, and found this long forum post about how this is broken everywhere --

We simply instruct them "to click on the time icon on the desktop,
then click the Internet Time tab,
and then copy the following blue text only - tick.usno.navy.mil -
and next paste it in the Server: Field,
then click on Apply,
then Update Now
and finally OK. Done, no more error messages.
Ok, isn't that what I did? No. (blogger fonts are whack when you paste text in from a webkit browser... I'm going with it).

What's missing? What did I do differently?
APPLY.
This is genius!
After you change the value, you have to click apply to tell microsoft windows you changed it. What should be a obvious intuitive interface is subtly subverted. You change the value to X, and click update now. Doesn't it use that value? It says, "error connecting to X" but it doesn't use that value? Not til you click Apply!
Why don't that have another button that says "ok, I clicked that button" ?

This is a cash cow for microsoft! How many people have called and been charged $59 for this? Whoever thought it up surely got a lot of stock options and probably a promotion to VP, or a special position where they can apply this feature to other parts of the system (send in your examples). An MBA student could do a thesis on this...


Well, I tested on 3 2003 Servers which had this problem,
but the XP system actually worked [but that was probably a bug].
I couldn't test on Vista, because the police took that computer.

... I guess I only read about a third of that post -- it looks like there could be multiple issues, or there are different types of voodoo that can cure it...
I only read about halfway, but I'm tired.
Good thing I have a Mac now.

3 comments:

MajorKarma said...

Okay, the kid's a genius and I'm blind as a bat...didn't catch the date was set wrong

Unknown said...

Answer by Narad http://www.sevenforums.com/general-discussion/2363-system-time-service-3.html was the best which solved my problem:
Quote "At the elevated command prompt (with administrator privileges), type the following command

1. Type "[B]w32tm /debug /disable[/B]" and press 'Enter' ([I]net stop w32time gave an Error 5 Access denied response!)[/I]

2. Type "[B]w32tm /unregister[/B]" and press 'Enter' (without using the first command the second did not work!)

[I]you should get the response " W32Time successfully unregistered"[/I]

3. Type "[B]w32tm /register[/B]" and press 'Enter'

[I]you should get the response "W32Time successfully registered"[/I]

4. Type "[B]net start w32time[/B]" and press 'Enter'

[I]you should get the response "The windows Time Service is starting. The windows time service was started successfully"[/I]

This ensured my Internet Time synchronization started working again. I suppose w32tm and w32time commands are interchangeable from the responses I got:D."

Unknown said...

Pure Genius! Thank you, I have been searching on a solution to this problem ALL day long. Who would have tho8ught to use the Navy's time server? Again, thanks again