Disable Network Authentication Credentials Storage on Windows Desktops

It seems like I'm having to debug authentication-related problems several times a week, all with different symptoms and each with different errors in the Event Log. Today was the last straw.

I've decided to disable this poorly constructed component via Group Policy. Here's how I did it. I opened up Group Policy Management Console and created a new Group Policy Object.

Computer Configuration > Software Settings > Windows Settings > Security Settings > Local Policies > Security Options

Find the entry named "Network access: Do not allow storage of credentials or .NET Passports for network authentication". Enable this.

Assign the GPO to the appropriate OU and restrict using Security Groups as appropriate. I'm scratching my head wondering why I didn't do this a long time ago...

DHCPServer 1010 1014 1016 Errors

I've recently installed a server at home and installed SBS 2003 SP1 Premium Edition on it. Everything went smoothly and I eventaully set up the Monitoring to send me daily reports. I started to get concerned with the DHCPServer 1010, 1014 and 1016 errors that were occurring daily. Backing up and restoring the DHCP database didn't work, chkdsk /f /r didn't show any errors, and hard drive diagnostics were fine. Memory testing was also fine. I removed Anti-spyware and Anti-virus software. Still no difference.

With much grinding of teeth, the occasional expletive and the desire to smash something out of the way, I continued the Googling to find an answer. Lo and behold, there was a thread in the newsgroup microsoft.public.windows.server.sbs which talked about turning off indexing on the %WINDIR%\System32\DHCP folder. I decided to give this a go by going into the folder properties, clicking Advanced on the General tab and disabling "For fast searching, allow Indexing Service to index this folder". Clicked OK twice and waited a couple of days to see if the critical error count dropped in the Monitoring report. Yes! Victory! The 1010, 1014 and 1016 errors stopped occurring! Sanity has been restored! The cat no longer cringes when I'm around!