I just recently got a Dell Dimension C521 (Athlon 64 X2 3800, 2GB memory, Vista Business) at my job. We have a Windows 2003 server upstairs that all our computers connect to. The server has some group policies, some software installation stuff, and some other things that it does on the client computers. So I added a computer reference for this computer on the server and then connected this one to the domain. I logged on, and it started doing some of the auto install stuff (setting up Internet Options, etc.). It took a really long time. I thought it was just because this was the first time this computer had connected to the server is why it took so long. But for the past week that I've been logging onto the server, it's been taking this Vista computer around eight minutes to finally get done loading! It gets through the logon screen and gets to the desktop, and then it just sits there, the hard drive running. I'll sit and wait, and about a minute later, the internet icon comes up. I try to click on IE, and it just sits there for about three minutes, and then finally, IE will come up...but I still can't do anything with it for another two-three minutes. See what I mean?

And if I try hitting Ctrl+Alt+Del, it sits there for about a minute and then comes up with a "Logon process has failed to create the security options dialog. Failure - security options." (seems like the security policy hasn't been put into place yet or something, who knows)

So my question is, what in the world is causing Vista to take so long loading when it connects to a Windows 2003 server? It started up within 30 seconds when I was just using the computer locally. Any help you can offer would be amazing, thanks!

Try checking the Event Viewer for errors around the login time (Go to Start and type in "eventvwr.msc" (without the quotes) and press Enter). Check all the logs for anything that might look significant.

Looks like there are some ACPI errors every time I log on to my computer. There are three of them every time. Here's what they say:



Then, approximately one minute into the startup process, there is an entry for Time-Service with this message:



After that the next message isn't for 5 minutes. It is an error labeled DistributedCOM, and this is the message:



Then another minute later, this message from DistributedCOM:



Geez, there are a lot. Here's a warning I see for Service Control Manager:



Then more for SCM:





Looks to me like Windows Update is doing something retarded. What could be causing this?

I suspect that Windows Update is retarded - even without the errors that you're getting! Seriously tho', it could be related to the time issues earlier in the boot process.

A couple of things:

1) The ACPI issues are pretty serious, I'd suggest finding out what's in your second PCI slot and updating the drivers for it. (not a simple thing, because the specs at this link ( http://www.dell.com/content/products/produ...;l=en&s=dhs ) say that you only have 1 PCI slot (but it depends on how your BIOS enumerates them - could be internal PCI connections, or it could be counting the PCIe slots). From the Service Manual on this page ( http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/syst...21/en/index.htm ) I suspect that it's your PCIe x1 slot. I'd check with msconfig and other system utilities to try and narrow it down.

2) The time provider service doesn't seem to be working properly either. And I have no clue about how to go about fixing that. A couple of suggestions to try tho:
- disable IPv6 on your local area connection (it's only required by Meeting Space AFAIK)
- disable the DHCP Broadcast Flag by using this article: http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&ct=res&...q4NPDLaLJG0K-Sw
- an article that might be related (and contains a hotfix) is here: http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&ct=res&...VcnBKyDmzLH7XVA

This is a guess (on my part) that something in your network isn't Vista compatible. If there are other Vista systems running without problems on the network, then this stuff probably isn't needed.

Otherwise, try using another Time Server to see if that fixes that.

Once this is done, let us know if it's helped, and what the other errors are that pop up - I'm expecting the Windows Update errors to go away. The Live Update errors may stay, but generally they can be fixed by totally uninstalling Norton/Symantec, then running the Norton Removal Tool, then installing a freshly downloaded copy of the program(s).

The DCOM errors can cause these errors also, mostly because they're dependent on it working when they start. It may be the Norton that's causing the DCOM to fail - and if that's the case, the Norton fix should cause the other errors to disappear. If not, then there's more troubleshooting to do.