We want to use slow link detection for both offline files as well as roaming profiles. We have one main office with subnet 172.22.0.0, every workstation has a 1gbit or 100mbit network connection. Both the filesserver as well as the dc's are locates in the main office. The remote officies are connected with the main offices with a fixed line, the bandwidth is between 500 kbit and 10 mbit. The latency in the main office is 1 ms, the minimal latency in the remote officies. The problem: No matter how i configure the slow link policy for offline files or roaming profiles, it doesn't seem to function reliably. For offlinefiles the path to be put offline is a dfs path. DFS is configured on the dc's so i presume it verifies slow link by testing the dc's. I presume that for roaming profiles it also tests the latency and or bandwidth of the dc's. When i ping our domain (so basically our dc's) from a workstation in the main office, the resulting latency is usually 1 ms, but quite often it is also 100 ms, so it is impossible to base slow link on latency. Apparently it is also unreliable to base it on bandwidth because when i set it at 10000000 bits/sec (10 mbit) i can see in the eventlog of workstations that are located in the main offices, that sometime offline files detects that the bandwidth is about 5 mbit when the actual connection is 100mbit, so that is also very unreliable. Does anyone know of a good, solid functioning workaround or alternative that will make the slow link detection function reliably? Or is there maybe some registry key available so that one can define that every network but 172.22.0.0 should be treated as a slow link? Or is it possible to make slow link detection do its detection on a dedicated device and no longer the dc's, so that the results are always the same?

Hello, Thank you for your question. I am currently looking into this issue and will give you an update as soon as possible. Thank you for your understanding and support. Regards, Sabrina TechNet Subscriber Support in forum. If you have any feedback on our support, please contact tngfb@microsoft.comThis posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties or guarantees, and confers no rights. |Please remember to click Mark as Answer on the post that helps you, and to click Unmark as Answer if a marked post does not actually answer your question. This can be beneficial to other community members reading the thread.

Hi, After consulting, I think that Roaming User Profile’s slow link algorithm doesn’t work with domain based DFS. You may consider stand-alone DFS for user profiles. More information: A roaming profile is not loaded from a DFS share Strange behavior in slow link detection with roaming user profiles As this issue is more Server related, in order to get the answer effectively, it is recommended to post a new thread in Windows Server Forum for discussion. Regards, Sabrina TechNet Subscriber Support in forum. If you have any feedback on our support, please contact tngfb@microsoft.comThis posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties or guarantees, and confers no rights. |Please remember to click Mark as Answer on the post that helps you, and to click Unmark as Answer if a marked post does not actually answer your question. This can be beneficial to other community members reading the thread.

Thanks Sabrina, i really appreciate that i now have an definite explanation for this inconsistent behaviour. However, the solutions mentioned only apply to roaming profiles, but we also experience the same unreliable behaviour with the slow link detection for offline files. Should i set up a seperate DFS server for offline files as well?

Sabrina, i know this is not the way to go, but we would really appreciate it if you would be able to answer this offline problem for us: http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en/w7itpronetworking/thread/a5d9c57a-f571-40bf-bd08-8171d936874f We think that it could also be a domain dfs incompatibility issue.

Sabrina, in know this is not the way to go, but we would really appreciate it if you would be able to answer this offline problem for us: http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en/w7itpronetworking/thread/a5d9c57a-f571-40bf-bd08-8171d936874f We think that it could also be a domain dfs incompatibility issue.

Hi, Sorry for my delay. First, as this issue is more Server related, I still recommend to post a new thread in Windows Server Forum for discussion which is the efficient way to resolve this issue. After accessing your link and reviewing the new thread which you posted, I think this is by design. Please check the link below for more information: Can I use DFS with Offline Files and redirected My Documents folders? Administrators must not enable Offline Files on a path with the same first component as a path used for roaming profiles. For example, if roaming profiles are stored on a domain root named \\Domain\Roam, Offline Files should not be enabled for a DFS root named \\Domain\Project. Similarly, if roaming profiles are stored on a stand-alone root or regular shared folder, such as \\Server\Roam, Offline Files should not be enabled for a path such as \\Server\Other. Offline Files treats the first component of the path name as if it were a server and caches everything under that "server." In the \\Domain\Roam and \\Domain\Project example above, enabling Offline Files for \\Domain\Project would result in the roaming profiles being cached by Offline Files as well. You may also refer to the paragraph below in the article: Using DFS Namespaces and Offline Files For example, if \\Contoso.com\Public is a domain-based root with several root targets and numerous links, the Offline Files feature interprets this namespace as a single server named \\Contoso.com. If a client is accessing or attempts to access a target in the \\Contoso.com\Public namespace, and the target is unavailable, the client interprets the entire namespace as unavailable and will attempt to open a user’s locally cached files (if they exist). Also, as there is another thread focus on that issue, in order to avoid confusion and keep track of troubleshooting steps, I recommend we keep working with the thread: Offline files always wants to set \\dfsroot\data share offline Regards, Sabrina TechNet Subscriber Support in forum. If you have any feedback on our support, please contact tngfb@microsoft.com This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties or guarantees, and confers no rights. |Please remember to click “Mark as Answer” on the post that helps you, and to click “Unmark as Answer” if a marked post does not actually answer your question. This can be beneficial to other community members reading the thread.

Ok, i have copied your response to the Offline files always wants to set \\dfsroot\data share offline , let's proceed there then.