I have a 2003 server with 2 onboard nic's, only 1 of which is currently enabled and being used. However, I have some weird problem whereby that server is practically inaccessible from another office over our vpn tunnel, even though other servers and ip addresses in that office are fully accessible from this other office. I've been wracking my brain with Cisco's tech support, and the 2 ISP's involved (different providers at each office), but thus far we haven't found a reason for the seemingly 'blocked' traffic. I also checked the 'windows firewall' on the 2003 server in question, but it isn't enabled, so it shouldn't be a factor.
Trying to find a workaround, I am able to get the other office to access this server using ftp and place/retrieve files that way, but that really limits which folders they're able to work with and just won't do long-term. So, for some reason, mapping drives and accessing the files in those drives to the server in question from the other office just isn't working - they can map the drives, but then are unable to see any contents of the drives, no matter which username they map them using. When setting up this server, I disabled the 2nd nic, because we didn't need it and, in researching and configuring active directory and dns, I saw mention here and there about 2nd nic's creating weird problems. Now, though, I'm wondering about maybe enabling the 2nd nic, giving it an ip address on the same subnet as the currently enabled nic, and seeing if the other office can properly access the server that way. Maybe it's a stretch, but given that an entire office network is having problems with just this one server with one ip address, maybe enabling a second ip address might work around whatever is causing the problem.(if they map their drives to \\ip_address#2\share, instead of \\servername\share or \\ip_address#1\share, that is).
Anyone have any comments on this problem or the 2nd nic idea? Any tips for problems to avoid with 2 nics on the same server and also on the same subnet?
Thanks in advance!
