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RobertSeattle

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Windows 2003 computer browser service getting changed to disabled on DCs

I have the Computer Browser service on on on my two domain controllers, but somehow the service is getting disabled approxiamtely every 24 hours.  I have to go into the Service MMC, turn it back to automatic from disabled, then turn if the service back on.  What could be causing this?  
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Pber
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Check your event logs.  That might indicate why it is stopping.
Also check group policy.  You might have a GPO that is controlling the service.  DC GPO's are processed every 5 minutes by default so I would suspect if it was GPO, it would be disabled sooner, but default behavior may have been changed.
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You may also want to turn on detailed logging in WINS, it may help troubleshoot the issue:
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc775732.aspx 
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RobertSeattle

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Doooo...

I had the Browser Service set to disabled in my default domain policy, but then I have it for automatic for My Defaylt Domain Controller Policy, but while I was checking the setting I noticed the Default Domain Controller Policy had the "Enforce" option unchecked.  I must have been editting some policies and inadvertently unchecked the "Enforced" option.  Perhaps Microsoft should make it a little more obvious when a policy isn't being enforced!  
Maybe I don't have the right type of logging on, but I didn't find anything in the System logs that said something like "Computer Browser service being turned off based on Policy XYZ:" - that would have been nice to see any made figuring this out much quicker.  It was just getting disabled with nothing mentioned in the logs.
The event logs won't show that directly.  You might see a SceCli event in your Application event log that the time corresponds to the Service Control Manager event for the browser service stopping.
Using GPResult or RSOP.MSC to troubleshoot.  RSOP.msc is nice as it will show what policy set which setting.