Fixing extremely slow domain logon windows 7

I just installed two Windows 7 machines and both of them take a very long time to logon to the (samba) domain controller. I’ve found several reports on the internet about people with the same issue. This was one of the pages I found. I tried it and it works. It says:

• Run gpedit.msc.
• Go to computer configuration.
• Go to Administrative templates.
• Go to System.
• Go to User profiles.
• Enable “Set maximum wait time for the network if a user has a roaming user profile or remote home directory” and set to 0 seconds

You’d think that this means it can’t logon, because it suggests the wait period was because of network connection problem. However, I tried adding files to the profile on the server and logged in, and the file was synced to the PC. So, it does seem to work.

While I was at it, I also changed the setting not to allow logons with temporary profiles. It’s in the same list as the option above. In Dutch, it’s “gebruikers niet aanmelden met tijdelijke profielen”.

I also found this about slow logons. It’s for Windows XP, but perhaps it’s useful. It sets “Always wait for the network at computer startup and logon” to true. For some reason, the asynchronous loading of the network caused slowdown for that person.

Finally, I also found people who fixed slow logons by setting the desktop to an image, as opposed to solid color. I tested it, and indeed seemed to influence it.