Timeserver sending wrong time to Windows Clients

[David Rankin]

Help Andrew! and whoever else..

I have a Linux Mandrake 7.2 box with Samba 2.07 acting as a timeserver
for our local lan. We are in the CST timezone. All windows boxes sync
thier time from the Linux box via: net time \\Nemesis /set /yes. I would
like to have xntp keep the clock on the server updated.

Problem:

ntpdate and xntp work great at setting the Linux box hardware clock to
GMT.

The problem I am having is that my windows clients do not get the right
time no matter what I set the zoneinfo or timezone or Linux system clock
to. It almost appears that my zoneinfo of [America/Chicago] adds 6 hours
to GMT instead or subtracting 6 hours to get the correct local time.

If the hwclock is set to GMT and zoneinfo is set to [no selection], the
windows boxes get GMT. (i.e. correct time + 6 hours).

If the hwclock is set to GMT and zoneinfo is set to [America/Chicago]
(CST), the windows boxes get GMT + 6 (i.e. correct time + 12 hours) -
Totally Bizarre!

I have tried every combination of hwclock/system clock and zoneinfo
settings available and the only way I get the windows boxes to get the
right time is to set the hwclock to localtime (CST) and the zoneinfo to
[no selection]. Of course this makes xntp useless because when it tries
to update it sees a 21600 second difference in time and just pukes and
dies!

I have read all How-Tos and Mini How-Tos, man pages, listserve archives,
etc and I am still at a loss. I don't understand what in the heck is
going on. I need help figuring out how samba figures out  what time it
serves to the windows boxes.

I am out of ideas and dead in the water on this one -- alas with a
feeling of defeat, I now send this question to the Linux Omniscient for
help.

--
David Rankin
Nacogdoches, Texas