My Windows 2000 Advanced Server domain controller (DC) refuses to start the Netlogon service automatically after a reboot. I can start the service manually, but that's a hassle. I've tried everything I can think of and searched the Microsoft Knowledge Base but found nothing that solves the problem. I'm running Active Directory (AD), and this DC is the only one in the domain. What's going on?
This problem can happen when service dependencies have changed from their default settings. Check your System log; if event ID 2114 and event ID 7024 accompany the problem, a dependency change is probably the cause.
The solution in this case is to restore the default configuration, in which Netlogon is dependent on the LanmanServer and LanmanWorkstation services. To do so, you need to modify (or add) the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/SYSTEM/CurrentControlSet/Services/Netlogon registry subkey's DependOnService value (of type MULTI_SZ).
You'll need to use regedt32 for this task because regedit in Win2K doesn't properly support editing of this registry data type. (Regedit in Windows Server 2003 does offer this support.) The Microsoft article "Netlogon Service Does Not Start, Event Viewer Records Event IDs 2114 and 7024" (http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=269375) describes the necessary procedure.