TUAW Tip: Setting your clock automatically after using Boot Camp

Are you using the latest version of Boot Camp?

I used to have this problem, but when I recently set-up a new Boot Camp drive and got the latest version of the Windows drivers (2.1 I believe), the problem didn't exist anymore.

It seems that if you have your software up to date, Apple has already fixed the problem.

There is a much more elegant way to make sure your OSX and Windows time are always in sync. The only complete solution to this problem should not require any time sync from a server at all. The problem seen here is due to the fact that OSX expects the computer's hardware clock to be set to UTC where Windows expects it to be set to local time.
The way to fix this is to tell Windows that the time stored in the hardware is UTC, just like in OSX. This is done with a single registry entry:

HKLMSYSTEMCurrentControlSetControlTimeZoneInformationRealTimeIsUniversal

Set this key to a DWORD value of 1, then reboot.

This will cause Windows to handle the hardware time the same as OSX, meaning that it doesn't matter which OS requests a time sync since they will always match.

I've used this method on a Mac Pro and a MacBook Pro using OSX 10.4 and Windows XP. I've not tried it with 10.5 because I haven't been using bootcamp for a while and I never tried it with Vista because I hate it.

The problem here is with the Mac OS X Not Windows. The Mac OS X uses ntpd to sync time with network servers. (ntpd is free open source software that when configured properly is MUCH better then the time sync software that Windows uses). Almost all Linux distros configure ntpd properly. But Apple Mac OS X does not.

I suspect Apple has intentionally configured ntpd poorly to reduce the load on the Apple time servers.

e.g. Open up Terminal and type:

ntpq -p

If you see a * beside a time server (e.g. time.apple.com), your Mac's clock is synced with that time server. But I suspect many of you will not see a * but that can be fixed!

Here is an easy solution. In terminal from an Administrators Account, do the following:

1. sudo nano /etc/ntp.conf

2. In the nano editor, change the line starting with server to:

server time.apple.com iburst

3. Save the file. Ctrl-X in nano.

4. Reboot.

For more info and a more complicated procedure on Tiger, see the Apple website:

http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=303731

Please note you don't have to use the Apple time servers. For a list of time servers, see http://support.ntp.org/bin/view/Servers/WebHome

Pick one that is closest to you. (you can tell by pinging the time server in Terminal. e.g. ping time.nrc.ca to ping the official Canadian time server in Ottawa). The time.apple.com is often not ideal for syncing time but it depends where you live.

Please note that one thing that Apple does NOT tell you is if you unlock and then lock the Time and Date System Preferenes, Mac OS X will overwrite the ntpd setttings with the poor ones.

To check if everything is working properly, open up Terminal and type:

ntpq -p

You should see a * beside a time server which tells you that your Mac's clock is synced with that time server.

How silly! Just disable all automatic time-adjustment features of Windows (daylight saving and network time) and you're done. Way easier.

i never noticed that bug! the joys of living in GMT

It seems you lot have trouble with this,

I myself use Bootcamp, WXP and Leopard 10.5.3 almost daily and never have trouble with the time. I have both OS'es set to GMT+1 and on both auto updating the time with time.euro.apple.com is set (yes on windows too!)

sigh.

i hate it when 'gurus' attempt to 'fix' a problem and end up making an unholy, godawful mess of it, like here.

seriously, did you put any effort into researching timekeeping in Mac OS X before writing the script and this article?

as a previous poster says, it's a one-liner. An alternative is to edit the ntpd config file since the ntpd runs in the background permanently anyway, and as stated, does not perform an update if the error margin is too high.

a one-liner. that is run once. then forget about it.

compare that to "open sys prefs every time your computer boots. wait a minute. close it." even if it's scripted - that's not a solution. that's not even a hack. that's just retarded.

There's actually the Mother of All Bugs in OS X since nearly the 10.1 It's complicated but certain prefs after a disgraceful reboot or something like bootcamp will be lost.

On notebooks it's ambient brightness, and automatic time. Drives ME INSANE, does it on all 50+ notebooks I've owned, and I can reproduce it on anybody's mac notebook.

Well, I used one of those 'hairy' registry fixes without any problems :-)
Easier, especially when I'm not connected to teh interwebz.

An even easier solution is to get the network time protocol daemon to do the work for you. It doesn't do it now as it doesn't like resetting your time if it is out by a large margin but you can tell it to ignore the margin.

Open the Terminal and, if you have admin rights, this line fixes it :-

sudo printf "nntpd -g -qn" >> /etc/rc.local

which adds a line to one of the shell scripts run at boot (the first, in fact, which doesn't exist by default) and whenever you boot your Mac the time server will be checked and your time fixed.

The advantage of this fix is that if you have Active Directory logins the time will be fixed before the Login Window comes up and a bad time can upset AD.

# Tony Williams
http://honestpuck.blogspot.com/