HP-UX Internet Services Administrator's Guide (August 2003)

Configuring NTP
Troubleshooting NTP
Chapter 494
stratum-1 server in the hierarchy does not exist, association is not
formed. To verify whether the local xntpd is able to form an association,
issue the following command:
/usr/sbin/ntpdate server
The server is the name of a trusted server, such as a peer or high-level
(lower stratum) server. If the local xntpd is unable to form any
association, this command returns the message No suitable server
for synchronization found. The possible causes for this error
message is discussed in the following sections.
Time Difference Greater than 1000 seconds
While evaluating incoming time updates, clients and peers reject time
from servers or peers if the time difference is greater than 1000 seconds.
If xntpd is configured with the broadcastclient entry in the
/etc/ntp.conf file, xntpd dies if it cannot find asuitable server aftersix
consecutive polls, or five polling cycles (approximately 320 seconds if
using the default polling interval). If xntpd is configured with server
entries in the /etc/ntp.conf file, xntpd dies if it cannot find a suitable
server after five consecutive polls, or four polling cycles. The number of
polls for the broadcastclient entry configuration is one count more
than the server entry configuration because the first successful
reception of an NTP message for the broadcastclient entry adds the
timeserver to the list of timeservers.
Because of this behavior, you may have to issue the following command
to synchronize the local system time with another NTP server before
starting xntpd:
/usr/sbin/ntpdate server
When a server entry is configured in the /etc/ntp.conf file, xntpd
knows the name of the timeserve and need to wait for only five polls to
synchronize with the timeserver.
The disp value in the ntpq -p command starts at approximately 16000
seconds and isdivided by twowhen a successfulNTP message isreceived
from the timeserver. If a value lower than 1000 seconds is received, the
client or peer attempts to synchronize with the timeserver and an error
message is received about the time difference. The first reception writes
a value of 16000 seconds to the disp value for the broadcastclient entry.
Because the client or peer polls the timeserver in case of a server entry,
the original disp value is set to disp.