Time is a funny thing. Invented by scientists to keep everything from happening at once, and the thing that drives our modern society.
When working with Dynamics CRM it is very important that your workstation – desktop, laptop, Surface, tablet, phone, etc. – have the correct and current time.
The Problem
Consider this rather interesting error message received while attempting to connect to Dynamics CRM Online:
While not easy for a layman to read, the error simply states that you cannot connect to Dynamics CRM because the clock on your computer is more than 5 minutes different than the Dynamics CRM server you are attempting to connect to.
The real issue is this error can surface itself in a variety of ways with most of them being very hard to diagnose. See the References section below for more information.
The Solution
This is a very easy thing to fix – just reset the computer’s clock.
This article mentions three methods for correcting the computer’s clock, with option 2, synchronization with an Internet time server being my favorite, if you are running a desktop that is connected to the Internet full-time.
References
- CRM 2011 – Outlook CRM Disconnected – Check the time on the server!
- Cannot connect to Microsoft Dynamics CM server because we cannot authenticate your credentials” error while setting up outlook client through ifd
- Problem when configuring the E-Mail Router: allowed clock skew is ’00:05:00?
- Topic: " CRM 2011 connector error – works to dev on premise but not online instance"
- Kerberos in Load Balanced Environments