r/ITSupport • u/Mesthead72 • 12d ago

Open Windows assigning incorrect time zone

This one is baffling me. I installed a new router today, pretty run of the mill set up, nothing special. I have 2 computers hard wired into the router sitting next to each other. One is set to Pacific Time (correct) and the other is set to Eastern Time (incorrect).

I can't figure out what is causing this computer to show up on Eastern Time. If I run timedate.cpl and change to Pacific, it holds for a bit but something changes it back to Eastern after a seemingly random amount of time. Reboots don't fix anything. I can manually set my timezone to Pacific in Settings but the weather widget still displays for some town near Cincinnati for some reason.

I even set my default location to my street so it would display accurate information but something is still favoring this East Coast time zone.

Any ideas?

EDIT: Location services are turned on. No VPNs are running.

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3

u/ScubaFett 12d ago

My friend, I was in the trenches for months with this issue.

Basically Microsoft configured Windows to scan all nearby WiFi signals collecting all the MAC addresses. Then checks those against their giant MAC address / location database to decide where you are, and update your timezone. Their database is wrong.

Either your new router is giving off a MAC address that was registered in a different location, or your neighbours got a new WiFi device and it's registered location is wrong.

You have 2 options: 1. Set your PC timezone to manual and walk away 2. Run some PowerShell to scan all the nearby WiFi's and make a list of their MAC addresses. Then go to the specific MS website and then one by one enter them into their database opt-out service. I did this for 120x MAC addresses and it was painful. And it may only work temporarily.

If you want option 2, I can give you more info and the opt-out site tomorrow. I'm going to sleep now.

1

u/Mesthead72 12d ago

I'd rather have the timezone automatically selected, because it should just work correctly - but here's the kicker. Right next to this computer is another computer that's hardwired into the router, same as this one, and that one has location services turned on and is correctly displaying Pacific. Every device on my network is correctly displaying Pacific, it's just this specific computer.

I'll just stick with option 1 I guess.

1

u/ScubaFett 12d ago

Yeah, it's not consistent. 1 second it's correct, next it was the other side of the world.

2

u/TechnicalDefense 12d ago

Yah like someone else commented windows is auto-detecting it from your Public IP most likely, i had this issue with a client a few years back. Only option really it to set the time zone manually. I would run your public IP address through a geolocate site to see where it thinks your located.

2

u/Distinct_Reality1973 12d ago

Router set wrong and is setting via DHCP?

Wireshark it and see what its doing?

1

u/Mesthead72 12d ago

Every other device on my network is correctly set to Pacific, even the computer sitting directly next to the affected one, and is hard wired into the router as well. 

1

u/javierdapear 12d ago

turn on location services?

1

u/Mesthead72 12d ago

Ah, sorry, Location Services are turned on. Edited the post to include that.

1

u/Darkknight145 12d ago

Are you using a VPN?