Odd problem with managed prefs in 10.4.9

Hi all, I'm having a strange problem with our network, hopefully someone out there can shed some light on things. Basically, we had a server crash so I reinstalled from scratch and created a whole new OD setup, etc. We're linked to AD and all the Kerberos is working fine, logins are fine, etc etc. Server and stations are all bang up to date with OS and Software Update. The strangeness is that managed preferences are not being applied to the stations. They've been re-bound to the server and they all show up fine, it's just the settings aren't being sent through. We had this before and it was down to the 'Disable Clear Text Passwords' option being ticked on the stations but not on the server. Anyhow, when I went to look at this, it seemed it wasn't ticked on the server so I ticked it and saved, then quit Server Admin. It still didn't work, so I went back in and noticed that the box had now unticked itself! It does the same for the 'Enable directory binding' setting too - if you tick it, it unticks itself when you save. The problem is that the stations DO have 'Disable Clear Text Passwords' ticked, and the option to untick it is greyed out, presumably because it's receiving that setting from the server. I've rebooted the server several times, started and stopped the service, it makes no difference - it won't let me tick those boxes. Does anyone know why it does this? Or any way around it to get managed prefs working? I don't mind hacking the files behind wherever that tickbox is getting the info from, but I am wondering if there is a good reason why it won't tick itself and if there's another way I'm supposed to do things? Or if it is just a case of hacking it, does anyone know the file that those OD binding prefs are stored in? Thanks guys! :) James