help with remote authentication

In the lab where I work, we have a main server and some workstations.
What I want to do is set up the clients to remotely authenticate with
the server and have their home directories on the server be mounted
locally.

I actually already accomplished the latter using NFS (I set up a test
account on a client). The thing I'm really struggling with is how remote
authentication works. I don't want to have to make all the accounts on
each server. Is there a way to make the login program authenticate with
the server?

I'd rather not use Kerberos because I think that's overkill. I tried
using FreeRadius, but that's also tricky to set up and it's not exactly
what I'm looking for (perhaps also a bit of overkill). I just want
something simple that works. Does it not exist?

(Debian Etch Beta 1)

Thanks,
Andrew