Please help! FsmoCheck PDC role is down.

[Guest]

I have 2x2003 DC's in HQ, 1 DC in another AD site, 1 domain.
Functional level - 2003 Interim.
After noticing my phone ringing loudly and users complaining of not being
able to access NT4 shares (after password or ACL changes), it was discovered
that the PDC emulator role had decided to stop working (after both HQ servers
were rebooted).

The second DC in HQ works as PDC emulator, but I get this message from
dcdiag (on all DC's) when trying to transfer the role back to the original
holder...

Starting test: FsmoCheck
Warning: DcGetDcName(PDC_REQUIRED) call failed,
error 1355
A Primary Domain Controller could not be located.
The server holding the PDC role is down.

The server is fine apart from that. All DC's are GC's and AD lookups
(command line and GUI) report the correct owner of the roles. DNS looks ok
too.

If anyone has any ideas, please please let me know.
Is Laura still out there? Thanks again for saving my job by resolving the
FRS problem!

 

[Glenn L]

Sounds like the PDC may not be registered in DNS.
check your zone in the PDC folder under _MSDCS folder.
You should see an _ldap record.
If you run dcdiag on all three DCs, does it report the same thing?

 

[Guest]

Hi Glen, thanks for replying.

The DNS record updates ok (all three servers run DNS) when the role is
changed and ldap / AD queries find the correct holder of the PDC emulator.
Dcdiag can't find the PDC emulator on any DC (reports the same error). The
DTC service terminates when the role is changed, but I assume that's normal
behavior, apart from that, there are no errors in the event log.

Any further ideas are much appreciated.

Gareth.