Profiles and 'new' domain

[Mike D.]

Hello -

I have about 15 PCs that were in a single domain with a single server for
AD. The server tanked and unfortunately the OS volume had to be rebuilt
(combination of bad luck and a bad backup). So the domain was 'rebuilt',
same name as before, but technically I assume its a new domain. Our XP
clients were logging in to their PCs with their cached domain accounts
during the outage. Is there a way to re-add their computers back to the
domain and allow the users to keep their profiles? Or do we have to logon
on each PC with their new domain account, logoff, logon with an account with
admin rights, and copy the 'old' profile over the new one for each user on
each PC?

Hope I explained this correctly.

Thx

-Mike

 

[Lanwench [MVP - Exchange]]

In

Hello -

I have about 15 PCs that were in a single domain with a single server
for AD. The server tanked and unfortunately the OS volume had to be
rebuilt (combination of bad luck and a bad backup). So the domain
was 'rebuilt', same name as before, but technically I assume its a
new domain. Our XP clients were logging in to their PCs with their
cached domain accounts during the outage. Is there a way to re-add
their computers back to the domain and allow the users to keep their
profiles? Or do we have to logon on each PC with their new domain
account, logoff, logon with an account with admin rights, and copy
the 'old' profile over the new one for each user on each PC?

Hope I explained this correctly.

Thx

-Mike

You have to visit each PC, sorry - disjoin the domain, and re-add it, and
then log in with the new user accounts, then log in as an account
w/sufficient domain rights and copy the profiles. Some settings will look
OK, some won't. You may need to recreate mail profiles, and will need to
reset printers, etc.

It would be good in the future to make sure you run *nightly* backups of all
your data, and the system state on the server....you wouldn't have needed to
do all this. Do test restores, and verify your backup logs daily.

Also, it's a very good idea to have more than one DC - even a cruddy
workstation box with nothing else to do can run Windows Server and be
another DC in your domain. This would also have helped.

I'm sure you know this, but thought I'd mention it.

 

[WhiteZin2000]

You can still use the old profile. Using the old profile allows the user to
keep their desktop layout, icons and configuration settings and can save you
a lot of time in a domain migration/rebuild. However, understand that some
of these shortcuts may not work if the apps/folders on the users old desktop
were actually shortcuts to the old domain server.

To use a previous users desktop environment after joining a new domain
perform the following:
1) Join the PC into the new domain
2) Logon as a user for the new domain. This will create a new user profile
in c:\Documents and settings for this user in the new domain
3) Logon as an administrator and open Regedit
4) Navigate to HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\Current
Version\ProfileList
5) Notice that each SID has a key value called 'ProfileImagePath'. For the
new domain user you logged in with at step 2, adjust this path to point to
the old users profile location.
6) Logon as the domain user and you will now have the old users desktop
environment.

NOTE: You may have to adjust the permissions for the old users profile so
that it is accessible for the new user - but this is easily done with NTFS
permissions. There is actually a Microsoft article on this procedure
somewhere - I just can't remember where.

 

[Mike D.]

Thanks ! I'm still bummed that I have to visit each PC, but I feel more
comfortable redirecting the new profile to point to the old profile than I
am with copying the profile. I'm sure there is no issue with copying, just
a personal comfort with the less I move data around the 'cleaner' this
process can be.

Thanks for the help....