promote a new server and demote the old one

[M.G.]

Hi.

I have a Windows 2000 server that it was the DC of the domain. I have
installed a new Windows 2003 server in a new machine and I have promoted
this w2003 so that it is DC and it has the fsmo roles and global catalogue.

I would like to shutdown the windows 2000 server for a few days before
removing from the active directory.

will the active directory work fine without having removed the w2000 server?

After a few days, if I see that everything goes ok, then I will demote the
w2000 server so that it won't be a DC, just a member.

 

[Harj]

Hi,

If all the FSMO roles are moved over, it is a GC, it holds DNS and the
clients are pointed to it and as long as it is not housing any shares
users need access too, and as long as you can live with errors that you
will start noticing on the W2K3 DC you can safely shutdown the W2K DC.
Do not shut it down for too long (tombstone) but it should be fine for
a few days.
Don't forget DHCP if it is there too...a lot of people forget the
machine is also the DHCP server. There is no problem housing DHCP on a
member server but if it is and when it is down clients might have
issues renewing their address.
Make sure the W2K3 machine is pointed to itself for primary DNS and all
it's little SRV records are registered before shutting down the W2K DC.

Good luck

Harj Singh
Power Your Active Directory Investment
www.specopssoft.com

 

[M.G.]

Hi Harj, thanks.

I can't understand some points.

You say that I can shut down the w2k dc for a few days but not too long.
Why?


What I want is to remove it definitively and , but before doing that, I
prefer to shut it down to see if everything works well without the old
server.

 

[Hank Arnold]

If the DC is off-line for longer than 60 days, it could cause
significant problems. This is called the Tombstone period. If it's only
a few days, you should be just fine..... If everything is OK, you can
bring it back on-line and DCPROMO it...

Regards,
Hank Arnold

 

[Harj]

Hi,

Like Hank mentioned you can keep it off for less than 60 days unless
you have extended the tombstone period manually which is really not
recommended.
Just keep it offline for a few weeks, bring it back online and let them
both replicate all the changes within the last few weeks, and then a
nice graceful demotion.

When an Active Directory object is deleted (or in your case removed),
it is not fully and immediately removed from Active Directory. Instead
the majority of the attributes are stripped out and the object is moved
to the deleted items container. This remaining object is called a
tombstone. This tombstone object is replicated to all domain
controllers in that respective domain so that they can learn of the
object deletion. In this manner, the original object is no longer
available to anyone searching Active Directory for it, but it is
tombstoned.

The default tombstone lifetime value is 60 days. Active Directory will
not allow data to be restored to the directory from data that is older
than the tombstone lifetime. If this were to happen, the restored
object would have an Update Sequence Number (USN) too old to trigger
Active Directory replication. In this scenario, the object would never
be replicated out to other domain controllers, and the restored domain
controller would never replicate in to the necessary information to
delete the object. Active Directory on the local server would thus
become inconsistent.

This is the reason that it is not a good idea to leave it off for more
than 60 days.

Harj Singh
Power Your Active Directory Investment
www.specopssoft.com

 

[Harj]

Hi,

Like Hank mentioned you can keep it off for less than 60 days unless
you have extended the tombstone period manually which is really not
recommended.
Just keep it offline for a few weeks, bring it back online and let them
both replicate all the changes within the last few weeks, and then a
nice graceful demotion.

When an Active Directory object is deleted (or in your case removed),
it is not fully and immediately removed from Active Directory. Instead
the majority of the attributes are stripped out and the object is moved
to the deleted items container. This remaining object is called a
tombstone. This tombstone object is replicated to all domain
controllers in that respective domain so that they can learn of the
object deletion. In this manner, the original object is no longer
available to anyone searching Active Directory for it, but it is
tombstoned.

The default tombstone lifetime value is 60 days. Active Directory will
not allow data to be restored to the directory from data that is older
than the tombstone lifetime. If this were to happen, the restored
object would have an Update Sequence Number (USN) too old to trigger
Active Directory replication. In this scenario, the object would never
be replicated out to other domain controllers, and the restored domain
controller would never replicate in to the necessary information to
delete the object. Active Directory on the local server would thus
become inconsistent.

This is the reason that it is not a good idea to leave it off for more
than 60 days.

Harj Singh
Power Your Active Directory Investment
www.specopssoft.com

 

[M.G.]

Thank you very much.

I find very important everything you said.

I finally will have both servers online and in a few days I will demote the
old one.