rebuilding AD + domain if DC dies ?

[scott]

heres a thing.....

running win2k domain using AD and your DC blows up. can another file server
be prompted to DC using dcpromo tool ?

does it have a copy of AD automatically or is it something you have to do ?

could my exchange server in theory be used to do this ?

what replaces the BDC function of NT4 ?

scott.

 

[Chris Knapp]

You cannot promote a member server to a DC unless there is a functioning DC
on the network that it can get a copy of the AD schema from. Member servers
do not have a copy of the AD schema on them. You would obviously have to do
this before the existing DC dies. Always a good idea to have 2 DC's.

If you only have 2 servers (File & Exchange) I would personally recommend
making them both DC's. Rebuilding Active Directory is probably the most time
consuming task there is.

2000 & 2003 Active Directories do not really use the concept of Primary &
Backup Domain Controllers. Each DC is basically a live copy of the directory
and is in constant contact with its peers. Note that DC's do have certain
"Roles" that must be transferred before they can be removed. You can't tell
what role(s) each DC has unless you run a few scripts from the command
prompt. Running dcpromo on a DC automatically transfers the roles (if it has
any) to other DC's. Losing a DC and failing to bring it back up again can
cause problems with your AD unless you know how to manually edit the roles.

 

[scott]

Thanks for the reply.

I guess im better working towards setting up another DC.

Is this fairly straight forward ?

Thanks
Scott.

 

[Chris Knapp]

Fairly easy actually. You can let the wizard do it for you.