Removing the last BDC

C

confused

We have one last BDC that is in our AD domain.

It is a real problem, because it is running Exchange 5.5,
WINS, DHCP, DNS, the last NT4 BDC, File and print (eggs,
basket).
We have plans to move Exchange and file services off, and
move DNS, DHCP and WINS to a new machine that will be
running Windows 2003. This is not a problem, and is
relatively straightforward.

But there is a problem that we noticed recently. When we
rebooted the NT4 BDC server after installing DFS to move
the files off the machine, it took a long time to reboot,
and in this time around 30% of our clients were unable to
log on and were being asked for authentication to access
other servers. These client machines had used this BDC
machine as their %LOGON_SERVER%. We have 4 other DCs that
are in the AD.

When we remove the last BDC, how long will it take before
clients no longer try to authenticate to it?
Can we force all clients to stop using the machine as
their BDC? Can we make clients unable to use this machine
for logons without impacting the clients?
 
D

David Adner

Not sure exactly, but what if you try shutting it down on a Friday and
asking users to shutdown their PC's for the weekend. For those who
follow instructions, they should point to one of the other DC's upon
bootup. For those who don't follow instructions, well, hopefully it
won't be many and you can troubleshoot as necessary.

And, I believe, if you pause the Netlogon service on the BDC, it'll stop
accepting new authentications but allow everyone else to remain. As
they reboot, etc, they'll age off, too.
 

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