Replication Probelm, Moving server

[Kevin Zabek]

Hopefully someone can help me out with this one...

I have one domain that is loacted at 2 offices connected with a VPN. One
office has 2 domain controller servers (serverA and serverT) and the other
office has 1 domain controller server (serverB). All servers are running
active directory and are supposed to be replicating with each other.
ServerB has not been replicating. I have just purchased a new server
(serverC) which is currently located at the office with serverA and serverT.
Active directory is up and running on it and it is replicating fine with A
and T.

Now I want to move serverC to the other office with serverB. When I bring
it down there I do not want it to start to replicate with serverB. There is
a different IP scheme at the second office so I am wondering what steps I
should follow to accomplish this.

Should I shut down serverC, remove it from Active Directory, then change
it's IP address when I get it to the second office?
Should I remove it from Active Directory, change it's IP address, then shut
it down to move it?

With serverB, should I demote it from a Domain Controller before bringing in
serverC as the domain controller?
Once serverC is at the second office I need to make sure it replicates with
the other office and not serverB.

Any help with the steps I should follow would be appreciated.
Thanks,

Kevin

 

[Ray Lava [MSFT]]

Kevin,

In response to what you need to do with ServerB depends on a couple of
things.

1. If Server B has not replicated in more than 60 days with your other DCs,
you have no choice but to demote forcefully, clean it out of AD on one of
the other good DCs in the original site and then repromote ServerB back to a
DC in the remote site.
a. Windows 2000 SP4 provides a new forceremoval option to allow you to
demote DCs that will not demote on their own. (Normally, you cannot demote
a DC if it cannot replicate off changes make locally). See kb article
332199 for information on how to do this.
b. If you forcefully demote ServerB, you will have to clean it out of
active directory on one of the other remaining DCs. See kb article 216498
for instructions on how to do metadata cleanup.
c. Once ServerB has been demoted and cleaned out of AD, you can then
repromote it to be a DC again.


2. If it has not been more than 60 days since ServerB last replicated, you
should not have to demote it. If this is the case then you need to
determine why it is not replicating with the DCs in the home site. It could
be DNS misconfiguration, a bad secure channel, incorrect user rights
assignments, etc. You may want to focus on getting ServerB replicating
correctly with the other DCs before moving ServerC over from the other site.
You can either fix ServerB's replication problems or just demote ServerB
following the steps listed in the first section just to get it out of the
picture completely. Then you will not have to worry about its impact on
ServerC.


Here is your action plan for getting Server C moved to the new site.
a. Take ServerC off the network (unplug its network connection). Then
assign ServerC the IP address that you want it to have once it gets to the
remote site.
b. Make sure ServerC points to a valid DNS server and then feel free to
shut it down. Essentially, we want ServerC's IP information to be
preconfigured for the remote site.
c. Go into your DNS manager at the main site and remove the SRV (Host)
record for Server C from the domain. This will remove the old, incorrect IP
address for ServerC. If you have DNS on ServerC, you will want to do this
to itself as well to avoid any potential conflicts.
d. Shut ServerC down and take it to the new site. Reboot it online and
it will reregister in DNS with its new IP address during the reboot. At
that point it should be replicating again unless you are having some kind of
networking issue with you VPN.

I hope this helps.

Ray Lava
Microsoft Corporation

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights