-----Original Message-----
One of my AD domain controllers will stop responding
(hang) one to two times a week. By "stop responding" I
mean no ping, no RPC (net use) no RDP sessions obviously.
I am also receiving domain wide error messages stating
that a domain controller can not be located. As well as
differing types of user authentication error messages. I
know this is vague, but has anyone worked through this
type of symptom?
Thanks Russ
.
Russ,
I have not seen this problem before but let's see what we
can do. I am going to guess that there is a DNS issue.
First off, let's try to gather some information from you:
1) How many DCs do you have in your environment?
2) How many Sites?
3) Do all/some of your DCs run DDNS?
4) Is this a single domain/tree/forest situation?
5) Do you see any event ids in your log files?
6) Have you installed the Support Tools on all of your
DCs ( well, actually all WIN2000 Servers! )?
The Support Tools are located in two different places:
the WIN2000 Server CD in the Support | Tools folder and
the WIN2000 Service Pack CD in the Support | Tools
folder. I would use the Service Pack CD if possible.
The Support Tools will give you some very useful
utilities that will help us. I would start off with
installing the Support Tools on all of your DCs and
running the following from a command
prompt: 'netdiag /fix' followed by 'dcdiag /v'
and 'netdiag /v'. You might want to post the results in
this NG so that we can take a look. Just an FYI: there
are several other very useful utilities included such as
NETDOM, NLTEST, REPADMIN, REPLMON, etc.
Remember to give everything time to replicate.
The 'netdiag /fix' *should* take care of some basic
things.
I would also ask you to take a look at your DNS MMC. Is
everything there? I am going to guees that not
everything is there. If you are not very familiar with
what "everything" means, no worries. We can help you
with that.
I assume that all of your DCs ( servers, for that
matter ) have a Static IP Address and that your DHCP
Server is configured properly. This most problably does
not apply to your problem but since we are here let's
just make sure.
Also, since we are here: are you familiar with the five
FSMO Roles? Are they all available? You might want to
go to each DC and at a command prompt enter 'netdom query
fsmo'. This will tell you. Again, this might not have
anything to do with your problem but let's just rule it
out.
I would ask you to consider doing these things and
letting us know what happens.
HTH,
Cary
