Win2k DC upgrade to Win2k3 at remote sites

Hi Everyone,



I just wanted to get a few opinions re my situation. In a nutshell, I'm
looking at upgrading our Win2k DC's to Win2k3 at all our remote sites across
the world without making a trip to these sites.

No server hardware will be replaced during this upgrade.

WAN links are poor and very slow.

The IT knowledge of staff at these sites are very limited and I would prefer
not asking them to assist with major issues.

These DC's do not hold any FSMO roles and would be a straight forward
upgrade.



What I thought of doing was building a fully replicated DC at our local
site, on completion, amend the IP address to an address at the site that it
will be shipped out to, number and remove the hard disks from the server,
ship them out to the remote site and asking a member of staff at the remote
site to insert the disks in the specified order. Then boot up the server,
connect to it and set/check replication partners etc.



Has anyone done this before? Or does anyone have any other ideas?



Many thanks

Shaun


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