Re: Test lab: DC Promotion and removal process

I have an article on creating a test AD Domain. This hopefully covers
everything you need

See
http://www.pbbergs.com/windows/articles.htm

There are also articles on decommissioning a dc and upgrading AD

--
Paul Bergson
MVP - Directory Services
MCT, MCSE, MCSA, Security+, BS CSci
2003, 2000 (Early Achiever), NT

http://www.pbbergs.com

Please no e-mails, any questions should be posted in the NewsGroup
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

"Marvin Cummings" <marvc@xxxxxxxxxxx (NoSpam)> wrote in message
news:F34771DF-3A16-49B9-8931-6BC1B85CA10D@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
In preparation for an upcoming domain migration I need to set up a new
test
lab and want to use a DC and all AD objects from the current domain. I
promote a member server to be a DC, point DNS to itself, make it a GC, and
allow time for replication. I then compare the size of the NTDS.DIT file
to
other DC's and notice that they're all different but the new file is the
same
if not smaller or larger than others so all "looks" well. I'm able to log
into the new DC and can connect to AD.
I now need to move this DC into the test lab and this is where I get lost.
Once I place the DC in the lab and power it on I notice an extreme delay
in
the boot process. By this I mean the system gets stuck at the "Preparing
network settings" process for almost 10 minutes before finally resting at
the
login prompt. When attempting to log in I get an error basically saying
the
domain isn't available. I've searched and have yet to come up with a
"documented" solution for this process. I know about the domain rename and
system state restore processes and have been able to successfully restore
the
system state to another server, log in, and have full access to all AD
objects. The problem here lies with either corrupted TCP/IP settings or
hardware issues due to it having been restored to a different model
server. I
don't want to rename the domain unless I "absolutely have to". So I'm
wondering if anyone can help shed some light on my issues before I'm
forced
to call Microsoft.

Any responses appreciated.


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