Active directory displays "The server is not operational"

[bludbunny]

Hi crew - I need some help (like most people here!)

Monday morning when attempting to modify some rights for a user, I went to start up "AD Computers and Users" to do the changes and it displayed the following message:
>
Naming information cannot be displayed because:
The server is not operational.
Contact your system administrator...... etc etc
<
This is very strange, as no changes have been made to my servers. This error also comes up on BP3, but BP2 is fine. My simple setup is as follows:
3 servers (bp1,bp2 and bp3) Running win 2000 server spack 4. BP1 acting as operations master.
It has run fine in this config for about over 2 years.

Over the last few months+, I have been attempting fight with some DNS problems: ie.

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;259277

but have given up - I still get the errors with DNS. This has not really been an issue, as everything has run smooth up until now.
I am just wondering if the problems are linked somehow.

Any help would be appreciated.

cheers,
Brett

 

[bludbunny]

OK

Working my way through the problem so far - it looks as though dns is the problem. I have used both DNSLINT and REPADMIN. DNSLINT shows that the DNS does not have a CNAME for the servers with the GUID. REPADMIN shows that the dns lookups are not working thus stoppinf replication.

Anyone got any ideas - how can I put in correct DNS entries for the server using the GUID? I am starting too get in too deep with this stuff - it's been so long since I studied this stuff!!!

cheers,
Brett