Demoting single PDC offline.

[IceHockeyRock]

Need some urgent confirmation...

Is it possible to build a single NT4 PDC Offline, then still offline demote it to a BDC?

Thanks!

 

[RiezalR]

I think it is possible to build a PDC offline. Only BDC's need to be linked to a PDC during installation for replication of the PDC's user account directory.

As for demoting to a BDC, i haven't tried this myself. I don't see any problem in doing so, unless the BDC needs to synchronise with a PDC when it is being demoted. I think it should be alright.

 

[rdroske]

You can definitely build it. The issue will come in when you plug it into the network that already has a PDC running.
You don't get an option to demote the only PDC unless you are promoting a BDC so you are going to have two PDCs for some period of time.

That will be a little funky, definitely going to be some error messages, but it looks like it might work

You might want to read this article.

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;167248

Its a little iffy because it talks about situations where for some reason each PDC boots successfully because it can't see the other one (ie router between them is down) and the reason for not seeing each other goes away.

Doesn't really say you can boot another one up if it sees the existing one.

Is there a BDC also on the network? Seems like that would make this easier.

Good luck and post back how that works if you can.