How to Remove old/thumbstone objects ?

[kokaina]

I have 4 domain controllers in my Domain.
2 DC ( let’ say DC1 and DC2 )are in my office , and other 2 DC ( DC3 and DC4 ) are in different locations.
Between my office and other locations is VPN.
The problem is , that DC3 is not replicated with my domain for very long time. This is was not a problem for my network, because is was only for testing purpose.
DC4 is now no longer in our network, and I don’t have access to server.
THE question is, HOW TO REMOVE this 2 DC ( dc3 and DC4 ) for my domain, because I receive a lot of errors like:
The Knowledge Consistency Checker (KCC) was unable to form a complete spanning tree network topology. As a result, the following list of sites cannot be reached from the lo cal site. Sites: CN=xxx,CN=Sites,CN=Configuration,DC=xxxxxx,DC=msft


And



This is the replication status for the following directory partition on the local domain controller. Directory partition: CN=Configuration,DC=xxxxxx,DC=msft The local d omain controller has not recently received replication information from a number of domain controllers. The count of domain controllers is shown, divided into the following intervals. More than 24 hours: 2 More than a week: 2 More than one month: 1 More than two months: 1 More than a tombstone lifetime: 1 Tombstone lifetime (days): 60 Domain controllers that do not replicate in a timely manner may encounter errors. It may miss password changes and be unable to authenticate. A DC that has not replicated in a tombstone lifetime may have missed the deletion of some objects, and may be automatically blocked from future replication until it is reconciled. To identify the domain controllers by name, install the support tools included on the installation CD and run dcdiag.exe. You can also use the support tool repadmin.exe to display the replication latencies of the domain controllers in the forest. The command is "repadmin /showvector /latency ".

So, there is a way to force this 2 DC to be out of my domain.

 

[basst]

Here is the procedure:

HOW TO: Remove Data in Active Directory After an Unsuccessful Domain Controller Demotion
SUMMARY
This article describes how to remove data in the Active Directory after an unsuccessful domain controller demotion.

WARNING: If you use the ADSI Edit snap-in, the LDP utility, or any other LDAP version 3 client, and you incorrectly modify the attributes of Active Directory objects, you can cause serious problems. These problems may require you to reinstall Microsoft Windows 2000 Server, Microsoft Exchange 2000 Server, or both. Microsoft cannot guarantee that problems that occur if you incorrectly modify Active Directory object attributes can be solved. Modify these attributes at your own risk.

The DCPROMO (Dcpromo.exe) utility is used for promoting a server to a domain controller and demoting a domain controller to a member server (or to a standalone server in a workgroup if the domain controller is the last in the domain). As part of the demotion process, the DCPROMO utility removes the configuration data for the domain controller from the Active Directory. This data takes the form of an "NTDS Settings" object, which exists as a child to the server object in the Active Directory Sites and Services Manager.

The information is in the following location in the Active Directory:

CN=NTDS Settings,CN=<servername>,CN=Servers,CN=<sitename>,CN=Sites,CN=Configuration,DC=<domain>...

The attributes of the NTDS Settings object include data representing how the domain controller is identified in respect to its replication partners, the naming contexts that are maintained on the machine, whether or not the domain controller is a Global Catalog server, and the default query policy. The NTDS Settings object is also a container that may have child objects that represent the domain controller's direct replication partners. This data is required for the domain controller to operate within the environment, but is retired upon demotion.

In the event that the NTDS Settings object is not removed properly (for example, the NTDS Settings object is not properly removed from a demotion attempt), the administrator can use the Ntdsutil.exe utility to manually remove the NTDS Settings object. The following steps list the procedure for removing the NTDS Settings object in the Active Directory for a given domain controller. At each NTDSUTIL menu, the administrator can type help for more information about the available options.

Caution: The administrator should also check that replication has occurred since the demotion before manually removing the NTDS Settings object for any server. Using the NTDSUTIL utility improperly can result in partial or complete loss of Active Directory functionality.

Procedure
1. Click Start, point to Programs, point to Accessories, and then click Command Prompt.
2. At the command prompt, type ntdsutil, and then press ENTER.
3. Type metadata cleanup, and then press ENTER. Based on the options given, the administrator can perform the removal, but additional configuration parameters need to be specified before the removal can occur.
4. Type connections and press ENTER. This menu is used to connect to the specific server on which the changes occur. If the currently logged on user does not have administrative permissions, alternate credentials can be supplied by specifying the credentials to use before making the connection. To do so, type set creds domain nameusernamepassword and press ENTER. For a null password, type null for the password parameter.
5. Type connect to server servername, and then press ENTER. You should receive confirmation that the connection is successfully established. If an error occurs, verify that the domain controller being used in the connection is available and the credentials you supplied have administrative permissions on the server.

Note: If you try to connect to the same server that you want to delete, when you try to delete the server that step 15 refers to, you may receive the following error message:
Error 2094. The DSA Object cannot be deleted0x2094

6. Type quit, and then press ENTER. The Metadata Cleanup menu appears.
7. Type select operation target and press ENTER.
8. Type list domains and press ENTER. A list of domains in the forest is displayed, each with an associated number.
9. Type select domain number and press ENTER, where number is the number associated with the domain to which the server you are removing is a member. The domain you select is used to determine if the server being removed is the last domain controller of that domain.
10. Type list sites and press ENTER. A list of sites, each with an associated number, is displayed.
11. Type select site number and press ENTER, where number is the number associated with the site to which the server you are removing is a member. You should receive a confirmation listing the site and domain you chose.
12. Type list servers in site and press ENTER. A list of servers in the site, each with an associated number, is displayed.
13. Type select server number, where number is the number associated with the server you want to remove. You receive a confirmation listing the selected server, its Domain Name Server (DNS) host name, and the location of the server's computer account you want to remove.
14. Type quit and press ENTER. The Metadata Cleanup menu appears.
15. Type remove selected server and press ENTER. You should receive confirmation that the removal completed successfully. If you receive the following error message:
Error 8419 (0x20E3)
The DSA object could not be found
the NTDS Settings object may already be removed from the Active Directory as the result of another administrator removing the NTDS Settings object, or replication of the successful removal of the object after running the DCPROMO utility.

Note: You may also see this error when you attempt to bind to the domain controller that is going to be removed. Ntdsutil needs to bind to a domain controller other than the one that is going to be removed with metadata cleanup.
16. Type quit at each menu to quit the NTDSUTIL utility. You should receive confirmation that the connection disconnected successfully.
17. Remove the cname record in the _msdcs.root domain of forest zone in DNS. Assuming that DC is going to be reinstalled and re-promoted, a new NTDS settings object is created with a new globally unique identifier (GUID) and a matching cname record in DNS. You do not want the DC's that exist to use the old cname record.

As best practice you should delete the hostname and other DNS records. If the lease time that remains on Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) address assigned to offline server is exceeded then another client can obtain the IP address of the problem DC.
Now that the NTDS setting object has been deleted we can now delete the following objects:
1. Use ADSIEdit to delete the computer account in the OU=Domain Controllers,DC=domain...

Note: The FRS subscriber object is deleted when the computer object is deleted, since it is a child of the computer account.
2. Use ADSIEdit to delete the FRS member object in CN=Domain System Volume (SYSVOL share),CN=file replication service,CN=system....
3. In the DNS console, use the DNS MMC to delete the cname (also known as the Alias) record in the _msdcs container.
4. In the DNS console, use the DNS MMC to delete the A (also known as the Host) record in DNS.
5. If the deleted computer was the last domain controller in a child domain and the child domain was also deleted, use ADSIEdit to delete the trustDomain object for the child in CN=System, DC=domain, DC=domain, Domain NC.

NOTE: ADSIEdit is installed from the Windows 2000 CD Support / Tools, also register DLL by start | run regsvr32 "c:\program files\support tools\adsiedit.dll"