Win Nt Servers Lost PDC

[flashes24]

My company has 2 Servers running Windows NT 4.0 SP6 and 1 running Win 2003 Server (no AD). They were all connected before, but recently we lost the PDC and had to start from scratch on this server. Now all BDC's are PDC's. Can the network be reconnected? If so, HOW?

We are also looking at upgrading the NT's to Win 2003. Do we have to upgrade to Win Server 2000 first?

 

[AndrewTait]

Fist things first. You will only have one BDC if you have 2 servers running NT4.0. The 2003 server might be running in compatable mode if it is showing up as a BDC.

Firstly make sure that your 2003 is only a member server. This can be done by running dcpromo

Secondly, you cannot have more than one PDC per domain, so check to see if you have mistyped the domain name or some such thing. The BDC should have manually been promoted to PDC when your PDC disappeared, by using server manager. This would allow your network to continue despite the crash of the PDC.

Thirdly, when you rebuilt your PDC, it should have been built as a BDC and then promoted to a PDC which would then automatically demote the PDC to a BDC. This again can be done in server manager.

I would suggest that you trash your original PDC, and re-install it again as a BDC, and follow the instructions above. Alternatively, there is a tool called u-promote. However, it is somewhat costly for demoting/promoting more than one server.

As for the upgrades to Windows 2003, no you do not need to upgrade to 2000 first. I have just done an NT4 to 2003 upgrade myself, and some of the issues to watch for are incompatable drivers and the fact that if you remove the last of the NT domain controllers, you will have to go to Active Directory.

Hope this helps.

Andy

He's not the messiah, he's a very naughty boy (Monty Python's The Life of Brian)