Link to home
Start Free TrialLog in
Avatar of kstaker
kstaker

asked on

NT4.0 server to Windows 2003

Office currently has an old NT4.0 PDC, no BDCs.  

They recently purchased a new dell shipping with Windows 2003 Server.  My question is:  Can I join the 2003 machine to the NT domain and promote the machine?  I do not want to change the domain name or anything, and exchange is not present in the setup.  I simply want to retain the domain, but replace the PDC with a 2003 server.  

Please tell me I can do that easily. :-)

Keegan
Avatar of kstaker
kstaker

ASKER

It seems the experts are mute...  Come on.... I'll even increase the points!
It's not going to be that easy.  you just can't promote the W2K3 server to a domain controller in an NT domain.  You need to either convert the PDC or create a new domain.  There are tools that you can use to transfer user accounts, etc to the new parallel domain.  

If you choose to convert the current PDC, you really should load a computer and make it a bdc.  Then you can promote this one to PDC and do the conversion to W2K3.  Take the original PDC, now a bdc, down during the process for fallback purpose.  Now you can promote the W2K3 Dell server to a domain controller.  Transfer all the FSMO roles, make it a Global Catalog server and get rid of the interim computer.  Then reload the original PDC with either NT or W2K3 and attach it to the domain.
Avatar of kstaker

ASKER

OK, I have a new plan.  I think its my best option, but points go to anyone with a better one:

I'm going to take the new clean 2003 server, and wipe it, install NT 4.0 and make it a BDC.  I will then promote that machine to PDC and do the upgrade.  The old server cannot handle 2003 and even trying would scare me.  

My assumption is that i would not need an additional BDC as the current PDC would become the BDC and serve as a backup in case of trouble.

Any pitfalls in this plan?

No that will work.  Your only problem may be having NT drivers on the Dell.  Make sure it's compatible.
ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION
Avatar of virtualfreak
virtualfreak

Link to home
membership
This solution is only available to members.
To access this solution, you must be a member of Experts Exchange.
Start Free Trial
Avatar of kstaker

ASKER

What NT drivers?  You're saying the NT may not be compatible with new hardware?  I never considered that.  

I'm talking about a brand new NT install on the dell... I guess i would need NIC drivers, and storage drivers... anything else?
SOLUTION
Link to home
membership
This solution is only available to members.
To access this solution, you must be a member of Experts Exchange.
Start Free Trial
SOLUTION
Link to home
membership
This solution is only available to members.
To access this solution, you must be a member of Experts Exchange.
Start Free Trial
Avatar of kstaker

ASKER

Thanks for all this input guys, let me tell you what ended up happening.

Given that we could not upgrade the NT PDC due to minimum requirements, and given that we did not want to install NT 4.0 on our new 2003 server for fear of trouble as cited by vern, in addition to the fact that we were unable to find drivers for NT for many of its components, we had to come up with an "out of the box" solution.

Using a brand new XP workstation, we installed VMWare with windows NT server and named it tempsv.  We then promoted tempsv to be PDC, thus promoting our old PDC, server_1 to BDC.  We then removed that machine from the network and upgraded the NT4.0 installation to 2000 server, installed active directory and upgraded the domain.  We then brought out 2003 server online, joined the domain, upgraded AD, and migrated the 5 server operations master roles to the new 2003 Server.  WE then removed tempsv from the network, joined server_1 back on, and now we have a 2003 domain with a NT4.0 BDC.

Thanks for the input.