Question

2003 R2 to 2008 R2 Domain Controller Migration

Asked by: Fester7572

I am starting to put together plans to migrate our AD domain to 2008 R2. The domain history is as folllows:
Single 2003 Domain Controller retired and migrated to 2 * 2003 R2 32bit DCs using standard microsoft methods (ADPREP, DCPROMO and migrating FSMO roles). Both are Global Catalog servers and host DNS, DHCP and WINS.
We would now like to move to 2008 R2 64bit which I appreciate means a re-install. The hardware side of things is fine.
Ideally I would like to retain the server names (more for documentation and historical reason as well as to hopefully not have to touch Exchange 2003 configuration immediately as we plan to go to 2010 when that is released). My question is this.
Is there any reason not to follow this basic procedure:
1) Migrate any FSMO roles off one of the 2003 R2 DCs (DC2) and remove Global Catalog from it
2) DCPromo it to demote it
3) Remove it from the domain
4) Install 2008 R2 and give server same name as old DC2 and join as member server
5) ADPrep as documented
6) DCPromo to make it a DC
7) Migrate FSMO roles to it and make it a Global Catalog server. Install DNS.
8) Repeat steps except for ADPrep of the first DC. The first server is also a certificate server. Certificate services will be uninstalled and migrated to a 64 bit virtual machine to allow for easier migration in the future.
9) Once both DCs are completed install DHCP and configure using the new Split Scope feature.

Thanks in advance for any advice given.

Darren

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Asked On
2009-09-18 at 00:02:05ID24742423
Topic

Active Directory

Participating Experts
2
Points
500
Comments
5

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Answers

 

by: mkline71Posted on 2009-09-18 at 00:10:03ID: 25363417

Very good, you have done your homework and definitely forward thinking as you all are already planning exchange 2010 and even using the new split scope wizard.

Can't really add much, after the dcpromo for demotion make sure to delete the server from sites and services manually.  

For the adprep you will be using adprep32.exe from the 2008 R2 DVD

During the 2008 dcpromo the GC option will be checked by default which is nice.

If I think of anything else I'll let you know but you have done a good job here.

Thanks

Mike

 

by: Fester7572Posted on 2009-09-18 at 00:13:21ID: 25363433

Thanks for the quick response. I'd forgotten about sites and services so I'll add that in to my plans.

Any issue in your opinion in keeping the old names?

 

by: mkline71Posted on 2009-09-18 at 00:30:20ID: 25363511

Nope no issues, also this same question came up on activedir last week, here is that thread

http://www.activedir.org/ListArchives/tabid/55/forumid/1/postid/36713/view/topic/Default.aspx</A>

Jorge (top MVP) suggested intstalling from media but that is because the poster there had DC's across the enterprise.

The important thing is to make sure you cleanup everything from your old DC, with only 2 DCs you won't need to force replication across multiple sites.  Intrasite replication between two servers is measured in seconds.

Thanks

Mike

 

by: Fester7572Posted on 2009-09-18 at 00:34:31ID: 31630421

Thanks very much for the advice.

 

by: GPPSD2357Posted on 2009-12-13 at 19:13:48ID: 26041844

I just did this exact thing and all worked out very well. Keep the same names was important to us.

20120131-EE-VQP-002

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