Link to home
Start Free TrialLog in
Avatar of CMCITD
CMCITDFlag for United States of America

asked on

Upgrade 2003 Domain/AD to 2008R2 Recommendations

We currently have 2 domain controllers running Server 2003 x64.  Roles include AD, DHCP, DNS just regular Domain Controllers.  I am wanting to upgrade both servers to 2008R2.  What would be the best plan to get these upgraded?  I would like to avoid fresh installs on both servers since availability is critical since we are an active hospital open 24/7 and cannot have the servers offline for too long.  I have heard in place upgrades are also not the best way to go since there can be quite a bit of cleanup after the upgrade is complete?  Should I take down the secondary DC, run soley on server 1 while I do a fresh install on server 2.  Once server 2 is ready to go, dcpromo it migrate everything from server1 to it and then take down server 1 for a fresh install and then dc promo it back and pull the roles back from server 2?  Which would leave us running a single DC server at all times?  The tricky part I forgot to mention is that server1 is also a file server for all AD users home directories which would mean transferring all network resources over to server 2 and modifying the group policy to redirect the workstations where to locate mapped drives, etc.  I do have a virtual environment that I could try to transfer the physical hardware to a vm environment temporarily while the physical servers get upgraded and then transfer from vm back to physical using dc promo and other migration techniques? Any suggestions would be much appreciated.  I would like to hear that inplace upgrades are safe but there are alot of admins recommending against this approach.
SOLUTION
Avatar of comnuts
comnuts
Flag of Singapore image

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
ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION
Avatar of Darius Ghassem
Darius Ghassem
Flag of United States of America image

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