Restoring AD to a Hot Site

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We are restoring a 2003 DC off of the network to simulate restoring at our
hot site. I am using exact hardware to restore to, but am having problems
with AD starting. The server boots and I can login, but can't get to AD
Users and Computers, WINS, DNS, DHCP, AD Sites and Services, etc. It is like
AD won't start until it replicates with another DC, but in a D\R scenario
that won't be the case. When I try to open AD Users and Computers the error
I get is domain cannot be contacted. Any suggestions?
 
I'm guessing the frs hasn't started so the dc hasn't started being a dc.

For starters go clean up the test metadata (NOT your production system) by
following the link and removing all dc cruft.
http://support.microsoft.com/?id=216498

Rebuild the frs
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;315457

Finally
Run diagnostics against your test Active Directory domain.

If you don't have the tools installed, install them from your server install
disk.
d:\support\tools\setup.exe

Run dcdiag and netdiag in verbose mode.

If you download a gui script I wrote it should be simple to set and run. It
has the option to run individual tests without having to learn all the
switch options.

The script is at http://pbbergs.dynu.com/windows/windows.htm, download it
and save it to c:\program files\support tools\

Just select both dcdiag and netdiag make sure verbose is set. (Leave the
default settings for dcdiag as set when selected)

When complete search for fail, error and warning messages.



--


Paul Bergson MCT, MCSE, MCSA, CNE, CNA, CCA

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.
 
Erik Campana said:
We are restoring a 2003 DC off of the network to simulate restoring at our
hot site. I am using exact hardware to restore to, but am having problems
with AD starting. The server boots and I can login, but can't get to AD
Users and Computers, WINS, DNS, DHCP, AD Sites and Services, etc. It is
like
AD won't start until it replicates with another DC, but in a D\R scenario
that won't be the case. When I try to open AD Users and Computers the
error
I get is domain cannot be contacted. Any suggestions?
Click to expand...


Follow Paul's advice but here are couple of additional ideas
or questions:

How SPECIFICALLY are you 'restoring' to the identical hardware?

Is this identical hardware on the net with the running DCs (even though
that won't be the case when you do true recovery?)

Is the identical hardware using the identical IP address? (again, is
it on the net with the running machines...)

What do you see if you type: Net Start (copy and paste the TEXT, not
graphics if you wish us to review it.)

What does DCDiag (on this DC) report? (Again save the text and search
it for Fail, Warn, Error, or paste the text here.)
 
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