Make a server a non server

[TechSupp]

Background is that I have a spare server with 2008 R2 installed and I want to utilise this server, probably for minecraft. Now I installed 2008 and didn't select it to have any roles I,e, DHCP, DNS etc as I didn't want it to conflict or cause issues. Now had this server turned on an on the network when I moved our main curriculum server to the new server room. Booted curriculum server and something conflicted as couldn't get clients to log on, server network just kept saying it was trying to identify the network etc. Unplugged spare server, rebooted main server... all back to normal, so its something that the spare server is doing. Its not even joined to the domain, just left it as a workgroup at the moment.

What do I need to do to allow the spare server to sit on our network without causing issues?

[fairm010]

Does it share the same IP address? Or server name?

[3s-gtech]

Does it have a reserved IP address corresponding to its MAC address in DHCP, which then conflicts with a static address on the new curriculum server?

[TechSupp]

No it has a totally different server name, curriculum server is Goliath, spare server is Hercules and main server ip is static and the spare server was getting them by dhcp from main curriculum server

[sniffingmoose]

I have a server 2003 sitting on the network not doing anything apart from extra local backup. Make sure its fully demoted and no longer a DC and your newer server is not trying replicate itself to it. Also no server roles.

 

Also I have found that sometimes there are references to an old server in the registry of your client PC's that caused me loads of problems when installed new servers.

 

Best thing to do, if you can stay late so one is logged on, connect your old server back onto the network and look in the logs. This will give you a clue whats going on. Best also to turn off any old shares on the old server so users cant gain access.

 

Chris T

[DavetheITguy]

Make sure you haven't got a reservation in DHCP.

[Michael]

Is this spare server an existing 2008 R2 Server, or did you format and re-install 2008 R2 as new?

 

I would double check what role(s) it definitely has, as it sounds either like an IP conflict or possibly it's acting as a rogue DHCP Server. Do you have VLANs configured?

[TechSupp]

Thanks for the suggestions, it has dual network ports and both plugged in (or were plugged in!), it was a fresh install of 2008, no roles assigned. Will give the cards static ip's just to make sure I know what its getting.

 

Update: Just thinking, could it have been that I had both network ports plugged in at same time? On main server when spare server was plugged in (with both cables) I could see two instances of Hercules (which I presume is correct as two ports and two IP's), anyway, given both ports a separate IP now and will just plug a single one in and see what happens.

Edited June 15, 2015 by TechSupp

[DavetheITguy]

If you have a reservation in DHCP, it will store the Mac address for the network cards.

[TechSupp]

Just got it on one network connection at moment and its picking up ip from main server dhcp and all seems fine. Problem seems to have been that I had the spare server running first and then fired up the curriculum server.