mirojr Posted February 22, 2010 Posted February 22, 2010 Hello, I am hoping to upgrade from server 2003 to server 2008 R2. Is this a straight forward process in anyones experience or am i going to have to create a new PDC and do all the role swapping etc I was hoping for to backup server and just run an upgrade! Am i deluded? Thanks.
Michael Posted February 22, 2010 Posted February 22, 2010 You can do this, but it's generally recommended to start again. I suppose it depends how many servers you have to play with. If you have just the one server then I would do a direct upgrade. If you have two servers, you can promote a secondary server as a DC, migrate all roles over, then install 2008 Server as new, then migrate all the roles back.
mirojr Posted February 22, 2010 Author Posted February 22, 2010 Thanks. I only have one server on site. I could poss bring a box from home and do the demote promote thing, but would find it easier to just upgrade
Michael Posted February 22, 2010 Posted February 22, 2010 Well you will need to make a full backup to a NAS (which is probably the quickest method) before performing an upgrade, so if it all goes wrong you have something to go back to.
cookie_monster Posted February 22, 2010 Posted February 22, 2010 Well you will need to make a full backup to a NAS (which is probably the quickest method) before performing an upgrade, so if it all goes wrong you have something to go back to. Agreed. I'd be tempted to use a workstation or old server to install a second DC then you have a working AD if the upgrade goes wrong. TBH i'd be tempted to do that anyway having just one DC leaves you open to big problems if that server fails.
mirojr Posted February 22, 2010 Author Posted February 22, 2010 Well I would be running a backup onto a usb drive. It will have all the data and system state on it. No way of doing a ASR, but at least its got the data. Last time some charity came to take some donated PC's and took our server also and sent it to africa after wiping the data, so i have had a worse case scenario.... though i do like the sound of a backup DC.... money though
cookie_monster Posted February 22, 2010 Posted February 22, 2010 Well I would be running a backup onto a usb drive. It will have all the data and system state on it. No way of doing a ASR, but at least its got the data. Last time some charity came to take some donated PC's and took our server also and sent it to africa after wiping the data, so i have had a worse case scenario.... though i do like the sound of a backup DC.... money though I can appreciate that but get a load of the price of this. HP ProLiant ML115 G5 Tower Server - Misco.co.uk
mirojr Posted February 22, 2010 Author Posted February 22, 2010 Thats good. Just the blinking OS then that would break the bank
cookie_monster Posted February 22, 2010 Posted February 22, 2010 Thats good. Just the blinking OS then that would break the bank Ah are you not in education? Education prices are about £50 for Windows server.
t_h Posted February 22, 2010 Posted February 22, 2010 I have one of those ML115s and they are very good for the price. If you can stretch to some extra RAM I would recommend it as 2008 R2 is a tiny bit sluggish on 1GB. Don't get me wrong it works, but another 1GB stick would work a treat. The only other niggle I have is a can't seem to find a working display driver for 2008 R2, which doesn't really matter anyway. Other than that it's solid.
tumbleweed Posted February 22, 2010 Posted February 22, 2010 R2 is 64-bit only - so you could upgrade if you're on a 64-bit OS to start with, otherwise it's start from scratch.
mirojr Posted February 22, 2010 Author Posted February 22, 2010 Where can i find the education priced OS. That sounds great. Thanks. Also I have this G5 Proliant that is supposed to support 64bit or 32bit software. Would it be recommended then to move over to 2008 R2 rather than 2008 32bit. I suppose sometime i will have to upgrade the server
cookie_monster Posted February 22, 2010 Posted February 22, 2010 Where can i find the education priced OS. That sounds great. Thanks. Also I have this G5 Proliant that is supposed to support 64bit or 32bit software. Would it be recommended then to move over to 2008 R2 rather than 2008 32bit. I suppose sometime i will have to upgrade the server Education pricing is available to schools and colleges only. There's quite a few resellers Pugh is one they can do charity pricing as well. Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 Standard | Microsoft | Products | ... discounted software for education establishments the software licensing specialist 1
r_peel Posted July 24, 2012 Posted July 24, 2012 Sorry to jump on an old thread but I thought it might be better then starting a new one. I also need to upgrade a Windows Server 2003 to 2008 R2 server howver I only have the one physical machine and would prefer to do a clean install as opposed to trying to upgrade. Could anyone tell me how I can backup all the shares from the existing server (Im reciving an "Unable to copy file" error when I try Copy / Paste to an external drive currently) as well as AD accounts (including passwords) and then restore them to the new server install? Unfortunately I'm also wanting to re-partition the Hard Drive to create more space so can just wipe the OS partition and keep the folder shares intact
fiza Posted July 24, 2012 Posted July 24, 2012 @r_peel Have a look at this Saving and restoring existing Windows shares
fiza Posted July 24, 2012 Posted July 24, 2012 I would be tempted to set up a PC as a temporary DC alongside your 2003 machine. Then wipe the 2003 machine, rebuild it as 2008 R2. Make sure you move FSMO roles to the temporary DC. You would need to do FORESTPREP and ADPREP on the temporary DC before joining a 2008 R2 server to the domain.
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