server migration 2003-2008, advice needed

[3s-gtech]

You will need to update the schema (if you've never had a 2008 R2 server before), you won't need to upgrade the functional level. Upgrading the schema is very easy and painless - why not do it?

 

Edit: didn't read post properly! No, if it's not a DC you don't need to touch the schema.

Edited March 7, 2011 by 3s-gtech

[zag]

Guys, forgive me for being thicker than the offspring of a village idiot and a tv weather girl (to quote red warf) but should i be able to to add a 2008 r2 server as a member server to my 2003 domain without having to upgrade the schema? I will not be running it as a dc it will be strictly sql sims server only.

 

Yes you can.

[SmellyLlama]

Sorry guys, been on holiday... Thanks for the replies.. How did it go wrong llama? i want to keep the same name too, what is the best way to go about the renaming?

 

Hope you had a good time, we seem to be almost sorted here. When we renamed the new server you have to give it a second name and then promote that name to primary and then remove the secondary (old) name. That way everything can keep on working. hmmm let me find the site I used...

 

this looks like the one, this Petri site is full of good stuff

Rename Windows Server 2008 Domain Controllers

 

hope thats some help there!

[SkreeM1980]

I did my DC's to 2008 the other day, there is a really good MS whitepaper on it, which when i get in to the office i will find and link post the link. It was remarkably painless, although in our case i had 3x 2003 DC's (1 of them 64bit) and a spare(?) server. The 32Bit servers were DNS & DHCP and one of them also runs the backup software. In order to get everything to work properly i also needed to get the new servers onto the IP's of the old servers ... Oh and i did it on a live network, although it was half term we still had approx 100 staff in.

 

The process we followed was

 

Install spare server as 2008 R2

Perform the AD schema updates (used the 32 bit version from the r2 CD and ran it on the existing server holding Schema Master FSMO role)

Wait for AD to Replicate

DCPromo on the new server

In place upgrade on the 64Bit 2003 DC

Install DNS both 2008

Point Pri DNS on the 4 DC's to OLDDC02

Change IP of OLDDC01, do ipconfig /registerDNS and stop/start NETLOGON service

Change IP of NEWDC01 do ipconfig/registerdns and stop/start NETLOGON service

Move FSMO roles to NEWDC01

Demote OLDDC01

Change Pri DNS of 3x DC's to NEWDC01

Install DHCP on NEWDC02

do netsh DHCP Server Export all on OLDDC02

stop DHCP on OLDDC02

Change IP of OLDDC02 run ipconfig/registerdns and stop/start netlogon service

Change IP of NEWDC02 run ipconfig /registerdns and stop/start netlogon service

do netsh DHCP Server import all on NEWDC02

Dcpromo OLDDC02

 

The only pain i had was that somehow one of the new DC's managed to get DNS forwarders that didn't work, causing some problems with delivering outbound email. and i had to install WINS again for some shortnames to work.

 

Skr

[jjohnsoncantell]

Had a good time thanks llama. How do you give a server a second name? never done that or even realised it was possible.. Thanks for the walkthrough skreem, it will be most heklpful when i do this next week.

[SmellyLlama]

Had a good time thanks llama. How do you give a server a second name? never done that or even realised it was possible.. Thanks for the walkthrough skreem, it will be most heklpful when i do this next week.

 

How do, here's the link to Petri's site. We followed these instructions to add a second name and then promote that name and remove the old name thus negating another reinstall.

 

Rename Windows Server 2008 Domain Controllers

[jjohnsoncantell]

sorry had a blonde moment there... re read it and ive got it now.. Should i be able to add as a second name to my new 2k8dc the name of the current dc its replacing? Or will this cause merry hell?

[SmellyLlama]

sorry had a blonde moment there... re read it and ive got it now.. Should i be able to add as a second name to my new 2k8dc the name of the current dc its replacing? Or will this cause merry hell?

 

I would have thought that having 2 dc's with the same name was a definite no no (edit: confirmed) . We made a vmware copy of the old server and then installed 2008 on the main server. We called that NEWRDC and left the old one as it was. Copied all the stuff we needed off the old one and did the dcpromo. Then we renamed the old dc to OLDRDC and renamed the new one to the old name. (hope that makes sense!!)

[jjohnsoncantell]

yep that makes sense. Ill make sure i choose an alternate name.. One more thing thats struck me, thinking passwords now, none of our passwords would comply with password complexity that 2k8 uses. Will migrating the dc's to 2k8 force password changes for all the users?

[jjohnsoncantell]

can i update the schema/domain level when there are people using the domain?

[sukh]

yes you can. Best performed on the scheme master.

 

Sukh