Active Directory... server not responding

[ackitsme]

We have two Windows 2003 servers, both running Exchange 2003. The two servers are located in separate cities.

In the event that the secondary server is shut down, the primary continues on without interruption; Users from both sites are able to log in and access e-mail.

In the event that the primary server is shut down, the secondary fails to authenticate users and Exchange is completely unavailable (even the webaccess fails to work.)

It's almost as if Active Directory is not fully functioning on the secondary machine. This would also explain Exchange being unresponsive as it relies so heavily on AD.

Initially I thought maybe it was a DNS issue, but both servers have DNS services running locally for the AD and they both appear to be fully functional.

Is there something that I can check to make sure that the secondary server is authenticating using a local AD copy instead of the remote machine?

Thanks in advance.

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Charlie Silverman
Sr. Systems Administrator
Globalstar, LLC

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We now return you to your regularly scheduled reality.

 

[mlichstein]

Is the second server configured to point to itself for primary DNS?

What about the clients? Are they configured to use both DNS servers?

 

[technome]

Run Dcdiag, Netdiag, verbos mode, Nslookup, on both sites
check the event logs
check your global catalog is enabled on the secondary, without it no is logging in, with the FSMO down.

 

[M3John]

Verify in Sites/services whether your 2nd box is a Global catalog server. If your GC is down, your users won't be able to login.

 

[ackitsme]

At the suggestion, I did some research regarding the global catalog issue. It does appear that the second server was not set up with a global catalog.

We enabled the GC on the second server yesterday, and will be performing a downtime test this evening to verify that this solved the problem.

I'll post again tomorrow with the results.

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Charlie Silverman
Sr. Systems Administrator
Globalstar, LLC

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We now return you to your regularly scheduled reality.

 

[ackitsme]

Adding the global catalog to the second server fixed the login issue.

Thanks everyone for your help.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Charlie Silverman
Sr. Systems Administrator
Globalstar, LLC

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We now return you to your regularly scheduled reality.

 

[M3John]

glad things worked out!