AD SITES & SERVICES

[cjpmcglinchey]

Hi Folks

I have four servers on my network called, SERVER1,2,3,4.

When I open AD Sites and Services I am not getting all the servers automatically generated.

And when I try and replicate it says that server2 has exceeded the tombstone lifetime.

Any ideas greatly appreciated.

Thanks

Chris

 

[bofhrevenge2]

Has anything been changed recently on the server e.g. the time for any reason? If one of the servers indicates to the other servers that it's copy of Active Directory is more than 60 days out of date the other servers will not replicate with it.

 

[cjpmcglinchey]

Hi

I have checked all four servers and they all have the exact time & date.

Thanks
Chris

 

[bofhrevenge2]

They probably have the same time now but if it was different during a replication for any reason then it will be excluded from further updates and you won't find out for a while. I've seen a few similar cases where people have changed the time on an AD server to get around time elapsed serial keys not realising the problems that it can cause.

Here is a post from someone that had a similar sounding problem, it's worth looking into.

thread931-953167

I'm not certain but it does sound like a time sync related problem, the tombstone lifetime is 60 days by default so it could be this long since something happened.
If you look on the server that will not replicate do you notice any differences in the AD e.g. recently created groups or users that are missing, this may indicate how long the servers have not been replicating for.

 

[bofhrevenge2]

Remember that if you do try the suggestions in the thread to make sure you get a good backup of one of the good DC's. Even better would be to take one down if at all possible, that way you have a good offline copy.