import AD from parallel installation; possible?

[PCGCU]

I just had to reinstall Win2000 Server in a parallel directory and it seems that my AD backup is corrupt. (that is an entirely different story) Is there a way to "import" my AD from the parallel directory into the new directory install? I set up the new install the same as the previous corrupt install, a DC.

Thanks much in advance!

Eph 2:10

 

[Seaspray0]

As long as you have a working domain controller with a good copy of active directory, you can add another domain controller and active directory will replicate to it automatically.

Question for the DC that died, did it host any FSMO roles? If yes, then seize them to the working DC and reformat the DC that died, reload the OS and promote it to a DC again.


Start, Help. You'll be surprised what's there. A+/MCP/MCSE/MCDBA

 

[PCGCU]

Thanks! Your right about Help and believe it or not the "Getting Started" book actually mentions to look there as well. Surprising to me considering what kind of documentation that comes with most OSs these days.

Unfortunately, even afer using chkdsk /r there are still corrupt files. I fear the disc itself is going. If I can partition off another segment of the drive and put the fresh install there, instead of a parllel directory, I assume the replication will still happen? Of course the last time I tried something like this with XP the boot.ini file was not modified and I could not gain access to either OS.

Eph 2:10

 

[PCGCU]

UGH! I can't seem to do a parallel installation because of errors reading the disc. Yet, CHKDSK /P reports no errors. When the installtion runs I get a stop error

Stop: 0xc0000218 {Registry File Failure}
The registry cannot load the hive (file):
\SystemRoot\System32\Config\SYSTEM or its log or alternate.
It is corrupt, absent, or not writable.

I thought the MSKB article #156640 was supposed to solve this issue. Why would CHKDSK report no errors and yet I can't seem to get a parallel clean install to work? Know of any DOS based Defrag programs? Besides DOS 6.0 that is cause I don't have that anymore.
Blessings,


Eph 2:10

 

[Seaspray0]

A dos based defrag will not help as Active Directory must reside on an NTFS partition.

Start, Help. You'll be surprised what's there. A+/MCP/MCSE/MCDBA

 

[dglienna]

Clone the drive before you start anything that may be harmful!

-David
2006 Microsoft Valueable Professional (MVP)
2006 Dell Certified System Professional (CSP)

 

[PCGCU]

diglienna: Yea, I had the drive on RAID but it seems that whatever caused the sever file corruption was just copied to the mirrored drive. The deeper I get into this them more it sounds like malacious behavior. But I scanned the drives daily so I'm not sure how it could be a virus, worm, trojan horse, etc. Although the later would certainly allow someone to gain access and screw with the files. Anyway, second dirve is mirrored.

I used a cool program called BootNG by Terabyte Unlimited to mirror the first drive to a USB DVD-R drive. Fast, efficient and cheap! My kind of tool.

Eph 2:10

 

[Seaspray0]

It's time to consider pulling out a backup and re'updating your domain from there. There is a dos utility tool that comes in the tools section that will dump all your active directory objects to a text file. It's not recommended as a backup and restore as I don't believe it retains the sid's or passwords (not a complete object backup), But... if you have to rebuild a domain from scratch, it can be used to recreate user accounts and such, much more than nothing.

Start, Help. You'll be surprised what's there. A+/MCP/MCSE/MCDBA

 

[PCGCU]

Seaspray0: I have access to a more recent backup of the NTDS folder on the system drive, via another computer. Is there a way to import the AD info from there? (I'm assuming from another post in another forum here that this is where Win2000 keeps the database.) I'm just trying to keep from having to rekey nearly 100 users!

Blessings,

Eph 2:10

 

[Seaspray0]

If you have a good backup of the sytem state data and the system folder, then you should be able to install a fresh copy of the OS and then restore the system state data and system folder to bring you up to the time the backup was made.

Start, Help. You'll be surprised what's there. A+/MCP/MCSE/MCDBA

 

[PCGCU]

Nope, the AD backup was corrupt too. I have learned a lesson here and that is to store the AD backups physically away from the computer. I do have an Excel file of the users and passwords so I guess it is a long weekend for me!

Eph 2:10

 

[Seaspray0]

An even longer week following. If you recreate your domain, you will have to join all the PC's back to it and you'll have to recreate all the permissions on shares. I would warn your users to back up any personal data to a folder they create on the local C drive of their PC's.

Start, Help. You'll be surprised what's there. A+/MCP/MCSE/MCDBA