Orphaned Domain Controller Help!!!! 1

[CEChriss]

This is the situation I have. it is a little long please read it all. thanks

We had a Domain controller (Windows 2000) go down. My associate took it to the shop and after many hours and about 11:00 pm called and stated that a critical piece of hardware had failed. He stated the only option was to replace hardware, reinstall windows from scratch, and then restore the data from tape.

I heard no different the next morning, so I went through the steps of seizing the FSMO roles and removing the domain controller from the AD (successfully).

A little later that morning he calls and states that he has been able to bring the Domain controller up. Later that afternoon we place it back on the network and it works. I am not sure how and I feel this situation will cause problems down the road.

At this point I thought no problem I would just demote it from a domain controller then promote to a domain controller.

This did not work:
1. try to demote as one of several domain controllers in AD, no success. I am sure because the domain truly did not see it as belonging to domain, (even though it is functioning as though it is.
2. try to domote as last domain controller in the AD, no success. I believe this is becaus it is not the owner of the FSMO roles.


Now the QUESTION?? Is there a way to work around this problem to either directly reinstate back into the AD or demote it as a domain controller so that I can reinstate it into the AD and then promote it back to a domain controller or even a 3rd option that I have not even concieved

Thank you ahead of time for all your help!!

 

[mlichstein]

Since you seized the roles to the other server, the dead server still thinks it holds the roles when it came back up.

The best thing to do is to forcefully demote the revived DC. Run 'dcpromo /forceremoval'

You will then need to do a metadata cleanup on the good server to remove all aspects of the failed server.

http://support.microsoft.com/?id=216498

After all that is done, you should be able to repromote the server.

 

[CEChriss]

What are the down sides or possible problems with this procedures. Couls I lose anything or worse everything On the server.

 

[mlichstein]

You will be removing Active Directory from the server, but since you have another working DC, you wont lose any of that data.

You won't need to format the machine after forcefully demoting it, so you wont lose any other files on it.