DCPROMO a Server Core as a DC in an existing domain
June 05 , 2008
I cranked up my machine and ended up doing this blog post with a sceencast.
Let's get into the subject proper. We have been looking at Server Core operations in the past videos. Now it would be good to have Server Core running as a Domain Controller. It is designed for handling that role. If you have also been reading about Windows Server 2008, there is a new type of Domain Controller, known as Read-Only Domain controller aka RODC. Now this is the perfect combination. Server Core + Active Directory (Read Only). Perfect combination for having a domain controller do its work, but yet provide security to Active Directory such that physical security of that Read Only Domain Controller in the Branch Office is not possible.
It can be quite a challenge to install a DC into Server Core if you do not get any guidance or help. So here, i want to help you know how to install it. In the video, I used an answer file. To make it easy, you can copy and past the following;
[DCInstall]
InstallDNS=Yes
ConfirmGC=Yes
RebootOnCompletion=Yes
ReplicaDomainDNSName=insiders.com
ReplicaOrNewDomain=replica or readonlyreplica
ReplicationSourceDC=dc1.insiders.com
SafeModeAdminPassword=P@ssw0rd
UserDomain=insiders.com
UserName=administrator
Password=P@ssw0rd
CreateDNSDelegation=No
Save it as a unattend.txt file and then fire off the command "dcpromo /unattend:unattend.txt" in Server Core Watch the Video for more explanation. Yawn, time to sleep.. ;-)
Video: DCPromo a Server Core as DC in existing Domain
/Dennis
