I have an SBS 2003 domain controller that no longer accepts the Administrator password. As an attempt to try a quick fix to see if this was just a result of some corrupt files, I did a repair install (without backing up my activation files individually first–dumb, I know). This did get the domain users back on-line with all services that are important to them. I was able to change the local machine admin account to get into Directory Services Restore Mode (DSRM), but it tells me that I need to activate Windows, which I can’t do in Safe Mode, only Normal Mode. But since I don’t have the domain admin account, I can’t boot into Normal Mode. Is here a way to active SBS 2003 through DSRM, since I can use the machine admin account to log on there. I do have backups that are on a NAS using Backup Exec.
If I can get past this activation piece, then I think I can use SRVANY and INSTSRV to help change the domain admin account. I just can’t get into DSRM.
I’d rather not have to do a clean install and rebuild the server.
Any help on getting around this would be greatly appreciated.
