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Questions on NT Domain Upgrade

By sostermann ·
First off, many thanks to all of the respondants on my previous post. All of the answers have been very helpful.

Using those answers I have a couple of more questions. Your input is greatly appreciated!

Our company has one domain and about 20 users. The network consists of one DC running NT 4, one file server running NT 4 and one web/ftp/domino server running W2K Server.

We are going to upgrade the DC first to server 2003 on a new box.

First, how do I migrate the user accounts? Or would it be simpler to just recreate them since there are so few of them?

Second, according to best practices -- are there any other roles that the DC can server? Since it shouldn't be a file, application or web server, I assume it shouldn't be an exchange server either. It just seems a waste to have a decent box in one domain with 20 users being only the DC.

Thank you for your help,

Shawn

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by BFilmFan In reply to Questions on NT Domain Up ...

Unless you are using Small Business Server; the following roles are the only ones I recommend on the DC using Windows 2003 Standard or Enterprise:

DNS server
DHCP server
WINS server
FSMO roles (as needed)
Global Catalog (as needed)

You are correct that the DC shouldn't be hosting applications, such as Exchange or file and print, as this will expose you to greater security risk.

As noted in the best practice guidance and with the new "roles" established with SP2 for Windows 2003, Microsoft has really adoped that infrastructure servers shouldn't be application servers:

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/windowsserver2003/library/ServerHelp/6bdadfc1-4a8e-4b55-8844-7f784d7ff20b.mspx

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by BFilmFan In reply to

As an add-on thought, the Certificate Authority role is okay for a DC also, if you have not established one in the forest.

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by sostermann In reply to

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by CG IT In reply to Questions on NT Domain Up ...

well if you only have 20 users, get MS Small Business Server. It's designed to be an all on one box solution for small business. Has Exchange, Sharepoint and the premium edition has SQL and ISA servers. Note: for SQL it's best to have a seperate HD for it so you could have server with SATA drives for SQL and have some ATA drives in a mirrored RAID for Small Business Server.

You could just re-create the user accounts but then that depends on users and their preferences. Some would hate to lose their favorites, URL links, blah blah.

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by CG IT In reply to

might consider closing out the other question and awarding all posters points. you can accept everyone's answers.

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by sostermann In reply to

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by sostermann In reply to Questions on NT Domain Up ...

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