Upgrade problems

You have to upgrade the pdc first to w2k, after that the new w2k servers can become dc's.
What is recommended to do if you have a current and update bdc, is to take the bdc from the network and upgrade the pdc to w2k.
In case something goes wrong with the upgrade process you can fall back on the bdc and promote it to become a pdc.

Leopold

Greetings,

Right now, I?m going through exactly what you are. I?m heeding the advice that Mark Minasi gave in his book, ?Mastering Windows 2000 Server?.

He wrote, ?If you are thinking about upgrading an NT 4 box that is acting as a domain controller, then I urge you to think once and twice before upgrading! You can cavalierly upgrade just about any other computer, but the domain controller needs some planning, or you?ll be very, very sorry.?

?You see, upgrading an NT 4 domain controller has an important side effect: it upgrades your NT 4 domain to a Windows 2000 Active Directory ? the Windows 2000 name for a domain. Windows 2000 doesn?t allow you to upgrade any of your backup domain controllers until you?ve upgraded the primary domain controller. So you might want to think twice before simply upgrading your existing DCs. Personally, I prefer a domain upgrade technique called, ?clean and pristine?.? (He then suggests reading the chapter on Active Directory.) ?Basically, however, I advocate building a brand new, empty Windows 2000 Active Directory domain, then moving the user accounts over to that domain, leaving your old NT 4 domain in place ?just in case? as you migrate?.

This is a great book, by the way. And, if at all possible, I?d build a brand new box with a clean and fresh install of Win 2000.

Good luck,

Maxwell

Just to be clear here:
You cannot add a Windows 2000 server as a domain controller of a NT4 domain.
Nope.
Doesn't work that way.
The whole Active Directory mixed mode (where you have NT clients AND 2000 clients together) only works when ALL of your domain controllers are 2000 machines.
If you keep you NT PDC and BDCs, you will NOT have a 2000 Domain Controller all in the same domain.

I don't believe you can put it in as a Domain Controller. Install it as a member server first. Once you have it functioning in the network then install Active Directory on it. You could also upgrade one of the NT servers with 2000 Server. Have the 2000 Server function in mixed-mode. Try this if you haven't done so far

Paul