DNS event error 4004 on boot, root zone.

Our W2K server has been up for over a year and was upgraded from NT4 PDC to become a W2K domain. We always get event ID 4004 when booting but were told it’s normal as it’s the only W2K domain controler and dns server. It recently became more of anissue as we would like to setup forwarders and per MS article removed the root zone. Upon doing this we can no longer connect to AD. There is both a forward and reverse zone for the domain that seem to be populated properly. We have not rebooted yet and that may be the key but wanted more info before making changes. Any thoughts or questions? Thanks in advance.